The 2-Minute Revolution
Everybody faces time constraints but few more so than senior executives. The 2-Minute Revolution explores ways to construct an effective two minute oral report that will soon become second nature. It provides best practices and practical tools that everyone can use to convey a succinct summary in 120 seconds. The method relies on research as diverse as that found in the field of architecture and linguistics, but it is grounded in a simple, and now widely tested and validated, step-by-step process.
The intense format, deliberately structured to get people thinking about how they communicate, pushes leaders to make absolutely sure they are getting the direction and the decisions they need from those above them. As the course was developed it became clear that even senior executives are reluctant to think strategically about each encounter. The course facilitators push participants to have a very clear “ask” as part of their reporting; ensuring they are able to play an active role in moving issues and decisions forward.
The methodology is explained and the tools are provided, but for the bulk of the course, participants actually construct, practice, deliver, refine and then deliver again, their two minute report. By the end of the half day, each member of the small group has a chance to produce their two-minute report relying on direct feedback from their colleagues and the lead facilitator. They leave the course with a simple construct that they can use again and again.
This hands-on half day course is aimed at senior executives and managers, who are regularly called on to report orally to their boss, the CEO, or the Board. It has now been taught and tested on more than 10,000 executives and managers at all levels in the public and private sectors.
Effective Writing
Terrible writing can be pervasive. It is often brought in by people fresh out of school who think they need to use big words to impress their colleagues. At times it is reinforced by senior people who never understood that keeping your language simple makes it easy to understand and easier to act upon.
Taking terrible language and making it simple involves a series of important steps, explored in this tailored 4 hour heavily interactive course aimed at senior and mid-level managers.
First, figure out who is your audience? Writing without a clear picture of your audience is like writing a love letter and addressing it “to whom it may concern”. If you know your audience you can be direct. Without a clear picture of your audience, your language will be overly general, ill-focused and hard to understand.
Next is being clear. Use the active voice and everyday language. Not the fancy-sounding words that are often ill-defined. Be very suspicious of any word that has more than 8 letters. Direct, clear words in English are almost always short words. Get rid of the passive bafflegab. Passive sentence construction makes things opaque and blurs accountability.
Finally, be concise and complete. Take out the unnecessary. Practice editing up (not dumbing down!) by trimming the number of paragraphs, sentences and even the number of words, by one-third! Follow the journalist's credo of making sure you have answered Who, What, Where, When, Why and How?
The 2-Minute Revolution provides the ticket to entry at all levels to become known as a smart, persuasive and strategic contributor. Effective Writing means you are a player who can articulate your ideas clearly, succinctly with purpose. The principles that participants take on board through these two sessions apply equally to all critical strategic work functions. We have worked with organizations to radically re-design how they run meetings, present their products to customers, staff and their Boards, and put advocacy into action. These custom-built programs include:
Where else do we need to rebel?
Storming your meetings
Meetings desperately need to be looked at strategically. If you wonder if this is necessary, send out an anonymous survey to participants asking them how often and how long meeting should be “ideally” to ensure the work gets done? In 95% of cases, chances are you’ll get responses like this one: “half the time, half as often”. Think of the savings of people’s time, and then translate that into $ saved and productivity enhanced. These are pretty easy metrics to calculate: if 10 senior people are at the meeting how much does it cost, based on what they are collectively paid, to have them at a 2-hour meeting? What if it was only one hour, half as often? Where else could they be spending their valuable time making your business more productive and more profitable?
The answer isn’t for the chair of the meeting to get impatient and cut people off; the key is to involve everyone in taking a strategic approach. No one is going to balk at having to take 10 minutes to prepare ahead of the meeting, if it means the meeting lasts half as long. Marry asking people to be strategic with some well-worn techniques that ensure interventions are kept short and guarantee full participation; and suddenly the work can get done in half the time, half as often and with better decisions emerging out the other end.
Can you meetings use a radical makeover? Give us a call and we can talk about how to get strategic buy-in that benefits everyone.
Rebellious Presentations
Why am I doing this? Good question. There has to be a reason, or else you are just wasting everyone’s time (yours included). Most of the time you are trying to persuade, to be an advocate for what you are presenting: so, think like an advocate. Who am I trying to persuade? How can I best persuade them? What do I want them to be thinking when I am done. To accomplish all this you need to be clear and concise.
What can my audience understand? (NOT “what do I want to tell them”!): Absolutely key to any effective presentation is audience research. Big companies spend millions and million of dollars trying to figure out their customers. Surely you can spend some time thinking about yours!
How best to do it? Like making maple syrup from tree sap, you have to boil it down and down and down until what you have is clear, easy to understand; with active language, presented directly.
Where are your most important and/or time consuming presentations being delivered? We tailor this session based on your needs and your audience. We created a strategic approach for a major UN Agency to get traction with their Board. Allow us to listen to your challenges and create something equally revolutionary. Give us a call or drop us a line.
Upending your Board
Yes, every board is different, which is why there is not “one size fits all” approach, but boards that need reform seem to have more than a few things in common:
· Long, often ill focused Board “kits”; only sometimes delivered with enough time for a very conscientious Board member to read it all.
· An attitude by senior management that this is their time to “perform” and justify their jobs/budgets/people.
· Serious discussion internally on how to “control” the Board so they don’t get in the way.
· Board and Board Committee meetings that seem to go on ad nauseam chewing through everyone’s valuable time.
· Issues that keep re-emerging and no consensus on how to deal with them.
The best way to upend your Board and get it back on track is to become a strategic rebel. Think through why they are there, how you can get the best out of them (not just get what you want), and how you can make radically better use of their time.
Making a commitment to to being strategic where the Board and Management meet - and sometimes compete - is incredibly radical, and amazingly productive.
All Boards are different. Yours could be leading a not-for-profit, a billion-dollar retailer or an oversight audit committee. If you think it needs to be upended, let’s chat about what needs to be done, and how best to do it.
Advocacy in Action
Government is omni-present in our lives and has a huge impact on our business. From tax policy to subsidies and regulation its sometimes-hidden hand directs much of what we do. Often it acts without knowing the impact of its actions and is usually open to modifying or changing what it does if it can be convinced otherwise.
Sometimes organizations are looking to governments to help it do good work, or stop harm. A solid, informed, and strategic advocacy effort is central to having an impact on anything government does or doesn’t do. This is where we come in. We don’t lobby for you, but we can help you set up a strategy that engages government and is focused on measurable outcomes. We help with the “why” and then provide advice on the “how”. Drop us a line and let’s have a chat about how we can help you become effective advocates.