By Michael Blanding for Harvard Business School Working Knowledge It’s a common experience in the workplace: You leave a meeting feeling good about the discussion and believe everyone is on the same page. “Then you meet with someone two days later, and you realize they’re not on the same page at all,” says Hanne Collins, […]
By Kelly Lyons for Newsweek Everyone communicates differently—even in the workplace. According to Princeton University, there are four main communication styles: passive, passive-aggressive, aggressive and assertive. An assertive style generally leads to the most effective communication. But not everyone reacts the same in every interaction, so it’s best to learn how to work with team […]
By Hannah Carvalho for Associations Now Every board wants to feel like they understand the association’s members and their needs. But that’s not always easy, especially since every organization is composed of members with different viewpoints and backgrounds. “The board wants to understand the wishes of the membership and feel like they are connected,” said […]
By Minda Zetlin for INC. How good are you at having a conversation? If you’re like most people, you may wonder about your own conversational skills. The truth is, being good at conversation is as much about what you don’t say as it is about what you do say. In an insightful post for Psychology Today, Dave Smallen, […]
By Grant T. Harris for the Harvard Business Review Find the “Crucial Nodder” Briefing a senior executive is an art and adept White House staffers do it every day under the most stressful of circumstances. They’re masters of compressing the right information into the right amount of time, no matter how complex the topic or […]
From Joe Novarro, writing for Politico I learned that humans are fairly good at lying — but they’re lousy at concealing their true emotions, especially when stressed. We reveal our unspoken thoughts in our bodies: faces flushed with embarrassment, lips pursed at unwelcome questions, fingers covering the neck dimple when discussing a touchy subject. I […]
By Arthur Solomon for PRNews Public relations brainstorming sessions, or creative meetings, can be the equivalent of a double-edged sword for those attending. On the one hand, account execs who attend the session will get the opportunity to show their creativity, if they are truly creative. The flip side is that those who can’t come up […]
By Merrie Spaeth for the Wall Street Journal When the National Football League inducted a new class of Hall of Famers on Aug. 5, one thing was conspicuously missing: bad speeches. For years the ceremony had been known for them. Winners droned on with a laundry list of thank-yous, reminiscing with obscure anecdotes and humorless […]
By Arthur Solomon for PRNews Public relations agencies have many tools to prepare a client for an interview. But perhaps the most important one is not in any text book or training manual, and that is, “common sense.” Preparing a Client Below are some “common sense” lessons you probably never learned in PR classes that […]
By Bruce Hennes, Hennes Communications Before James Comey headed up the F.B.I., he served as general counsel of Lockheed Martin Corporation. While at Lockheed, he spoke at the National Security Agency about how studying law is similar to the education intelligence analysts receive. “You read a case and decipher…relevant facts, the [outcome] of the case…you are drilled […]