Your Presentation Best

Influencing Your Stakeholders (And Their Stakeholders) Influencing and getting buy-in from your stakeholders is all about preparation and homework.  This includes being able to concisely and concretely share the value-added with your counterparts. Moreover, how will this value added make the lives of your stakeholders and/or their stakeholders better than the status quo?  What’s the roadmap to success look like? Having good answers to these questions, as well as personal stories as real-life illustrations are essential. But so is exploring the emotional needs of the stakeholders you want to influence. The following five questions can help you prepare for this: Five Key Questions for Your Stakeholders 1. What financial or emotional interest do they have in the outcome of your work? Is it positive or negative? 2. What motivates them in general and most of all? 3. What information do they want from you and what’s the best way to communicate your message to them? 4. If they are no...

A Question of Why In negotiation, What your counterpart wants is important. Far more important is Why they want it and which Results they are looking for, short, middle and longer term. The What is the demand of your counterpart. The Why is the reason behind the What. The Result is the goal(s) of the Why. Harvard Negotiation Project founders Roger Fisher and Bill Ury have found over the last 40 years, that the What exists because it is one way your counterpart thinks he can reach his Why. There are almost always several possible ways to satisfy the Why. Generating and exploring other options, or combinations of options can be a powerful way to work together with your counterpart and help them get what they really want. If you can understand and make progress towards satisfying your counterpart's Why and help them reach their Result(s), the What becomes unimportant. And that means the likelihood of reaching a more satisfying negotiation result greatly increases...for everybody. Want...

The Power Of Storytelling   Legend has it that Ernest Hemingway was challenged to write a story using only six words. His response? „For Sale: Baby Shoes, Never Worn.“ What do you imagine when you read these six words? What do you feel? Why? It’s easy to conjure any number of touching, tragic scenarios of what happened, what tears were shed, what could have been... It’s probably also easy to connect this story in some way to our own lives directly or to the lives of those we know or have known. It’s not as easy to connect this story to our business case, but what if we could? What if our product or service might have changed the ending or allowed us to make sure this story didn’t happen again...or as often? Would you grab your audience emotionally if you lead with this story and shared a personal experience tied to it? Would it enhance their understanding and feelings about our product or service? Would it stand out in the mind more? The Takeaway: Storytelling has the power to make...

Make My Life Better:  Aaah an Ice-Cold Beer "How are you gonna make my life better? This is the basic question your audience is asking when they come to your presentation. Another way to put it is "Why the hell should I listen to you?" They are investing their time and their energy to listen to you, so they really do want to know why it's worth it for them. Your number one job as a presenter is to give them an answer.   Even if it's just a small thing. And front-load it.  Give them a taste of it at the very beginning of your presentation, so they know right away why they should listen to the details. If you don't, they won't. Be You Presentation Best. Got a Presentation Question?  Ask Me.   dan@boswell-training.com

Have you ever been in a meeting that didn't have a point? Worse, it goes on and on because each presenter has way too many slides for his agenda point? You look down at you watch and the meeting which was scheduled for 45 minutes is now running 45 minutes too long. And you, your boss and that guy from legal still haven't made their presentations... If this sounds at all familiar, consider taking a page from a V.P. who had taken over the next-generation development project of a luxury car company's flagship model. When he had his first cross-functional project team weekly meeting, each member of his senior mangement team came armed to the teeth with long slide decks defending what they were doing in micro-detail.  Sure, some of this PowerPoint -Palooza was because German automotive engineers are ultra-perfectionist. But the other big influence was what we see every day at big companies: a PowerPoint culture that truly believes that more is bette...

KISSS Me, Baby! Just a reminder: Keep It Short, Sweet, and Sexy. Short: get to the point. Time Is Money. Sweet: use positive language. Sweet sells better than sour. Sexy: grab your audience's attention and stand out from the crowd. Make sure you know what turns your audience on. What's sexy (important) for them? KISSS your message, your slides, and your take-aways. Each of these should add clear and concrete value to your audience. Their time is very valuable.  The KISSS formula helps them to get the most from the time they spend with you. "Dan is an absolute passionate coach. He inspires through his personality and with new presentation methods which can be implemented directly. We were able to improve ourselves immediately. Absolutely recommendable!" Stephanie Huerttle, BlackSheep Director of Talent Management EAME/Southwest Asia  Hyatt Hotels Corporation Got A Presentation Question?  Ask Me.  dan@boswell-training.com Be Your Presentation Best.  Home of th...

Negotiation Pearl of Wisdom #2 "I wish I'd had a Plan B..." Do You Have a BATNA? If you don't, you're not ready to negotiate. Many negotiators know what they want, but what happens if they can't get it? They invest time, energy and money to achieve their goal, and sometines it works. Often it doesn't and their not prepared if Plan A fails. This usually leads to accepting an unwanted result or ending up with nothing. Protect yourself and your team by always preparing a BATNA. Basically, it's your Plan B that you can easily shift to if Plan A doesn't work out. Your Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement gives you power, flexibility and security. The only requirements are that your BATNA is better than the status quo, and that you are willing to actually use it if necessary. The better your BATNA, the more power, flexibility and security you have. Want to bring your team to the next level of Negotiation? Sign them up for our Negotiation E...