Dr. Mark’s Ten Rules for Creating and delivering Transformational Presentations Using InsideOut Formula:

The greatest thing I’ve got going for me is my ability to believe in other people’s talents. I am a feedback mirror because I hear and see people doing things they can’t hear or see themselves doing. Every great communicator needs that kind of feedback or they will not be stimulated to change or grow.  Having confidence in yourself is important, but it helps to have someone who believes in you, too, whether it’s a spouse, a friend, a teacher, or even a coach. To be a great a presenter takes “Truth telling” which begins with courage and belief in yourself. So if you want to come across to your audience as authentic practice daily the actions listed in my “ten rules for presenting” they will speak volumes of who you really are and transform a speech into a transformation experience.

Dr. Mark’s Ten Rules for Creating and delivering Transformational Presentations Using InsideOut Formula:                                             

1. Be clear and concise, confident and compelling about your goals for the presentation.Don’t present anything you won’t want to sit through yourself

2. Learn that “Connecting with Others” is more about you than the audience. Do you believe in what you are presenting? Are you comfortable in presenting ideas and information to others?

3. Believe in your self—Know your strengths and use them. This will allow you the freedom to overcome nervousness and self-doubts.

4. Know nothing will bother or interfere with your performance and your ability to stay on message and in the moment.

5. Radiate and Resonate. Love what you are doing and your audience.—Be confident responsive and respectful. Your radiance is coming from the pure, utter joy of feeling alive–of being connected to your message and the audience.

6. Speak with passion–be energized and excited that you get the privilege of presenting  what you know that can help the audience members live a more fulfilling life.

7. Stay focused but flexible on audience interests, needs and engagement.

8. Be natural and authentic—Don’t try to hard to be someone you are not or say things you don’t believe.

9. Don’t worry about evaluations and results of the presentation. Stay in the moment observe, respond and focus on the process of conveying your message and connecting with the audience.

10. Seek feedback on how you are meeting expectations as you are presenting—use checkpoints

11. Close with a bang. Check for understanding. Wave the flag. Call for commitment, change and action

Extra Idea for getting ready to speak– Use “relaxation and release” tools to start in a great state of mind and energy…   be open to whatever arises.

More from Dr. Berne Brown on Vulnerability, Shame and Connecting

Vulnerability is our most accurate measurement of courage”. Dr. Berne Brown

The most  viewed blog post on The Wick is a TED speech by Dr. Berne Brown. She talks about the power of being connected and vulnerable through the lens of dealing with our shame. Her conclusion is that what makes people vulnerable and feel inadequate is what makes people beautiful and happy. To find meaning we need the ability to empathize, belong, love.  This is a very personal and humorous talk by a truly authentic person.  She shares a deep insight from her research, one that caused a breakdown and sent her on a personal quest to know herself as well as to understand why shame is always whispered and hidden even from our conscious self. Her insight about  shame is groundbreaking and priceless.

Now she is back with more insights and over 5 million views of her Houston TED speech. Again she opens and models her vulnerability with a funny story about what success has taught her about vulnerability. Don’t miss this thoughtful and reflective speech.

Connecting and Shame

Daily Quote: and Reflection: Insights and Social Advocacy from Consumer Perspective

Daily Quote: “For a person with mental illness, the challenge is to find the life that’s right for you. But in truth, isn’t that the challenge for all of us, mentally ill or not?”Dr. Elyn Saks, from her book, The Center Cannot Hold.

Reflection:Very moving speech detailing,one highly functioning person’s, long difficult struggle with Schizophrenia and Mental Illness. Dr. Saks, insightful, sad and realistic story makes me want to help more with this devastating disease.  Here is her heart felt and insightful speech at the University of Virginia Law School http://www.law.virginia.edu/html/news/2009_spr/saks.htm

What are your reactions?  

Note: Dr. Elyn Saks is the Orrin B. Evans Professor of Law, Psychology, and Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at USC’s Gould School of Law, an adjunct professor of Psychiatry at the UCSD School of Medicine, and assistant faculty at the New Center for Psychoanalysis in Los Angeles. In 2009, she received the MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant.” Despite battling schizophrenia and acute psychosis since she was a teenager, Saks is a nationally recognized scholar in mental health law, criminal law and the ethical dimensions of medical research.

After decades of hiding her illness, Saks published a memoir about her struggles and successes in The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness (Hyperion, 2007). The book won far-reaching acclaim from literary critics and advocacy groups.

Poem on Respect and Responsiveness

Poem on Respect and Responsiveness by M.W. Hardwick

    Idea for poem: Respect and Responsiveness are the keys to employee and customer satisfaction and they seem to be lacking in many organization–for example We can’t do that because of policy.

      R&R is key to brand perception.

      R&R are keys to your ability to look in the mirror. 

      R&R are keys to to leadership effectiveness.

      R&R are keys to long-term relationships and trust.

      R&R are free.

      Embrace and pursue the value of R&R

      R&R require empowerment and empathy…

     Where are they…Where are they… 

Daily Quotes and Reflection: Power of First Impressions

Quotes:

The answer is that we are not helpless in the face of our first impressions. They may bubble up from the unconscious – from behind a locked door inside of our brain – but just because something is outside of awareness doesn’t mean it’s outside of control.”
Malcolm Gladwell, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking

 Its’  all about storytelling. It’s about creating a connection to the audience.”

Reginald Hudlin, President of Entertainment, BET

 Reflection: 

Spend more time on making a strong and lasting “first impression” on the audience. Like the old saying, you only get one chance for a great first impression. Overcoming a lack luster open to your presentation,  like a flat  or non-energized beginning, and then having to change that initial  poor image, takes lots to time and effort. Your initial first impression can make or break your presentation.

Action Assignment: You may not be making a speech today, but is helpful to practice how to make good first impressions. Today, stop and try to make a positive impression on someone you don’t know. After the interaction circle back to get some feedback–How did you come across to this person and what was their first impression of you? There is a lot to learn here because we all have “blindspots” between how we want to come across to others and their actual experience of you. 

 

Practice Makes Perfect–Myth or Reality of 10,000 hours of practice

Practice Makes Perfect —Really

Does 10,000 hours make you expert or master of a subject or performance activity, like tennis or public speaking? From my review it seems that the key is 10,000hours done in deliberative practice structure. So what exactly is deliberative practice? Most research defines it as an activity with a very well-defined end-goal, which should be difficult. The activity needs to be highly repeatable. There needs to be feedback on the quality of each repetition; so it is helpful to have a coach or friend review your performance.

Many cognitive scientist that the key to mastery comes about when a skill is moved from the short term memory of the beginner to the working long term memory of the expert. Once embedded in the working long term memory, the brain can short-cut the slow process of deliberation associated with juggling new rules stored in the short term memory. Indeed, the operation of working long term memory is like snap judgments or “gut decisions” you make on a daily basis because we have been there before and done that thing we wanted to do.

I believe that the neurological rewiring that occurs during focused attention is the driving mechanism behind the deliberative practice process for learning.  Only focused attention can trigger the brain into the process of rewiring the brain. Self-reflection over the feedback seems to be the important element needed to move a skill from short term memory to the working long-term memory. Often, after I’ve practiced a new technique in tennis, a burst of energy and satisfaction of having let my natural  Self 2 do what it does best without interferences of past experience, doubt or negativity. This is probably a consequence of some kind of rewiring. The repetition of this self-awareness in deliberative practice results in the most effective rewiring, leading ultimately to a state of mastery where the activity can be done quickly, and without effort.

http://boscoh.com/books/towards-mastery-deliberative-practice-flow-and-personality-traits

Creating Trusted Business Relationships: Be a Person for Others

Daily Quote: ”I’m not concerned with your liking or disliking me… All I ask is that you respect me as a human being.” – Jackie Robinson, First African American Major League baseball player

“The friendships which last are those wherein each friend respects the other’s dignity to the point of not really wanting anything from him.”- Cyril Connolly

Reflection:

Core of Respect for others is a mindset that fosters building effective and long-term trusting relationships.  In this instance, it involves listening to and understanding the other person, noticing details about them and their situation, and then taking an active role in doing something about it. I really consider this to be a strong Quality of worklife (QWL) culture where respect + solution oriented action =friendship and loyalty. Taking action is about participating rather than observing which is essentially communicating disinterest or not caring behavior. Unique connected behavior has the benefit of the concept many are calling purpose-centered behavior which is the reward system for doing the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. Everything we do, say and act on has a reaction –there are no neutral moves. Because we are connected, almost as quickly as one positive happens the next is sure to follow. This concept is so important, it will change the way you think and do things indefinitely as well as everyone you come into contact with.

Call for Action: What can you to today to create trust and respect at your work place?  Use the Stop-Think-Do technique to get started in creating a more respectful climate and more trusted relationships.   

Daily quote and reflection: Power of Self-Efficacy and Suspension of Disbelief

 

Daily Quote: “It is very important to understand that change is not the triumph of heart over head — it is the unique intersection of both.”  David Caruso

Reflection: One constant in life is change. How we learn to live with change depends on our experience and mental-set. An unpleasant or painful experience may program your mental-set  to either avoid or see new experiences as an opportunity and a challenge. It all depends on how we perceive the original event and process it into our long-term memory. Some of my clients are bored or “stuck” in their marriage or career, or their lives in general. By remaining in their habits and status quo ways, they are denying themselves opportunities to see the possibilities in their life and fall short of their full potential. Self-mastery is knowing when to learn new skills or take on new responsibilities, when to hold on to beliefs that serve you, and when to let go of beliefs, thinking and behaviors that do not fulfill your potential and serve you.

Self-efficacy is the context-specific assessment of belief in our personal capabilities to organize and execute what is required so as to achieve the intended goal. It is concerned not with the skills we have, but rather with our control over our own level of functioning. People with high self-efficacy choose more demanding tasks. They set higher goals, put in more effort, and persist longer than those who are low in self-efficacy.

Self-efficacy grows through personal and vicarious experience, discipline, and valid feedback. Although usually considered in a single context, there may also be a generalized effect reflecting a person’s abilities across a broad array of difficult or novel situations. For instance, if someone is loved by a supportive family on the home front, then that person will display a greater confidence on the job. This will be reflected by peer and management feedback, which will, in turn, show up on the home front, perpetuating the cycle.

How can you better address change in your life? Here are some tips:

• Envision. Look at the big picture—what the end result will be. That way you won’t become so overwhelmed with the small details.
• See change as an opportunity to try something new or to do things in a different way.
• Do your homework. Find out all you can about what is changing so that it will make you feel more confident as it happens.
• Believe that no matter what happens, you can deal with it, and that in some way you will learn from it.

What are you turning away from personally or professionally that needs to be addressed? In the end, if you don’t make the changes in your life, life will make them for you.

Want to reduce Stress and Performance anxiety for next Presentation?

Deliberate practice, good preparation in knowing your topic,  and an authentic connection pays big dividends in reducing performance anxiety. Next time you need to   present to an audience, follow these four steps:

1.Keep audience focused and interested by capturing their attention in the first 8 seconds of the speech. You want them to lean in and be curious about what you have to say–Check-out my past blog on how to accomplish this in as little as 8 seconds. http://thewick.wordpress.com/2012/01/17/

2. Be confident in your topic. Your audience already believes that you’re the expert, so don’t try to bluff. If the people you’re presenting to feel you’re unsure of your material, they’ll lose interest in your presentation.

3. Be ready for questions.  Imagine questions people might ask. Construct answers before you give your speech. Either incorporate the answers into your presentation or be ready to provide them during Q&A.

4. Memorize the first minute of your presentation. You experience your greatest anxiety at the beginning of a speech. Knowing the opening of your presentation will give you a good start.

5. Start with audience interactive activity–like completing a one page inventory on the topic to be presented , such as Stress Management. Have audience members complete self-awareness and goal setting sheet. Then use the Pair-Share discussion tool where audience members share with a neighbor their reactions to the inventory and one change goal for the day. After 10 min you can introduce yourself and do a de-brief. Everyone gets engaged and you learn about the audience members level of understanding and needs.

New Poem–One Shining Moment

 

 

One Shining Moment by MW Hardwick  

 

Weaves in and out from defenders

Reaches out and grabs the bounce pass

He dribbles around the screen and glances at the basket

On the hard courts

rich in texture and color

He jump stops

And gazes at the rim,

He fakes and then shoots,

Up in the air

Raising his cocked arm

Above his head

Snaps the wrist

And follows through like fish-hook

And years of deliberate practice

Tells him it is always good

This day and this moment

Is all there is

All pieced together

This one final moment…

The shooting hand

And eyes fix on the rim

As fan noise reaches a climax

Hear the swoosh…swoosh…

Of the net

Now enjoy and love,

One Shining Moment…Moment of truth…

Oh, my God…

Choosing One’s Way Meaningful Constructive Living Framework and Smart-Step Change Process

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms-to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” Victor Frankl 

Constructive Living necessitates the elimination of self-sabotaging thinking and behavior. It requires more self-directed action and the creation of a meaningful life purpose and process.

The technique used to facilitate this transformation is what I call the Smart-Step Centering process. It is all about establishing a clear and meaningful purpose, confidence through positive self-talk and skill development through realistic practice, feedback and execution plans.

Smart-Steps framework is more manageable in developing positive behavior changes then a more general or holistic approach. Smart-Steps allow the client to focus on the goal and the process instead of judging performance (based on fears, false expectations and results). For example, process goals help people to focus on being in the moment and responding in a responsive way to others and their environment. It helps people turn shyness and nervousness energy into positive enthusiasm for interacting and understanding others. Here are some essential components of the Smart-Step Process as applied to interpersonal communication.

1.  Clarify and agree to an agenda and expectations for your time together. Start interaction by asking questions and listening to the other person. Show interest and sincere concern in hearing their story.

2. Monitor and Edit yourself. Sincerely listen and try to meet the other person’s need to share and be understood by not giving advice, judging their behavior or opinions.    Show them that you have their best interest at heart.

3. Soften your “connection”.  Be friendly and welcoming. Too much, too soon and too strong usually leads to suspicion and resistance from others.

4. Accept influence. A presentation succeeds to the extent that the presenter can accept influence from the audience members. Be responsive to audience comments or concerns. Be quick on your feet and flexible to show your care.

5.  Respect and Encourage candid dialogue. Understand how to become a better listener, give positive feedback, and mirror the other person’s gestures and body language. Learned to model the good habits and positive energy you would like others to show you.

7. Focus on the optimistic “POV”. Try to connect with and understand the other person’s view of the world. Interpersonal conversations work best when you are experienced as a caring and respectful listener So make at least three-five times as many positive statements as negative comments.

Once you understand the Smart-Step process you are on the road to significant personal change.  Process goals replace personal expectations and help performers focus on what is really important during a performance – being audience centered and in the moment. Being and living in the moment is critical to developing confidence. It means learning to trust, believe in yourself and developing a sense of being vulnerable and at risk. Trust is directly related to your ability to be open and is experienced as authentic by others. Make sure you leave a good first impression and this could turn-out to be the start of a life-long friendship.

 

 

Time management isn’t our problem–but our need to manage our energy is critical for success.

Quote: To recharge themselves, individuals need to recognize the costs of energy-depleting behaviors and then take responsibility for changing them, regardless of the circumstances they’re facing.

The lack of focused time and thus stress and burnout be an epidemic, but the problem isn’t in what we say. It’s what we do and how we set priorities and use a limited amount of our precious energy. For all the people writing about the importance of the “sustainable development” of our economy, how many are there worrying about the sustainability of our own body energy ? Research reports that a disciplined and focused lifestyle effectively helps in achieving more in less time. Don’t miss this excellent article by Tony Schwartz it provides a whole new perspective on how to manage and expand that valuable resource called energy. Take the self-assessment tool provide by Mr Schwartz to see if you are heading for a personal energy crisis. Good Luck and fun with this it will provide a reading on your ability to recovery and stay healthy in our fast-paced world. http://hbr.org/2007/10/manage-your-energy-not-your-time/ar/1

Daily Quote And Reflection: Top Athletes and Singers have Coaches–Why not You?

Quote:” Elite performers, researchers say, must engage in “deliberate practice”—sustained, mindful efforts to develop the full range of abilities that success requires. You have to work at what you’re not good at. In theory, people might be able to use self-coaching, but most people do not know where to start or how to proceed. Expertise, as the formula goes, requires going from unconscious incompetence to conscious incompetence to conscious competence and finally to unconscious competence. The coach provides the outside eyes and ears, and makes you aware of where you’re falling short. This is tricky. Human beings resist exposure and critique; our brains are well defended. So coaches use a variety of approaches—showing what other, respected colleagues do, for instance, or reviewing videos of the subject’s performance. The most common, however, is just conversation.” Top Athletes and Singers have Coaches. Should you? Atul Gawande

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/10/03/111003fa_fact_gawande?currentPage=all

Action Challenge: Given that we can all improve our skills the question for you in the next week is to identify–What areas would you like a coach to assist or provide feedback on so that you can become a more effective professional? 

Daily Quote and Reflections: Power of Genuineness in Building Trusted Partnerships

Quote: ”You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you.” Dale Carnegie

Reflection : Genuinely caring for and recognizing the accomplishments of others helps to create unique connections and builds trusting relationships. This approach reduces competition with others and creates a more positive and collaborative climate to accomplish goals and increase work place satisfaction. Confidence is required to command respect, but authenticity and genuineness are the glue for building long-term relationships.

Action Challenge: In the next thirty days create a relationship development plan consisting of five key people in your life and commit to building a “trusted partnership”. One suggestion is to show more positivity toward them by doing specific activities that focus on recognizing and supporting their effort to accomplish their goals.   

Daily Quote and Reflection: Oh shit–What a blooper. What to do?

Quote: ”The team that makes the most mistakes will win”- Coach John Wooden, UCLA Basketball

” When you make a mistake, turn your attention to what comes next. Focus on doing well, with full mind and heart. Look ahead, not back.” Patrica Ryan Madson    

Reflection: The ability to edit yourself and refocus is important when you make a mistake in any performing art. I hear a speaker the other day talk about the way to handle mistakes. He said we have two directions to go–

1. Shrink inwardly and focus on the error. Saying negative things like I really “blew that”  ”Oh, boy am I stupid” and other negative self-talk.

2. Find a way to stay in the moment,  self-correct and move-on.

I guess most of us would like to follow the second path. But how do you regain your footing and pull yourself together to go on. Most speakers use what I call “fillers” at this point-um, ahs, you knows etc. to get by.  The temporary pause can be embarrassing and confusing for anyone.

From over thirty years of studying and coaching I would recommend a device that Patrica Ryan Madson recommends in her little but powerful book called Improv Wisdom. She relates how to shake the tendency of self-blame and withdrawal when a blooper happens by thinking about the “blooper” as a wake-up call–to re-energize yourself and become more alert by taking this mistake seeing what you can make of it. I agree because nothing in live can be done perfectly.  My solution has always been to pause, take a deep breath and correct your mistake. Audiences are forgiving because they have experienced similar situations. The mistake shows that you are a “fallible human being”. The key to getting through this rough patch is to show flexibility and a sense of humor by accepting what just happened and continue to create the best outcome that you can.

Action Activity: The next time something doesn’t go well in your life–you get a flat on the way to the airport, the dog leaves a puddle on the rug, the birthday party was a bomb, best planned vacation was a disaster, you got slammed by your evaluations for an important presentation what is your reaction? Stop observe what you did and said and reflect how could you do better to handle your disappointment.