When all of this started, back in March, it seemed like people were finding ways to make the most of this time at home, time with family, etc. The folks I know baked bread, got back into yoga or took long walks, reconnected with family and friends. As the months have gone on, that … Read more
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Bananagrams is one of my favorite games. Each player starts with a random collection of letters on little tiles, and you make as many intersecting words as possible. When you use all your tiles, you say “PEEL!” and every player has to draw additional tiles from a common pile. It’s kind of like Scrabble, but … Read more
I’m sure you’ve noticed this. You’re on a video call, and two people start to speak at the same time. This leads to both people stopping, then with saying, “You go ahead.” I want to mention a couple of things about this very common phenomenon. The first is: This is good! When a … Read more
Teaching is one of the most profoundly physical professions I can think of. That may sound weird—what’s so physical about sharing information with people? But when I think of what it takes to teach a class, particularly a class of children or teenagers, I think about Saying hello and looking at the students as … Read more
When my kids used to play the violin, they were supposed to practice every day. At first, they loved it—they pulled out the violin and scraped out a couple Twinkle Twinkles and that was that. As the months went on, and they realized what “every day” means, their enthusiasm…waned. The novelty had worn off, and … Read more
There are so many ways to tell a story, and none of them is complete. No story tells everything there is to know about the topic. No story can include each person’s facts, emotions, assumptions, background, point of view, knowledge, and opinions. Once we know this, we can look at the story as … Read more
When we’re trying to make our case, to explain, to get through, the chances are good that we’re competing with noise in the listener’s head. What assumptions did they hold before you ever started speaking? What concerns are they dealing with that have nothing to do with you? The thing that made this … Read more
When you have the impulse to say something, there is a moment when you can check in with yourself, before you speak. You can ask yourself, “What do I want to happen as a result of what I say?” This is how we create the habit of deliberate intention. In the moment when we … Read more
Imagine a sales representative for a medical device company. She is used to meeting with potential buyers at their offices or hospitals. She can easily establish rapport as they settle into their seats, finding common ground to chat about as everyone prepares for the meeting. By the time she fires up her PowerPoint deck, everyone … Read more
My colleague Anne Thibault reminded me in a meeting recently that “you’re trying too hard” can be quite an insult for many people. “Trying too hard” can connote earnestness, nerdiness, and caring deeply about something. Just reading the title of this post puts a knot in my stomach. As a person who has had … Read more
