Real People, Real Trust: What Trust-based Strategy Consulting Looks, Feels, and Sounds Like

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Janet Andrews is a senior-level consultant at SRA’s Touchstone Consulting Group, a strategy and management-consulting firm. Janet spends her days running from one U.S. federal government building to the next, working with executives on issues of national interest. Discover Janet’s six tips for building trust-based relationships while getting the job done.

A Matter of Focus

“Janet’s reputation can be described as polished, thoughtful, and methodical,” says Jen Vanmeter, a colleague of Janet’s who teaches Trusted Advisor programs in-house and who co-wrote this blog. “She’s known for her smarts, her work ethic, and her integrity—she does exactly what she says she’ll do, when she says she’ll do it.” Jen continues, “She’s incredibly busy, and yet she takes time to pay attention. Even in a quick hallway chat, she’s focused on you, not the meeting she’s dashing off to.”

Jen and Janet spoke at length about how to build trust-based relationships in the midst of demanding and high-stakes projects. Here are Janet’s six maxims for client relationships that really work.

1.     Know Yourself; Know Others Even Better

When Janet thinks about building trust in business relationships, she makes it a point to step back and think what is most important for the person she’s talking to.

“If you have a client who leads with social connection, then that’s where you need to put your foot out first. If someone is results-oriented, they might not want to chat—they want to know what we did for them today. This colors how I position things; it helps me think, ‘How do I start off that conversation?’ That awareness of my own style and preferences helps me see that what I want to lead with maybe isn’t what will work best for them.”

2.     Remember It’s Their Truth, Not Yours

“Sometimes your version of what is right isn’t right for your client,” Janet says. “When I want my clients to do the right thing according to me, rather than the right thing according to their reality, I can easily become frustrated and therefore less effective.

“When I view their world with a lens of objectivity and put aside judgment of ‘that choice is good or bad,’ then I can walk into conversations with a more open mind. And I’ve noticed that clients respond in kind. When I remember they’re the ones that are living it, not me, then I focus on doing my best to advise them. Yes, I’m trying to sway them, but I keep in mind the decisions and choices that come out of it are theirs to own.

“Am I disappointed sometimes? Of course. But I keep reminding myself that whatever conclusion they come to, it is their truth. It’s my job to give them my best thinking. Pushing them on something they don’t want—or don’t want yet—is going to break trust, not build it, no matter how ‘right’ I think I am.”

3.     Focus on the Dialogue, not the Difficult

While Janet acknowledges that there are always difficult conversations to be had in any business relationship, she says they don’t have to be personally difficult.

“Earlier in my career, I might have taken more of a defensive posture with clients whose style can be aggressive or combative. Now, I see a tense conversation as less of a conflict, and more of a dialogue. And when I feel less tense, my clients seem to also.”

4.     Bravely Go First

“If there’s an elephant in the room that no one wants to bring up, I take a deep breath and bravely go first—once I’ve put aside my own judgments. If you can somehow frame the elephant by thinking about the other person’s motives, viewpoint, and how they like to lead, it can bring down their barriers to listening, so a dialogue—not a stand-off—can ensue.”

5.     Slow Down and Listen

Janet emphasizes the importance of listening, which can be challenging in the fast-paced world of strategy consulting. “Learning to be less focused on dictating how the play is going to end, and more focused on listening along the way, has been a real shift for me in my career.

“I remember once we were working on a key deliverable for a client. We’d been back and forth a couple of times on drafts. The client was mad at our team for not taking her comments seriously enough, and the team was frustrated because they thought she was being difficult. All it took was a real conversation and some patience to break the logjam.  Slowing down to really listen made me realize that we were all arguing the same point. When I acknowledged that, she agreed and we were able to move on.”

6.     Don’t Sweat It When You Don’t Click

 “Not all my clients consider me their trusted advisor. That used to worry me—of course I want everyone to like me. Now I recognize that sometimes it’s not going to click. So part of being a trusted advisor is being self-aware enough to recognize when it’s time to pass that relationship off to someone else who might be better suited for the relationship.”

Janet’s self-knowledge, her commitment to continuous improvement, and her willingness to focus on relationships as well as results clearly make a difference—for her colleagues as well as her clients.

Connect with Janet on LinkedIn.

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The Real People, Real Trust series offers an insider view into the challenges, successes, and make-it-or-break-it moments of people from all corners of the world who are leading with trust. Check out our prior posts: read about Chip Grizzard, a CEO You Should Know; Ralph Catillo: How One Account Executive Stands Apart;  Anna Dutton: A Fresh Perspective on Sales Operations; and Heber Sambucetti: A Learning Consultant’s Approach to Leadership.

StoryTime: When to Walk Away

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Our Story Time series brings you real, personal examples from business life that shed light on specific ways to lead with trust. Our last story told of an unexpected way to recover lost trust. Today’s anecdote zeroes in on the importance of personal integrity.

A New Anthology

When it comes to trust-building, stories are a powerful tool for both learning and change. Our upcoming book, The Trusted Advisor Fieldbook: A Comprehensive Toolkit for Leading with Trust (Wiley, October 31 2011), contains a multitude of stories. Told by and about people we know, these stories illustrate the fundamental attitudes, truths, and principles of trustworthiness.

Today’s story is excerpted from our chapter on dealing with untrustworthy people. It vividly demonstrates the value of being willing to walk away from a deal any time, and the paradoxical outcome that often follows.

From the Front Lines: Walking Away from the Table

Anthony Iannarino, President and CEO of SOLUTIONS Staffing in Columbus, Ohio, tells about facing an accusation from a client.

“After going through two long Request for Proposal processes, I was finally presenting to the 14-person buying team for a dream client. One panel member I knew to be hostile asked a critical question. I knew he wouldn’t like my answer, but I was truthful. He voted No—but I still won the job.

“At the contract signing, the ‘No Vote’ person read the contract and said: ‘I see here you have failed to meet the commitment you made to us in your presentation.’

“I replied: ‘I am sorry for any confusion, but I was very clear that I couldn’t provide that service. I told you that doing so would destroy our ability to provide you with the whole package we proposed, including the price.’

“The No Vote said: ‘You lied. You would have said anything in there just to get our business.’

“I got up and said: ‘Then I am afraid I can’t sign this contract. If you believe I lied to get your business, then I cannot take your business. I have never lied to get any business.’ And I got up to walk out.

“At this point the main buyer intervened. He contradicted the ‘No Vote’ and upheld my account of the presentation. The contract was signed.”

 It was Anthony’s willingness to put integrity ahead of the sale that, paradoxically, made the sale.

—S. Anthony Iannarino (President and Chief Sales Officer, SOLUTIONS Staffing)

Are you, like Anthony, willing to walk the talk—even if it means walking out the door?

+++++++++++++

Connect with Anthony on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, or his blog.

Read more stories about trust:

Straight from the Headlines: Trust in People, Companies, Nations

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Three trust-related headlines last week:
  1. An insider trading conviction for hedge-fund billionaire Raj Rajaratnam,
  2. A free-fall in Morgan Stanley’s stock price, and
  3. A drop in the Chinese government’s credibility.

A Person

Mr. Raj Rajaratnam, former head of the Galleon Group hedge fund, and once worth a billion and a half dollars, was sentenced to 11 years in prison.  His crimes were the stuff of movies—secret deals and secret messages—insider trading.

Some finance theorists think “insider trading” should be legalized, though most people would sooner see heroin legalized if they had to choose.  Rajaratnam’s white-collar hand-in-the-cookie-jar crimes are, it is generally agreed, egregious and immoral. He’s going where he belongs.

Raj is a poster child for low trust. Lying, cheating, conniving, sneaking—he was everything you wouldn’t want in a trusted partner.

But he is a sideshow. Rajaratnam, Bernie Madoff, Ivan Boesky—these are the movie versions of white-collar crime. Raj and Bernie no more caused our current financial malaise than Bonnie and Clyde caused the Great Depression. And we cannot solve our global trust problems by simply picking off colorful foot soldiers from the Dark Side, no matter how untrustworthy they are.

A Company

Jesse Eisinger in the NYTimes notes that by nearly every financial measure of strength and trustworthiness—more capital, longer-term financing, lower leverage—Morgan Stanley is a stronger bank than it was in September 2008, at the height of the crisis. So, why has their stock price dropped 42% this year?

Trust, that’s why.

Morgan Stanley, and other banks, still holds massive amounts (defined as over $50 trillion) in unregulated derivatives. And of course they don’t want regulation. But they are not stupid—the banks themselves are not about to trust each other when they know the other guy is holding part of that unregulated $50 trillion. As Eisinger puts it:

“Surely no bank would be so reckless as to accept dodgy collateral these days. It would hold out for something unassailable, like, say, Triple A mortgages on American homes. Wait, scratch that. It would accept sovereign debt, perhaps from some European realm that has been around for centuries. Whoops, no, no. Well, O.K., maybe United States Treasuries—and we’ll agree to ignore that one of the country’s two major political parties was willing to plunge the United States into default to achieve its aims.”

The banks don’t trust each other. They do agree that they don’t want governments checking their numbers; they also agree that letting Lehman go was a big mistake—that governments should be willing to bail them out.

But the people are not too happy about their governments bailing out the rich guys, whether they’re at OWS, in Greece, or even in Germany.  The governments are looking like neither paragons of virtue nor representatives of their citizenry.

A Country

Never mind the GOP playing chicken with the US’s credit ratings; never mind Germans and Greeks playing chicken with Europe. As Reuters notes:

Equities jumped 10 percent on the day three years ago when China said it would buy up bank shares in the market. They barely budged after a similar announcement on Monday. The difference is credibility. A sustained financial crisis has shown that governments around the world have a limited ability to make things better.

Nations around the world have kicked the can down the road regarding public expenditures. They’ve done the same thing regarding energy and the environment.

The human race has been conspicuously failing recently at two key trust skills—collaboration and constructive confrontation.

Trust Recovery: Where Do We Start?

Yes, it’s complicated. There are feedback loops everywhere. Beware of simple answers. 9-9-9 may work in a computer simulation game, but does not a tax plan make.  8-8-8 is not the answer to health care, and 7-7-7 is a better lotto number than a plan for campaign finance.

But complexity works both ways. It means the whole system is loaded with causality.  No single change at the person, policy or institution level may be necessary, or sufficient. But actions at every level do have impacts. We can push back at the personal level, at the company level, and at the national level.

It is a good thing that Raj Rajaratnam got the longest-ever prison sentence for insider trading; it sets a moral tone that is in stark contrast to an amoral ideology that we have allowed to infect our entire commercial sector.

It is a good thing that people are protesting the serious transfer of wealth and power that has taken place in recent years, because increasing inequality ruins social trust.

Yes, it’s complex to recover trust, but it can start simply. Here are three steps.

1.    Promote personal character. Don’t fudge your taxes. Don’t lie, don’t ask others to do so, and just say no to those who ask you to do so. Teach your children. Thank people who do good and shame those who don’t. Stick your neck out a little. On alternate Thursdays, pay the toll for the car behind you.  Pick out a small sum of money and give it to a charity that needs it more than you do.

2.    Promote better thinking. We have seen the result of four decades of economists who think that markets are self-clearing and that financial institutions will self-regulate out of concern for their reputation; business theorists who preach competition instead of collaboration; CEOs who think the purpose of a company is to raise shareholder wealth; and politicians who think either that government is a feeding trough or that interstate highways are communist plots.

The result is not good, and much of the trouble arises from bad beliefs. We will not solve our problems through belief in econometrics, patent litigation, or demonization of foreigners. Tell the b-school professors, the law schools, the think tanks and the industry associations to apply their talents to understanding and building systems around collaboration instead.

We are, in fact, all in this together. We need to start believing it so we can act on this belief.

3.    Promote better politicians. Don’t support simplistic ideologies.  Stop contributing to single-issue pressure groups. Scream for campaign finance reform; on everything else, stop screaming.

Read up. On alternate Tuesdays, watch Fox or CNBC, whichever one you makes you uncomfortable. On alternate Fridays, read a foreign newspaper online. Don’t give money to, talk about, or vote for candidates who out-negative their opponents.  Support those with a message and a plan of their own.

Tell the media, the politicians and anyone who wants your support that you’re done with vague platitudes and simple slogans. Tell them you want the truth.

Ask them, “Why should I trust you?” And don’t settle for an answer you can’t believe in.

The Dos and Don’ts of Trust-Based Networking

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We’re pleased to announce the release of our latest eBook: The Dos and Don’ts of Trust-Based Networking.

It’s the fifth in the new Trusted Advisor Fieldbook series by Charles H. Green and Andrea P. Howe.

Each eBook provides a snapshot of content from The Trusted Advisor Fieldbook, which is jam-packed with practical, hands-on strategies to dramatically improve your results in sales, relationship management, and organizational performance.

The Dos and Don’ts of Trust-Based Networking reveals:

  • How trust-based networking is different from every-day business networking
  • Ten best practices for trust-based networking
  • Specific dos and don’ts for online networking

P.S. Did you miss out on Volumes 1 through 4 of The Fieldbook eBook series? Get them while they’re still available:

  1. 15 Ways to Build Trust…Fast!
  2. How to Sell to the C-Suite
  3. Six Risks You Should Take to Build Trust
  4. How YOU Can Raise Trust in Your Organization

Take a look and let us know what you think.

The October Trust Matters Review

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Trust EquationSocial Tools suggests ways to make reciprocity, the grease of relationships, easier.

S. Anthony Iannarino suggests that instead of concentrating on the C-Suite, you look after the real stakeholders.

Ira Flatow interviews Professor Baron-Cohen on the origins of evil and the neuroscience of lack of empathy.

 Jason Chen discusses the effect of embarrassment on trust.

Chris Brogan on how to not burn trust with the introduction before the introduction.

Paul R. Lawrence and Robert Porter Lynch write an excellent overview of why trust is low, what the costs of low trust are, the benefits of high trust, and how leaders can create trust.

Trust GM?  Seems that if you cancel your Onstar service they keep tracking you and sell that data.

Roger Dooley discusses the benefits of handshake deals.

Americans don’t trust the government, but the do trust one part of government.  What do you think it is?  What does it say about Americans?

The Trust Matters Review highlights the best articles and posts on trust our research has turned up in the last month.

For a live stream of our trust research, follow our team on Twitter: @CharlesHGreen, @AndreaPHowe, @StewartMHirsch, and @SandyStyer.

If you’d like to share a great article about trust, let us know on Twitter or in the comments here.

For more links to outstanding articles on trust, see:

To Link or Not To Link

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A colleague recently asked me how I handle LinkedIn invitations from people I don’t really know.  Another colleague asked about connecting to people whose reputation is questionable.  While the same questions can be asked about Facebook, Google Plus and other social media, because of the differences in the types of services and benefits each offer, I’m only going to discuss LinkedIn here, and address mostly issues relating to trust.

Trust All Connection Requests?

When people ask me questions about whether to accept invitations, they are usually not asking about the business benefits of making the connection.  Often, they are asking about the business and personal risks associated with accepting the invitations.

Recently, Charlie Green shared a Trust Tip via Twitter  (#57 Trust but verify?  No. Trusting means you don’t need verification).  He explained the Tip more in his Trust Tip Countdown blog.  While trusting without verifying may be appropriate in some circumstances, it is not appropriate for everything.  In his presentations, Charlie often says “I trust my dog Sammy with my life, but not with my ham sandwich.”  It is common sense to not leave a sandwich in front of a dog, if you expect it to be there a minute later.   Accepting an invitation from someone we don’t know, poses some risks, and requires some verification in advance.

Here are some risk scenarios that may result from accepting LinkedIn invitations:

  • I don’t block my connections from seeing who my other connections are.  Some people do block that access on LinkedIn.  Sharing LinkedIn connection names has the risk that some of your connections will contact people with whom you are connected without your permission, by using your name.  I’m told that because of this risk, recruiters block access to their connections.
  • If we connect to a person who has a reputation of not being trustworthy, that could reflect badly on us.
  • Some people are concerned about connecting with competitors.  That might increase your opportunity to collaborate and generally benefit from being connected.  You may also be concerned about whether your competitor will misuse your contact list, or take business advantage of other aspects of being connected.
  • If you don’t know many of your connections well enough to introduce others to them when requested, having a lot of connections may seem disingenuous.  Of course, there may be business or other reasons we choose not to accommodate an introduction request.  One of these reasons should not be: “I really don’t know that person.”

Best Practices Suggestions for Accepting Invitations  

Here are three typical scenarios I encounter when I receive an invitation on LinkedIn.  I quickly assess the risk, and simultaneously look for ways to increase the business benefits of the potential connection.   :

1. I already know the person or we have at least met in person or by phone or online.

I think about how well I know the person, and assess whether I will be comfortable with connecting the individual to other people I know.  I have fairly liberal standards, and generally opt in favor of connecting.  I may have met the person briefly at a conference or we may be in a virtual group together.  Before accepting the invitation, I may reach out to the contact and ask for a phone call so that I can increase my comfort level and trust.

2. I don’t know (or remember) the person, but we have connections in common.

For these potential connections, I investigate further, by reviewing their profiles on LinkedIn, and using Google to check their online presence.  Generally, I am likely to connect based on my investigation, relying in part on the transferred trust from the person I know.  Sometimes I even write to our common connection and ask if s/he knows the person.  In addition, before I connect, I am much more likely to reach out and ask the person to have a phone call with me so we can establish or enhance our relationship.

If the person seeking to connect with me on LinkedIn does not want to have a call with me, that is a sign that I should not accept the invitation.  Having the conversation creates a stronger connection, and could give me more information as to whether it makes sense to connect.  Interestingly, I recently received an invitation without a personal note reminding me of where I met the person.  It turns out she was a student in a class I taught on coaching.  I emailed to ask her if we knew each other, and we then had a follow up call.  We are now building a relationship, and I would not hesitate to introduce her to my other LinkedIn connections.

3. I don’t know the person, and we have no connections in common.

I suspect some of these requests are spam, but just in case, I usually investigate further by reviewing the person’s profile, and researching them on Google.  Recently, I’ve been receiving invitations from people who have high ranking titles, and appear to be part of solid companies, usually from outside the US.  Yet, they have only a very few other connections.  Their invitations do not indicate how they know me, or why they want to connect with me. I ignore these.

Those invitations that do not appear to be spam often look like they are from people who are using LinkedIn’s service to connect to everyone in a group, or everyone in their email database, regardless of whether we know each other.  I think about each one, and determine whether I want to reach out and have a call or connect by email or just ignore it.  I just use common sense.  You may end up with a good connection, or you may just be clogging your LinkedIn with people who you cannot help or from whom you can ask for help.

Make Invitation Requests Easier to Accept

I enjoy getting invitations and inviting people to connections.  My advice – when inviting someone to connect on LinkedIn, don’t just use LinkedIn’s template.  Personalize it, and, unless there is no question that the person knows you, remind her/him how you met, and why you want to connect.  Make it easy for both of you.

The Dark Side of Work to Come

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If one wants to be a pessimist about the future of work, there is no shortage of opportunities to nurture one’s paranoia. A compelling new work by Lynda Gratton—The Shift: The Future of Work is Already Here—could feed your dark fears. But she also shines considerable light on them, showing the way out, and the way towards a fulfilling future. If, that is, we can follow our better angels.

Lynda Gratton is Professor of Management Practice at London Business School, where she leads over 50 global companies in the Future of Work Consortium. She has been praised by the Economist, hailed by the Times, and lauded by the Financial Times.  She certainly tones up our joint neighbourhood of Primrose Hill.

Drivers of the Dark Future

Gratton outlines five forces that will shape the future pattern of work:

  • Technology (think 5 billion people, digitized knowledge, ubiquitous cloud).
  • Globalisation (think continued bubbles and crashes, a regional underclass, the world becoming urban, frugal innovation).
  • Longevity and demography (think Gen Y, increasing longevity, aging boomers growing old poor, global migration).
  • Society (think growing distrust of institutions, the decline of happiness, rearranged families)
  • Energy resources (think rising energy prices, environmental catastrophes displacing people, a culture of sustainability emerging).

There are good sides of all the above as well; but let’s stay on the dark side of  work for a bit. Think increasing fragmentation (a three minute world, dominated by overload and time compression), isolation (the genesis of loneliness) and exclusion (the new poor). (Remember A Clockwork Orange, anyone?)

Bring In the Light

But she also holds up the bright possibility of a crafted future – co-creation (where people across the world are ever more willing and able to link up and share ideas and energy), social engagement (the rise of empathy and balance) and micro-entrepreneurship (crafting creative lives).

If we are to reach the bright possibilities of this crafted future, we need to bring about three shifts:

1. From shallow generalist (knows a little about a lot) to serial master (has in-depth knowledge and competences in many domains).

To get here, three career paths will be of particular importance – grassroots advocacy, social entrepreneurship, and micro-entrepreneurship.

Future career trajectories will be defined by a series of bell-shaped curves in which energy and the accumulation of resources grow and then plateau, only to grow again. She urges us to ‘slide and morph’ transferring knowledge and skills from one specialism to another.

2. From isolated competitor to innovative connector.

‘One of the marvellous opportunities of the coming decades of work will be to build our social capital in a way that was never possible in the past. With 5 billion people connected to each other in an increasingly participative way, the possibilities are endless.’

Gratton sees three key future network-types:

  • The posse; the small group of people we use as a sounding board, people we call on quickly for a tough call to make, a really challenging problem to be solve or a complex task to get underway.
  • The big ideas crowd; the group of hundreds, often friends of friends, ready to make a connection, support our innovation.
  • The regenerative community; ‘the real people whom we meet frequently, with whom we laugh, share a meal, tell stories and relax’, crucial to our emotional well-being, and our protection against the possible isolation and loneliness of the dark side.

How can we best build these networks? Mainly by our capacity to build reciprocity and trust, deep mutual understanding and ways to attract other people to us.

3. From voracious consumer to impassioned producer.

The trend toward seeing work as a place of productive experiences rather than simply an activity that has pay as its key driver of motivation.

Work for Whom?

Cui bono? Gratton invites three groups in particular to consider the implications of these three shifts:

1. Children. ‘What will you do with your long, productive lives?…Your life will not simply have education at the beginning, with work in the middle and retirement at the end. Instead, you can expect to experience a mosaic that has education and development woven through it….Much of your work will be spent working with people virtually, and so one of the challenges  you face is how to create deep friendships with a small group of people in a sustainable way.’

2. Business leaders. ‘Globalisation will add new markets and intensify competition; work hierarchies will morph into more organic forms; talented  employees will want adult-adult mutual relationships; people will place greater emphasis on meaningful developmental work in a mosaic that has sabbaticals; and throughout it all, sources of competitive advantage will derive from the capacity to build co-operative relationships across various eco-systems.’

3. Government leaders. ‘ Governments’ willingness to support high-quality educational and cultural institutions will play a key role in attracting people with high value skills who will increasingly choose to cluster near each other….While ever more prevalent transparency and sharing of information will only serve to exacerbate the current decrease in citizens’ trust in institutions….. Gen Z’s will want to work into their 70’s and 80’s, and it will be a priority for government s to find ways to support these aspirations.’

If Professor Gratton is right, it’s clear that empathy, reciprocity and trust will figure significantly in both personal and organisational successes of the future.  But tellingly, these are currently under-developed capabilities.

It is those traits—empathy, reciprocity, trust—which probably hold the key to which side of Professor Gratton’s predictions for the future of work will take hold—the Dark Side, or our better angels.

In Netflix We Trust

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This post is not about piling on Netflix (or its new spin off, Quikster). You can read elsewhere about the movie rental company’s bad decisions, their business prospects, or—more entertainingly—their Twitter handle being owned by a ‘Pot-smoking Elmo.”  Ditto for parsing Netflix CEO Reed Hastings’ apology.

What I want to talk about is: How Fast Is Your Mirror?

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

Dorian Gray had a picture that told him the truth about his age.  Snow White’s Queen possessed a magic mirror that told the truth about her beauty. But what kind of mirror do we have for a bonehead moment?

Over time, some of us come to recognize some of our errors. Sometimes.  (Lifelong denial is not uncommon.)  But if you’re a business leader, the pressure is enormous to get it right, right away.

The pressure is worse today. When Johnson & Johnson became the poster child for responsible behavior during the Tylenol scare in 1982, we forget that several days passed before the national recall. Yet Netflix felt it had to apologize overnight for its moves.

What kind of mirror can tell us overnight that a way of doing business, a major decision, an unchallenged assumption was dead, flat wrong?  And what sort of mirror is good enough to convince us overnight?

Who can reverse their self-consciousness overnight after being hit in the face with a bucket of icy reality-water?

How fast is your mirror?

Does it Take Time? Or Objectivity?

There’s a saying that ‘time takes time.’ Meaning, the passage of time is required for some shifts to take place, and there’s no hurrying it.

Remember when Michael Richards (Kramer of Seinfeld fame) went racially ballistic in a totally offensive comedy routine?  That was November 20, 2006. Later that night he went back on stage to apologize, and two days later was doing a hastily-arranged public apology on the David Letterman show—which, as I recall, was in some ways more acutely embarrassing than the incident itself.

He could have benefited from more time.  Watching sausage-making destroys the appetite for sausage.

On the other hand, if the end-game is revised perspective, maybe there’s a better way than to watch paint dry and the hands on the clock turn.  Maybe your truth-mirror is another person—someone you can trust.

I don’t know Reed Hastings, and I don’t know if anyone on his management team could have told him his decision was flawed—more interestingly, that his apology was half-baked.  Remember, Netflix stock may have dropped from 300 a few months ago, but Hastings had brought it there from 20 less than 10 years ago.  Whoever wouldst play Hastings’ mirror role had better have a lot of gravitas.

Who’s Your Mirror?

If the proverbial hits the fan, whom do you call? If the world suddenly is telling you you’re a bozo and that just makes you’re even more convinced you’re right–to whom would you listen to tell you otherwise?  The wrong answer would be “no one.”

Who’s your mirror?

 

Now Presenting…Four Experts on Powerful Presentations

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I’ve been giving business presentations for nearly 20 years. The more I do it, the more I appreciate just how hard it is to do it really well. Today’s blog post features four resources to help with various aspects of speaking and presenting. Please add your favorites!

Get it Together

The same ol’ same ol’ approach to designing your presentation may not be getting the results you want. Nick Morgan (@DrNickMorgan) shares 5 Quick Ways to Organize a Speech.

Nick says:

“Too many people structure their presentations by pulling together slides and then assembling them like a deck of cards, in what seems like an OK order.  That usually means that no one except the presenter can divine where the speech is headed.

“That’s a bad idea.

“At the heart of a successful presentation is a clear structure.  Which one should you use?  The best structure for what you’re trying to do depends on the nature of your talk.“

Nick then shares five possible situations in the organizational world for which you might be called upon to present, with a suggested outline for each.

Present with Presence

Sims Wyeth (@simswyeth) writes regularly about a variety of delivery techniques like pausing as a presentation skill.

Sims says:

“Taking time to think when you’re on stage makes you more interesting to watch. It gives you presence and gravitas. It fills your body with a mysterious power-electric activity under the skin.”

Who doesn’t want a little mysterious power-electric activity under the skin!

(By the way, I recently signed up for Sims’ weekly Presentation Pointers and am really enjoying them. They are brief, insightful, and usable—a great combination.)

The One “Thing” to Avoid

Patricia Fripp (@PFripp) writes about the importance of being deliberate with the words we choose in How to Sound Intelligent in a Speech or Sales Presentation.

Patricia says:

“The one thing you should always avoid when you speak is—“thing.” What a fuzzy, flabby, non-specific word! Never be vague if you want to be believed. Use exact, precise words—words with power and value.”

Yes, ma’am.

Kill the Presentation Altogether

You wouldn’t treat a job interview like a sales presentation, complete with 40-slide deck, would you? S. Anthony Iannarino (@iannarino) turns our traditional ideas of how to conduct a sales call upside down in You Think You Are Presenting. You Are Being Interviewed.

Anthony says:

“Don’t get me wrong, there are times when you absolutely must present your company using your standard slide deck and when you must share some basic history. Even then, that presentation should not dominate your time with your dream client.

“Your dream client considers you a candidate for hire. They are considering making you part of their team and giving your responsibility for some outcome. The reason they need a dialogue instead of a monologue is because they are trying to get to know you. They are trying to make a good decision.”

Goodbye presenting, hello listening.

Acceptance Is an Active Act

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Usually “acceptance” means giving in to some over-powering force–grudgingly.  Active acceptance is not part of the basic toolkit of trust, but it belongs in the advanced course. If you can learn to actively accept, you will gain unheard-of levels of trust.  Not to mention, you’ll be a lot happier.

Accepting a Smoker

My wife-at-the-time helped me quit smoking by accepting me as a smoker. She told me that while she wanted me to be healthy and live a long life, she more wanted me to live my life on my terms, and she’d do everything to help me with that.

“If you want to smoke in the living room, the bedroom, the kitchen, whatever,” she said, “It’s OK.”  She once rerouted a joint long plane trip into two so I could get off and have less time without a cigarette.  (Hey I was hooked).

About two weeks after she made that offer, I quit on my own.

Acceptance is Not Defeat

Don’t confuse acceptance with surrender under protest.  It’s not giving in.  It’s not something you do as a last resort.  And if you’re “accepting” with fingers crossed, eyes rolled, and resentments intact—that’s something else entirely.

Acceptance is a positive. It’s an affirmation of the other party.  It’s a commitment to support them, despite some fairly significant differences in world-view. Acceptance goes beyond “tolerance”—it’s a statement of the other’s legitimacy in the world.

If it’s a client or a buyer that you’re accepting, it means acknowledging them as equals, and not as parties whom you succeed or fail in selling to or persuading to do your will.

Acceptance is Paradoxical

Much like trust, when you accept another, odd things happen. Accepting someone’s foibles–as my wife did mine–often results in a reciprocating counter-offer from the other party. Unless, that is, you were secretly trying to get that result, in which case you jinxed the deal.

The best way to change someone is, sometimes, to give up trying to change them, and to change yourself instead.  Specifically, to change your attachment to achieving your change.

Don’t ask yourself, “Who needs changing?” or “Who needs to get better at accepting?”

Instead, ask yourself, “Whom do I need to accept?”