I’m something of a novice presenter, so I’m sure that this will not be news to many of my readers, but here are the lessons I drew from the four 90 second presentations I made

My actionable lessons learned: I should

• speak more slowly
• make more eye contact
• coordinate hand gestures with eye contact – I had them off time for a bit and it did not work well at all.
• stress the online nature of Stronico – at the beginning, middle and end.  The online nature of the application was lost on some people
• use more props –  On the spur of the moment I held up a stack of business cards I had gathered by the middle of the event, and that was an “aha” moment for some people
• stress that Stronico is Mac compatible.  This is something I always assumed that everyone else would assume, but it is not.
• concentrate most on the independent artisan – the pro networker is already too heavily invested in their existing system to ever switch to something else, and the mid level corporate person does not have the power to make any sort of software decisions.  The independent artisan is dependent upon a strong network for business, but maintaining the network will never be their top priority(that is why they are artisans) so social maintenance outsourcing is something they are either looking for or open to.
• have brochures made.  Selling a visual product verbally is tough.

photo credit: fdecomite

Full Disclaimer: I am not an attorney, nor account, and I assume no liability for anything you do with anything on this blog

Download Sample Articles Of Organization (pdf format)

Download Sample Articles Of Organization (Microsoft Word format)

photo credit: deanfotos66

Thanks!

photo credit: Pink Sherbet Photography

• Live in the present – thinking about the past and the future leads to thoughts of grievance or anxiety.  The best example is Derek Sivers’ essay on the topic
• Be specific – self explanatory but the general rule is that if you can’t be specific about something, you will not get it, and probably don’t need it.
• Not much will kill you – we conjure up dragons and doomsday scenarios in our heads, all for no purpose.  Go ahead and try it
• Nothing is that important – you can afford to lose a few times so long as you rounds of the fight so long as you learn something
• Measure – measurement is the key to everything – if it can’t be measured in at least some way, reconsider doing it.

The rest seem to be specific tips and tricks.

photo credit: h.koppdelaney

I realized this while at a client meeting; we were talking about problems with a botched sales program and the staff had a litany of complaints about the program (ed. note: it was created by a separate vendor years ago, and the fault lies with the now-departed project manager who designed something inappropriate.  It does a masterful job of integrating legacy systems from different vendors, languages, platforms, a mainframe and Europeans are involved somehow,  but the user interface is wanting.  But I digress…).  Then I remembered hearing the same litany of complaints a year ago.   Unlike last year,  I offered suggestions on how to make small improvements to the program. Everyone proceeded to ignore me and continued complaining.  At the end of the meeting everyone felt a lot better once they had talked about their problems.  No one made any plans to actually fix the problems.

Then I had the realization, (to me anyway) that, complaining makes you feel better and this is why you should never complain! Complaining cures the short term rage and anxiety caused by the problem while sapping your motivation to actually fix the problem.  The end result of complaining:  Much short-term anxiety, and then the problem either continues or recurs.  You never solve the problem.    Therefore never complain, and let the problem eat away at you until it hurts enough to be worth fixing permanently.  It is the only way you’ll have the motivation to arrive at a permanent fix for the problem.

Disclaimer, I have not read A Complaint Free World, though I’ve heard it is quite good.  And upon further reflection, part of this thought was inspired (yet again!) by Derek Sivers.

photo credit: uncafelitoalasonce