Planning a presentation? Once you’ve analyzed your audience and determined what you want to say, give lots of attention to the presentation’s two most critical parts: the opening and the close. They’re the parts the audience will remember best – and each of them serves a vital purpose.
Begin with a Bang
Begin the presentation by seizing everyone’s attention with what we at Communispond call ‘the grabber’. Wake them up. Shake them up. Involve them. Create an opening that makes the audience members put away their hand-held gizmos and focus on what you’re saying.
Among the most compelling of grabbers is a dramatic story. That’s because everyone loves a story. We’ve loved them from early childhood, since mankind’s early beginnings and they’re loved across all cultures. Telling a story does much more than command the audience’s attention, though. It helps you make an emotional connection with everyone.
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Bill Rosenthal is the Chief Executive Officer of Communispond Inc., an organization that has taught business communications skills to more than 600,000 persons. Bill is responsible all aspects of the business including sales, marketing, content development, and the delivery of Communispond courses by certified faculty. Prior to joining Communispond, Bill was CEO of Digi-Block Inc., a K-12 education publisher focusing on mathematics. He also served as President of Kaplan College, a division of Kaplan Inc., the well-known test preparation company, where he developed and launched the online college that offers Associates and Bachelors degrees and certificates in Business, Information Technology, Nursing, and Law. In a previous role as President of Ziff-Davis Education (now called Element K), Bill oversaw the leading supplier of computer training products worldwide and supervised the operations of ZD University, the leading web-based computer skills site.
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Should you share your firm’s financial results with this staff? This is one of the questions that business owners face every day, and all too often the answer is no.
But no is probably the wrong answer. An organization can very often improve performance and get its employees bought into it’s mission and purpose simply by sharing financial results with the employees.
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Bill Hettinger, Ph.D. is an internationally known consultant, educator, and thought leader who has trained numerous students, business owners, and managers in finance, entrepreneurship and small-business creation.
His latest book is Finance Without Fear: A Guide to Creating and Managing a Profitable Business. Finance Without Fear is an easy to understand guide to finance that not only explains the key concepts of finance, but also explains what the numbers mean and how finance can be used to create a business with a competitive advantage. He can be contacted at [email protected]. To read Bill’s complete biography, click here.
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Organizations are accustomed to looking at concepts and practices one way at a time. Clinging to obsolete definitions and viewpoints have a way of perpetuating companies into downward spirals.
By viewing from others’ viewpoints on life, we find real nuggets of gold with which to redefine organizations.
Companies that adopt new viewpoints and defy their conventional definitions will create new opportunities, organizational effectiveness, marketplaces and relationships.
As a Big Picture business strategist, I encourage clients toward adopting new ways of thinking about old processes, including those which brought past and enduring successes. Symbolic are these phrase definitions which I have created for familiar business words. I have created new acronyms for well-known business terms, in order to help us visualize opportunities differently.
My acronym for BUSINESS: Big-picture Understanding Symbiosis In Nomenclature, Economics, Systems, and Services
WORK: Windows of Opportunity, Requiring Know-how
My acronym for GOALS: Getting Organized Allowing Lifeblood Systems
Growth Opportunities And Legacy Support
THINK: To Have Ideas, New Keys
FAILURE: Finding Answers In Life, Utilizing Retrospective Enlightenment
SETBACK: See Experiences
in Terms of Business Accomplishments, Commending Knowledge
SUCCESS: Sophisticated Utilizing of Conditions, Contributions, Energies, Strengths and Synergies
My acronyms for FEAR: Find Excellence After Reflection
Formulating Energies Actions and Responsibilities
TECHNOLOGY Teaching Excellence Can Have Numerous Outcomes on the Life Of the Global You
WEB: Worthwhile Economical Business
EMAIL: Enlightening Marketplaces And Initiating Links
The purpose of any business is not just to make money. It is to be just:
Committed to customers.
Respectful of employees.
Successful enough to grow, pay its dues and continue growing.
Upholding standards of quality and commitment.
Focused through everything else we back to our customers.
Too often, one hears about what goes wrong in business relationships. From our viewpoint, if business is conducted honorably and professionally, then profitability and success flow from doing the right things… not from pursuing false goals.
The best successes are earned and learned. We should not take good fortune for granted. Business track records are garnered by going the distance, reading the trends and continually changing. As the years go by, one continues paying dues. Learning, experiencing and evaluating is the best process to achieve lasting success. The best dues yield nuggets of wisdom that couldn’t have been earned any other way.
The smartest person is the one who knows what he-she does not know. With maturity comes the quest to learn more, understand the factors and apply newly acquired insights to higher purposes. The person who commits to a path of professional development never stops achieving… and profitably impacts his-her business relationships.
Language is food for the mind. Browse a dictionary, and you create new ideas. Words are fun and connect your business to tomorrow. Technology cannot take the place of human communication… only may add to it. Every opportunity should be taken to enhance literacy skills of employees and entire organization. The language of success is initially found in a dictionary.
My acronyms for EDUCATION:
Standpoint of students: Earning Distinction Usually Capitalizes After Training and Instruction Optimize Net-rewards
Standpoint of teachers: Each Day Unleash Creativity After Teaching and Inspiration Occur Noticeably
MUSIC: Masterfully Utilizing Symbiosis, Imagination and Congruence
TRAINING Teaching Radiant And Innovative Nourishment Inspires Natural Growth
LISTEN Language In Studying The Evident Networks
PROBLEM Polarizing Routine Obstacles By Letting Elegance Materialize
SERVICE Securing Excellence Requires Visualizing Innovating Customer Effectiveness
PROGRESS Pursuing Royal Objective Gauges… Rewarding Empowered Super Service
FORTUNE Future Operations Require Teams Understanding Needs and Expectations
INNOVATE Imagining Niches and Norms, Optimizing Valuable Alliances, Training and Experiences
Every business, company or organization goes through cycles in its evolution. At any point, each program or business unit is in a different phase from others. The astute organization assesses the status of each branch on its Business Tree™ and orients its management and team members to meet constant changes and fluctuations. Going ‘outside the box’ to shift perceptions enables any company to think, plan and operate in productive new ways.
Characteristics of Creative Business Definitions… thus, Company Philosophy…
Focus upon the customer.
Honor the employees.
Show business life as a continuous quality process (not a quick fix or rapid gain).
Portray their company as a contributor (not a savior).
Clearly define their niche (not trying to be all things).
Say things that inspire you to think.
Compatible with other company activities and behaviors.
Remain consistent with their products, services and track record.
About the Author
Hank Moore has advised 5,000+ client organizations worldwide (including 100 of the Fortune 500, public sector agencies, small businesses and non-profit organizations). He has advised two U.S. Presidents and spoke at five Economic Summits. He guides companies through growth strategies, visioning, strategic planning, executive leadership development, Futurism and Big Picture issues which profoundly affect the business climate. He conducts company evaluations, creates the big ideas and anchors the enterprise to its next tier. The Business Tree™ is his trademarked approach to growing, strengthening and evolving business, while mastering change. To read Hank’s complete biography, click here.
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Information flow is the lifeblood of every organization, whether passing verbally, electronically, or via hard copy. The clarity, accuracy, and conciseness of information passed as well as the quality of understanding by the intended receiver(s) determine, in part, the effectiveness of transference by the overall communications network. The fluidity of the system, formal and informal, composed of people, applications, hardware, and paper, serves as the remaining factor in the organization’s communications effectiveness.
While critically important to every organization’s success, variations between individual knowledge, experience, and motivation, creates differences in perception that makes all communications difficult. Similarly, differences between the organization’s computer applications and hardware systems employed challenge the smooth, unaltered passage of data and information.
Focus of the Communications Forum
Materials within the Communications Forum focus on those principles and best practices implemented at leading organizations to ensure consistent, fluid transfer of information between individuals. The following articles, podcasts, documents, and resources cover those topics critical to an exceptional internal and external organizational communications.
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Recently, The Los Angeles Times reported on cell phone use in Korea and revealed remarkable information about where our digital culture may be heading. They discovered Korean teenagers make up to 90 cell phone calls a day, and social scientists are now beginning to correlate high cell use with rising rates of depression. For some time, I’ve noticed that many young people value their digital life as much (if not more) than their real life. A friend of my daughter sent 3,500 text messages in a single month, (that’s more than 116 per day, and not unusual for today’s teens).
Add that to another recent study released by the Knight Ridder news service that Americans are reporting fewer and fewer close friends. In 1985, pollsters noted that the average person reported having three close friends, but today, it’s only two. And the number who say they have no one to discuss important matters with has doubled to one in four. The social implications are significant, from no friends to visit people in the hospital, weakened bonds during crisis, fewer watchdogs to deter neighborhood crime, and a lack of community.
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Phil Cooke is a television producer and media consultant at Cooke Pictures in Burbank, California. His new book is ‘Jolt! Get the Jump on a World That’s Constantly Changing.‘. Find out more at philcooke.com.
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Bill Rosenthal is the Chief Executive Officer of Communispond Inc., an organization that has taught business communications skills to more than 600,000 persons. Bill is responsible all aspects of the business including sales, marketing, content development, and the delivery of Communispond courses by certified faculty. Prior to joining Communispond, Bill was CEO of Digi-Block Inc., a K-12 education publisher focusing on mathematics. He also served as President of Kaplan College, a division of Kaplan Inc., the well-known test preparation company, where he developed and launched the online college that offers Associates and Bachelors degrees and certificates in Business, Information Technology, Nursing, and Law. In a previous role as President of Ziff-Davis Education (now called Element K), Bill oversaw the leading supplier of computer training products worldwide and supervised the operations of ZD University, the leading web-based computer skills site.
Bill Hettinger, Ph.D. is an internationally known consultant, educator, and thought leader who has trained numerous students, business owners, and managers in finance, entrepreneurship and small-business creation.
Hank Moore has advised 5,000+ client organizations worldwide (including 100 of the Fortune 500, public sector agencies, small businesses and non-profit organizations). He has advised two U.S. Presidents and spoke at five Economic Summits. He guides companies through growth strategies, visioning, strategic planning, executive leadership development, Futurism and Big Picture issues which profoundly affect the business climate. He conducts company evaluations, creates the big ideas and anchors the enterprise to its next tier. The Business Tree™ is his trademarked approach to growing, strengthening and evolving business, while mastering change. To read Hank’s complete biography, 
Information flow is the lifeblood of every organization, whether passing verbally, electronically, or via hard copy. The clarity, accuracy, and conciseness of information passed as well as the quality of understanding by the intended receiver(s) determine, in part, the effectiveness of transference by the overall communications network. The fluidity of the system, formal and informal, composed of people, applications, hardware, and paper, serves as the remaining factor in the organization’s communications effectiveness.
Phil Cooke is a television producer and media consultant at Cooke Pictures in Burbank, California. His new book is ‘Jolt! Get the Jump on a World That’s Constantly Changing.‘. Find out more at 
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