There are four presentation styles that every speaker should and can easily master. Watch the video and read the descriptions below.

Director Style

This is the presentation body language that commands attention while maintaining dignity and rapport. It offers no immediate opportunity for resistance.You will use it to give clear mobilizing directions.

Instructions: Stand straight, square the shoulders, and maintain eye contact. During instruction, stay as still as possible. After the instruction, freeze for a couple of breaths while slowly scanning room. Use a strong voice. Use visual words and physiology.

Discovery Style

This is the presentation body language used when ‘on stage’ or teaching.You can use it to elicit curiosity, wonder, excitement and discovery. To explore what is possible to know or learn; to build closeness and partnership with the audience.

Intsructions: Stand light on feet, move laterally across stage, Use lots of gestures congruent with content, voices and expressions, and maintain an air of playfulness. Use “Let’s”, “Us”, “We” and phrases such as “Here’s an idea. What do you think or feel about it?” “This is true for me, how about for you?” Move in and out of the audience.

Leadership Style

This is the presentation body language style that inspires and calls people to action. You can use it to unify a group, and get them to move toward commitment and action.

Instructions: Stand straight, breathe fully, and maintain eye contact. Keep one foot in front of the other; slightly turn body to one side of the audience at a time. If in center of audience, slowly rotate and speak to different sections.

Authenticity

This is the presentation body language used for establishing openness and authenticity. You can use it to own up to a mistake or deliver bad news.

Instructions: Use a calm voice. Sit down, open your palms upwards be emotionally vulnerable.

Practice these styles in front of a mirror and incorporate them in your next presentation or contact us for presentation skills coaching

Ask the tough question

•  “Send me some more information!”

• “Let me think it over!”

These are the two statements that most prospective clients use on sales people. And unfortunately, most of them get away with it.

1)      Unfortunate for the sales person, because he or she will need to call again to chase the prospect/client for an answer whilst having no guarantee of the result.

2)      Unfortunate for the prospect/client, because they will be called again and will have to spend valuable time either reevaluating or fobbing off the sales person.

Since we all know this happens, why are people still doing it?

1)      Because clients are often too polite to say “No” upfront.

2)      Because sales people are afraid to be upfront for fear of getting a “No”.

So, how can you save yourself and your prospect loads of time?

1) Assess if the client is interested – Immediately!

Next time you hear,  “Send me some more information!”Or “Let me think it over!”

Immediately ask the tough question:

“I just want to check with you if my service/product is of interest to you? If not, it will save us both valuable time if you can tell me upfront.”

This way you are giving the client permission to say “NO” and avoid the “unfortunate” part. But you also show that you are serious, have belief in your product and have no interest in chasing the client if they don’t need it.

Most intelligent prospect/ clients will respect that . Who knows? You may even get referrals if you ask for them and might hear “I don’t need it, but I know a friend who might.”

So, with this awareness, are you ready to ask the tough question?

If you give enough presentations, there’s a good chance that someday you’re going to find yourself the target of an uncooperative or hostile audience member. As in most crisis situations, you will be in good stead to have a plan of how to respond. There are many verbal techniques available which will help you handle hostile or difficult audiences, some of which I am able to outline here. These are all tried and tested over the course of the last 10 years during my own personal training and presentation courses. Use them with confidence – they really work!

1. Questions that keep on coming

One of the most common difficulties you’re likely to encounter is a barrage of questions from a single or several audience members. Sometimes these people really want answers to their questions but at other times the interrupter has a hostile motive.

Usually, this sort of person does not want to attack you personally. On the contrary, the questioner is launching an attack on the material that you are presenting. This is a very important distinction, because the most effective way to attack the material that you are presenting is to draw you off topic into areas that you are not prepared to speak about. Don’t go there –stick to your guns and the messages that you have pre-prepared for yourself.

Short sharp concise answers

The least confrontational way of dealing with a constant stream of questions is to answer each question as briefly as possible. Limit your answers to one breath in length. And before stating your answer, ask yourself if this material will be covered later in your presentation. If it will be, tell the interrupter that the material will be covered later. Don’t expand on your answer, because lengthy replies containing additional details will only serve to give the questioner additional opportunity. After giving your succinct brief answer, go straight into the next topic.

While you may not want to take time to answer unexpected and off the topic questions, if the interrupter is an authority figure, you may feel obligated to do just that and answer the questions. Remember, keeping your answers brief minimises the negative effect of the interruptions and allows you to move on.

Set Limits

Setting limits is a great way to discourage constant interruptions. State the limits at the outset of your delivery and tell the audience why these limits will benefit them.

Acknowledge and Delay

Please don’t ignore a question. Doing so may be taken as a sign of hostility on your part. Even if questions are inappropriate or ill-timed, try to acknowledge them.
If short answers and setting limits haven’t deterred interruptions, acknowledge the question but delay the answer. By using bridging techniques which are words or phrases which allow you to acknowledge and move on, no-one will ever think you rude and dismissive.

2. Off-topic Questions and Discussions

A handful of off-topic questions from your audience shouldn’t pose a problem for you. However, if they are many, a problem may well exist. If the off-topic questions emanate from several people, this could be a sign that your presentation is unsuitable.

If the off-topic questions stem from one person, then your presentation may be unsuitable for that person or the person may be hostile to your material. The interrupter may be trying to make your material look bad because he or she will benefit from its failure.

Ask for Relevance

One technique for dealing with an off-topic question is to ask for its relevance to the current topic. This must be done tactfully, to avoid offending or embarrassing the questioner. The sooner you can relate the question to the current topic, the sooner you can tell the audience member that the answer can be found in another part of your presentation.

Write Down Questions

If there are a stream of off-topic questions that you can’t relate directly to your course material, you could offer the audience the opportunity of writing down their questions in the hope that you will answer as many as possible at the conclusion of your presentation.

3. Confrontational Questions

When dealing with a confrontational question, separate the attitude of the questioner from the content of the question.

Separate Content from Tone and Restate calmly.

Separating the tone of a question from its content defuses a question. If the tone is challenging and you respond to the tone, with a challenging or sarcastic response, you decrease your credibility. Never ever lose your cool. If you display emotion, the game is up.

If however the content poses a legitimate question, and you are able to rephrase and restate the question in a conciliatory way, all confrontation will be defused.
When faced with a confrontational question or statement, pause and look for the legitimate question within it. Restate it and answer it as honestly and completely as you can. You will have turned an obstacle to your advantage.

Address Hostility behind Closed Doors

If defusing hostile comments doesn’t work well, you may need to speak privately with the questioner. Keep the discussion focused strictly on the training process, not on their problem and offer to have a chat with the person at the conclusion of the event.

Remember that if someone or a group of people start being disruptive during your presentation, you won’t be the only one who’ll be annoyed or upset. You can use the audience to support you in dealing with difficult members within it. You are the speaker and therefore the person in control. Don’t let one audience member ruin it for everyone else.

Tips for Answering Difficult Questions:

1. Treat your audience with the respect you’d like to have shown to you. Answer their questions directly and honestly.

2. “I don’t know” is a very acceptable answer to some difficult questions. So relax. Never feel like you do have to know everything.

3. If you’re asked a question and you feel you should know the answer, please consider saying: “Thank you. That’s a very interesting question. I’ll have to get back to you on that, after I’ve spoken to (whomever).”

4. Set a time and a time limit for questions
In any presentation it’s always a good idea to set a time when the audience can ask questions. It’s also good to set a limit to that question time.

5. Never end your presentations with a Q and A session
While it’s great to keep the questions until after you’ve spoken, please make sure that you have the last word. Literally. When you’ve answered questions, be sure to end your presentation with a strong assertion of your main message(s).

Sandy Kaye offers Presentation Skills Training and Media Skills Training in Australia and Singapore with Self Leadership International.

“If words of command are not clear and distinct, if orders are not thoroughly understood, the general is to blame. But if his orders are clear, and the soldiers nevertheless disobey, then it is the fault of their officers.” – Sun Tzu

On May 26-27, 2009  Self Leadership International will be conducting a 2-day “Leadership for Managers” Program in Singapore.

If you are interested in developing your leadership skills and mindset to cope and prosper during with this current economic climate then you should consider this program as an essential investment. Normally we run this program for large multi-national companies but the public run gives the opportunity for SME’s to send their managers for a world class training. This program is also ideal for those MNC’s that want a cost effective program for selected managers.

For full details of the program you can click here or contact Radu at our office on +65 6887 4335.

Benefits include:

• Develop the skills and attitude which will enable you to lead and motivate your people
• Meet and exceed your objectives
• Be able to delegate effectively
• Effectively stimulate high performers
• Anticipate and manage conflict
• Sustain productive working relationships
• Communicate a clear vision
• Develop and sustain a culture of excellence in your team
• Build a committed and highly productive team

Can you afford to miss it?

Have you ever wondered why some people get what they want and others don’t?

Can I make a suggestion?

Remember a time when you really wanted something; something you couldn’t have right away but something you would have to wait for, you pictured it in your head, you imagined what it would feel like to possess it and you could feel the pull.

Now I don’t know what you imagined but if you did remember something, as I suggested you will have got in touch with a feeling; notice that feeling.

Creating imagination and feeling is the the secret power of influence.

It works like this; your brain was triggered to locate a memory or an imagination and finds the associated feeling that it has stored with this. Your brain is a huge neural network of associations and these associations are linked to your feelings and your feelings motivate you to act.

Knowing how the mind works is the secret to influence and creating the right associations in the minds of others will help you to get whatever it is you want. Do you want to sell more?  Motivate your employees? Get your children to come home on time? Find a special partner?

I have been interested in influence for many years and studied NLP, Neuro-Semantics, Cognitive Behaviourism and Hypnosis to understand how to communicate more effectively and to achieve my goals. When I first met my wife, I knew I had only one chance to make a first impression. It was a crowded environment and I needed to create a positive association and give her a reason to see me again. Using all my best influence skills I succeeded, and we now have two gorgeous children, Tasha and Nathan. Now my need for influence skills has increased! – if you have kids you will agree.

Having learned the secrets of influence it is now my pleasure to share these concepts with you. I have worked with companies to help their sales teams connect with customers, with their managers to influence performance and with coaches to facilitate change; I have even helped people to get a pay rise.

When teaching the power of influence I find most people grossly underestimate their ability to influence an outcome and are wasting opportunities. Moreover many people are creating negative associations that are creating the exact opposite of what they want.

Here is an example of negative associations. A good friend of ours is a committed doctor who wants to influence teenagers to make informed choices about sex and asked me to speak to the teenagers and coach their parents at a public forum. Consider how a parent’s good intentions could backfire if they don’t understand influence; telling a child that, “You can’t have sex until you are an adult,” can get linked in the mind as, “Having sex makes me an adult.”

Minds are amazing things – they create all sorts of associations, or cause-effect mental maps and not all of them are accurate. For example a phobic might associate snakes with danger to the point where they don’t want to leave the house. They have created a horror movie in their mind and this is creating feelings that paralyse. Just talking to this person won’t work – you have to demonstrate that their mental map is not accurate. This can be done by vicarious experience – having them watch someone else hold the snake.

Vicarious experience can create new mental maps as we role model the person engaged in a particular behaviour. This morning I was role modeling my tennis coach as he showed me a serve, then I tried to experience the same thing myself. So after watching others hold a non-poisonous snake, phobics are able to visualise themselvea holding the snake and finally able to take action and hold it themselves.

So in summary; to positively influence someone:

1. Create an image in their minds of them doing the required behaviour. This can be done by telling a story about someone, like them, that has engaged in that behaviour.
2. If possible show them someone else who is doing the behaviour you want to influence them to do.
3. Invite them to do the required behaviour and praise them for even the slightest positive action

Why else do you think that car salesman wants you to test drive the car and tells you how good you look when you do?

If you want to know more about coaching for influence, feel free to contact us.

Communication

Good communication skills are essential to lead yourself and influence others. Poor communication causes pain, conflict, loss of productivity and profit.

Listen to a  podcast on Communication Skills.

To win the communication game you must know and apply the rules of the game; and the #1 rule of communication is that -  All communication occurs inside a frame.

A communication frame gives the listener reference points to know how to handle the information they hear from you. A communication frame points the listener’s mind in a particular direction and when used correctly will create trust and remove misunderstandings.

Any time we say “In terms of …” we set the boundaries of the discussion and hence the frame. Often two or more people in conflict are actually discussing different topics or perspectives, using “in terms of…” allows us to focus on the specific topic or to challenge people who have gone off topic.

For example:

• “In terms of reaching a decision in the next hour, let me make this point…”
• “In terms of us working together in this team, how would you like me to interpret your behaviour?”
• “In terms of our stated budget, do you think this is a wise purchase?”

Here are some other simple examples of communication frames and how to use them:

The Workshop Frame:
“Just work shopping – what if we did…x”. This frame is great for putting ideas out; it reduces reactions because it sets the frame that it is ok for the other person to give input.

The Sharing Frame:
“I’m just sharing, this is the way I feel about… x”. This frame allows you to share your feelings without the other person needing to take your emotional state personally.

The ‘What if’ Frame:
“I know we have never done this before, but what if we did?” This is a great frame for setting for pushing the boundaries and creative thinking.

There are, of course, frames that you already use and many more you could learn to use. The frames we use in language often reflect our frames of mind, do you have a ‘can do’ frame’? Or do you operate from a ‘can’t do’ frame?

Training yourself to become aware of your frames of mind and frames of speech is a fundamental of self-leadership and using the technology of Neuro Semantics (an evolution of NLP) we can set frames for great relationships, health and even wealth.

Want to know more? For Communication Skills Workshops in Singapore, Australia, Malaysia, India or the Middle East  contact us.

These are perennial questions in the field of leadership development and the answers vary depending on who you talk to.

The concept of a leadership pipeline is that as we start supervising/managing we will be more transactional (performance management) and as we move up through the organisation we will become more transformational (visionary/inspiring).

In reality the modern manager must be adept at both transactional and transformational leadership and the the earlier s/he can do both the more successful they will be.

Transactional Leadership is classic management – organising people and resources towards agreed corporate goals. The four elements of transactional leadership are:

1. Goal Setting – creating specific, measurable, acheivable targets that focus effort in line with the corporate vision.
2. Monitoring Performance – making sure goals are achieved. Providing regular performance reviews either in a structured or fluid fashion.
3. Providing Feedback – letting people know how they are doing relevant to the target/benchmark. Good  feedback must be understood, believed and accepted.
4. Developing Careers – By demonstrating genuine interest in others needs, interests and desires. Being able to connect individual aspirations with the needs of the organisation.

Transformational Leadership style  is where the manager engages with others in such a way that the leader and followers raise one another to higher levels of motivation and purpose. The three elements of transformational leadership are:

1. Creating a Vision – motivating, inspiring and influencing others to see a new possibilities for themselves and the company. A clear vision creates passion, commitment and focus.
2. Stimulating the Environment – creating a positive and challenging work environment that causes people to think, re-examine their ideas and find creative alternatives. Such an environment breeds imagination and innovation.
3. Treating People as Individuals -making people feel valued and encouraging them to contribute. Recognising that people have unique talents, strengths and weakness and allowing for these differences without judgment.

Burns (1978) first introduced the concepts of transformational and transactional leadership in his treatment of political leadership – and I wonder what you think of the graphic I chose and the difference in style between former President George W. Bush and President Barack Obama?

At Self Leadership International we use the transactional/transformational leadership concept with it’s seven competencies as part of executive coaching and leadership development programmes. We are based in Singapore but work in Australia, Malaysia, India and the Middle East.

We have a public workshop - Critical Skills for Senior Managers in Singapore, October 2011.

Confidence is a key success factor for modern managers and leaders and yet many lack confidence in the following areas:

1. Managing downwards when subordinates have higher qualifications or are qualified in a different discipline
2. Influencing peers or external stakeholder when there is no direct authority
3. Managing upwards even in a matrix organisation

I had two meetings in Singapore this week where Senior Leaders highlighted a need for increased confidence in the above areas, but I don’t think this issue is just related to Singapore.

With all three scenarios the key to confidence is personal power. Personal Power is like self leadership, it comes from knowing who you are and what’s important and exercising the right to choose.

When managing downwards, managers need to remember Henry Ford who said, “The generalist will always employ the specialist.” The manager doesn’t need to know everything about everyone’s discipline they need to know how to engage smart people to get the job done. Highly specialised people often miss the big picture and don’t connect outside of their discipline. The good leader knows a bit about a lot of different things and can therefore use the best skills or combination of skills within the team to get the job done.

Confidence to influence laterally comes from believing that your idea is a good one and knowing how to communicate the benefits of this idea or action to the other parties. In an age of social networking we should feel confident to socialise our ideas, after all, it is not the best ideas that get adopted but the best supported ideas.

To confidently and successfully manage upwards requires the manager or emerging leader to perceive their superior as a colleague rather than a boss. I don’t mean do away with respect or be over-familiar, but to realise that they are both subservient to the vision of the business/company. Just like influencing laterally, ideas that are framed as beneficial to the business will be well received.

When we succeed a something it builds confidence but we must have the confidence to attempt before we can succeed. If you require confidence to attempt something for the first time, remember Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance – so prepare and then as Nike says, “Just Do It!”

This doesn’t guarantee success everytime but with confidence we know we can receive feedback, learn from our mistakes and do better next time.

BTW this Blog has just made it to the top 100 leadership Blogs

An important realisation when working in a team is that the way you perceive and respond to the world (your personality) is NOT the “Right Way” or “The Only Way” to do things. This realisation reduces our frustration and opens us to the possibility of collaboration rather than compromise.

The team work cycle highlights the need for different personalities. Some people are better at generating ideas, some at evaluating ideas, some at making decisions and others at execution (implementation). If everyone on the team were the same, then some parts of the team work cycle would be left out.

Most team issues are due to a lack of effective communication resulting in people becoming aggressive creating conflict or becoming passive and de-motivated. The key self-leadership skill for team members is therefore ‘assertive communication.’

Communication occurs when those involve have shared meaning and understanding. Since we don’t know what something means to someone unless we ask, communication involves asking questions and getting clarification. It also means speaking up (assertive) so that others know your meanings and understandings about what and how things should be done.

Assertive team communication has been made more complex in the virtual world where we don’t have non-verbal cues and we have to factor in cultural differences in speech styles and meanings.

In my experience, what remains a constant for high performing teams is that the following things are communicated and understood by all.

1. Vision - How this work/project is important to the company and the team members.
2. Group Identity – That we are all on the same team and all benefit from the success of the work.
3. Role Clarity – That we each have a role to play and that role is clearly defined.
4. Trust - We are all different but we can trust each other to do the work to the best of our abilities.
5. Recognition - Each of us will do our best for the team and appreciate others for doing the same.
6. Communication - We will both listen to others and speak up as appropriate so that everyone shares an understanding of what is possible at each stage of the work cycle.
7. Celebration - We will celebrate together with each milestone we reach.

How does your team measure up? What can you do to make sure these things are communicated?

Have a good day at work.