Again about the previous post: I think short form content has been unfairly demonised and long form overly romanticised A better way to think about this is: Long form helps you think / find out what you’re trying to say. Short form helps you get the points across. (This frame applies to both reading &…
Category: Communication
Saying “I’m doing a couple of projects on Content, L&D, and Knowledge Management consulting now” is less effective than “do let me know if you knew anyone who needs help with their content strategy, L&D, onboarding, training, and enablement”. Be more direct. even if you think it’s obvious, even when you knew they do have…
Back in Sept 2020 (wow it’s been a while! just checked my note’s timestamp) I joined a group in Meetup called Unhurried Denver. What is it? It’s part of the Unhurried movement started by Johnnie Moore, a guy I came across when listening to On the Edge podcast. Quoting their section on Unhurried Conversations: https://www.unhurried.org/conversations…
Been reading Nancy Duarte’s book: Resonate. https://www.duarte.com/presentation-organization-different-structures/ Quick reference for structuring your presentations: These four structures have contrast inherently built into them, and work for persuasive presentations: Problem-solution: Arrange information by stating the problem and then the solution. Establishing that there’s a problem helps convince people of the need for change. Compare-contrast: Arrange information according…
Been thinking and reading (again) about the real challenges with trying to solve problems in a group. Thanks to these two tweets, which I stumbled upon, two days apart. https://twitter.com/mscccc/status/1430986038252654600 https://twitter.com/seanjtaylor/status/1430369389602217994 Rabbit hole, here I go. They say if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. My…
I’ve shared some practical tips about how to prepare for, lead, and participate in meetings in my other newsletter. Now let’s look at some principles and frameworks to help us think about meetings. Why can’t we have good meetings? One reason is because we’re still spending time sitting in bad meetings. Cancel that meeting if…
I am learning to be less efficient in my communication. Lately I realised I am too obsessed about communicating efficiently that it hurts the effectiveness. I am not getting my message across as well as I could. My tendency is to distill what I want to say into the most precise and succinct set of…
Let’s now take one extra step and attempt to distil everything we’ve learned so far into 16 sins of Modern Communication. 1. Not aware of your Intent (change behavior, change mental state, change emotional state) 2. Not documenting before conversing (missing Context) 3. Not documenting after conversing (vaporising Content) 4. Diverging aimlessly (false Maturity, likely…
Stumbled upon the idea of “radical listening” on Twitter. It complements the Three Types of Listening I learned the other day, so I decided to share it here today. First, what is this “radical listening” thing? Dr. Jason Purnell, an esteemed community leader, professor, and researcher at Washington University, said this: “[Radical listening is…] listening…
https://twitter.com/buster/status/1182390032671203328 Buster Benson’s book “Why Are We Yelling“ was one of my favorite books last year. I personally believe that everyone in this digital era of information torrent and opinion floodgate could benefit from learning and practicing the skill of arguing productively. It’s a light read filled with real stories and 100 of Buster’s illustrations.…