I’m terrible
summarizing my ideas. I get lost easily with unnecessary details.
During first quarter
of this year I am working particularly hard to polish this skill. Again, my
lovely fellow Toastmasters are helping me to improve.
Yesterday I presented
my project number 3. This third scheme is “Get to the point”. And this challenge
was perfect for me! I learned a lot while preparing it.
I learned some
techniques to overcome my difficulties to actually get to the point when I
express myself.
During last weeks I
learned the following methods:
- I don’t have to over explain.
o
We speak
to a rhythm around 130 words per minute (http://www.speechinminutes.com), and
our brain needs time to process that information. To avoid useless words while
I talk I have to ask myself “Am I
including too much info that they don’t need?”
- I learned to use the journalist approach to express my ideas in a faster way
o
When I
think about the who, when, where, why and what, I can convert a complex thought
in something easy to follow. Even I can convert my idea in a small story, which
is key to keep attention during my conference calls or presentations.
Storytelling is working in a very powerful way for me to grab people attention
- I learned how to use pause
o
I feel
uncomfortable when I use pause while taking. But the fact that I feel uncomfortable
it means they are necessary J. I discovered that it’s an effective weapon to allow the others to
process what I just said. I realized that very often I used long sentences.
Glued with a lot of words such as so,
and, but … This is complex to follow. I was taught to replace these words
with pauses. I practiced yesterday these pauses during my speech and it worked!
I saw several nods when I was provoking intentionally long pauses
- I learned how to request others to get to the point
o
Since now
I’m paying more attention to get to the point I can see others also struggle getting
to the point J Sometimes
people come to my desk and they ask my advice about something. Sometimes the
introduction is very long. Sometimes I don’t know what the question is and
quite often I’m not sure where this introduction is leading. When I feel I’m
lost after listening for 30 seconds I interrupt politely the other person and I
say something like:
§ I'm
sorry, I'm not following. What exactly do you need us to do? How can I help
you?
§ I
see...so how exactly can we help you accomplish this?
I work with people from different countries, different
cultures and getting a common understanding it’s tricky. When I use question
like this I find easier to get things back on track
This
is my shorter post of the year. Maybe because I’m starting to learn how to get
to the point?
@yolocalizo
