I so loved the title of Brad Feld’s post, that I just had to copy the title. This is an important one. We live in a world of personal branding, quick online reputation checks and a lot of noise. Authors, Entrepreneurs and job seekers get less and less time to explain themselves. This morning I was … Read more
“Art is the elimination of the unnecessary.” Pablo Picasso I finished a wonderful 3 day seminar this week in Madrid with 30 directors ranging from industries as diverse as agriculture, to mobile handset makers, to pharmaceuticals to drinks. The course began on Tuesday morning at 9am as the participants introduced themselves, their challenges and their … Read more
This post is a follow up to the TED-Education post yesterday: What Aristotle and Joshua Bell teach us about Persuasion. If you haven’t already watched the lesson, you’ll need to as background to the material in this post. You can watch it here on TED Education. What could Joshua Bell do to get his music heard … Read more
I wrote “Give a TED talk” on my bucket list 4 years ago, today I feel happy to see the idea come to fruition. It is not a TED Talk per-se, i.e. it is not up there on a stage, but in my mind almost better – a lesson from my class, and a concept … Read more
You finish your pitch and the customer says: “Your product is too expensive!”. You arrive home, you’re a few minutes late: your partner says “You are always late!”. At a dirty plate left on the table: “you never wash the dishes!” What do you say in this moment? How do you handle objections? It is possible to take … Read more
The Words, the Meaning, the Effect As we communicate, there are 3 separate processes at play: what we say, what we mean when we say it, and what we accomplish by saying it A rhetorician would call these 3 separate processes: 1) locution, 2) illocution, and 3) perlocution. In my courses we use the shorthand “Point X” to … Read more
Mythology and The Human Experience As part of the Greek and Roman Mythology course that I have been following for the last 10 weeks, our teacher Dr. Peter Struck has been drawing out a number of “universal human laws” from the myths. We read of Odysseus, of Aeneas, of gods, of monsters. We read material … Read more
In the late 1870s, A Dublin-based shoe company sent 2 salespeople from their head office to a new territory in rural Africa. The two salespeople, Willy and Jimmy, travelled out on boat, trains and foot to reach the rural African areas that was to be their new sales area. 2 months later, 2 telegrams arrived … Read more
This is a guest post by Tobias Rodriguez. Tobias runs seminars on Conflict Management and is a leading member of Toastmasters in Barcelona. Follow him on twitter [twitter-follow screen_name=’conflictmentor’] or check out his blog. An ancient Greek storyteller, called Aesop, said: An Eagle was soaring through the air when suddenly it heard the whizz of an … Read more
Daniel Shi gives a simple but profound answer to “How can I learn to be more Influential?” over on Quora: I think that you can certainly become influential without having to do something “extraordinary.” 7 Steps to become more Influential Connect with many people. Learn that just because someone may not be important today, it doesn’t … Read more