I overthink so you don’t have to.

What really happens in a moment of truth?  And I don’t mean the Procter & Gamble, marketing, or even Google “moments of truth,” though I’ll get to those in a minute. I mean those times when the traffic light of change in someone’s mind suddenly flips from red to green. When you decide to go […]

Speaking points are the ideas you want the audience to leave your presentation understanding. Thinking about them ahead of time has two benefits. First of all, you can make sure your speaking points are sharp. Secondly, you can look at what your audience says after your presentation and see if they show up. We know […]

Someone asking you to talk about yourself can be intimidating, but storytelling can help you out. Realize that what people are really asking for when they ask you to talk about yourself are the patterns of who you are. Finding those patterns comes down to a simple phrase: what’s true for you is what you […]

For years, Content Marketing World—the world’s largest content marketing conference—was the one conference I couldn’t get on the schedule for. Tom, my husband, went year after year and was loved and adored (as he should be). Five years ago, I peevishly asked him, “Why don’t people love me on stage as much as you? Why […]

The challenge of giving and receiving feedback is to get people to move past the negative. The problem is that our brains can’t just stop doing something without replacing it with something else. Telling someone (or yourself) that something is wrong doesn’t tell them what to do instead. The trick for feedback is to pair […]

Shyness and stage fright are part of our flight or fight response, but how can we overcome them? The first step is to know that it’s normal. The other thing to realize is that delivery is the least important part of getting your message across. Your audience will give you the benefit of doubt if […]

In 1987, the Walt Disney Corporation and the government of France signed a deal to build a new Disney theme park in the suburbs outside of Paris. France fought (!) to have Disney come. They wanted the theme park. They beat out Spain to get it (another first!)… and so Euro Disney was born. And […]

How to Raise Your Idea From “Idea Infancy” to “Idea Adulthood” Ideas need to grow up to meet their potential, to do that you need to understand the idea lifecycle. With an idea in “idea infancy,” your role is the seeker. Just like with humans when an idea is in an infant stage, you don’t […]

Treat Important Ideas Differently This week we look at how and when to your slides in a presentation about your idea. There are few more polarizing topics, however, so let’s talk about how slides work. Our brains are wired to process visual information, so the more that we can pair what we’re saying with what […]

Let’s say you sit down to read a new mystery novel. You crack open the cover, flip to the first page, and just as you’re about to read the first line, your (soon-to-be-former) friend comes over and says, “The butler did it.” GAH. Why does that drive us nuts? And more importantly, why does it […]