Introverts and Extroverts Value Their Contacts

Who are you connecting with this week?

My Master Mind groups this month have been focusing on their key contacts for business and relationship development.

It is common strategy for pipeline development to make a certain number of calls weekly, seeking
face time with those in the position to make decisions on the services we offer.

Although it isn't a particularly favorite task of many introverts, picking up the phone to stay in touch is beneficial. Not only does it give us practical skills in conversation development and getting to the point, it helps us exercise our rapport-building strategies while leading to appointment development.

Valoria Hoover, past Ohio Women's Bar Association president and co-founder of the OWBA Foundation, says "An attorney does nothing for themselves. You represent others, so you must know others." Getting outside of our selves and reaching out to others for support, feedback and assistance are key to practice development, no matter your introvert/extrovert temperament.

Staying connected is key. Whether through email or phone calls, we must schedule time with others. While it shows how much we value those we spend time with, it also helps us fine-tune our understanding of their circumstances and needs.

Who are you reaching out to, today?

With a Little Help from my Friends

As we consider the relationships around us, key relationships and those who are dear to us, we rightly value our impact on them. Do we also value their impact on us?

Just this week, several individuals have shared both concerns and successes regarding friends and doing business.

One had taken the difficult step (in his mind) of reaching out to individuals of long-standing relationship to seek advice/assistance while prospecting. On telling his success he shared the observation that the situation wasn't nearly as difficult or cumbersome as he expected.

"But of course," were the responses of several of his friends. "I would be glad to help." What a relief after he had anticipated hesitation and possible loss of friendship.

Another individual shared a need to take care in handling a possible opportunity for purchasing a friend's business. "This is new to me," he offered. "Not only have I never bought a business before. I want to do right by my friend. This is one of my biggest challenges right now."

How do you feel when asking friends to help with business or business connections?

I was at a women's leadership luncheon yesterday which focused on the theme of Asking. One of the presenters suggested, "When we ask, we allow giving to happen". The same is when we ask friends for advice, support, assistance whether in business or personal matters.

Take care with these relationships, yet while taking care, trust that you have the relationship to ask for help. The Beatles, your mother, your boss and your friends will appreciate it.

Are You Practiced or Engaging?

How is your delivery with the routine things you say? Practiced or engaging?

I used to be a BNI member when I was in business in Toledo.

The idea was each week we would have something different to say about ourselves and our work, opening the minds of those in the room to how they could remember us between meetings for referring business our way.

To get this result, we needed to work at our 60-second introduction.

What Your Audiences Fear #2

Yesterday's post addressed the number one fear of audiences - speakers wasting their time. Today's fear is a very close second.

Audiences fear when we speakers focus on things they don't understand.

As a past high school teacher, I remember the number of times I did this in my own classroom. It's painful for students to sit through a class feeling unaware. Emotionally they are left with a complex of not feeling smart enough.

Can you relate to my high school students, listening to a presenter who speaks over your head? Who uses jargon or language you don't understand? Who gets carried away with information or stories you cannot relate to? Then you know first-hand the problem associated with audience fear #2 - feeling left out.

What this leads to is frustration, anger, exasperation and sometimes even hostility. It comes from feeling trapped listening to something that makes us feel inadequate. We presenters don't want audiences responding this way. It's stressful enough just getting in front of audiences.

We want to make the most out of our time with audiences, getting signs of reflection or approval, even participation.

So if we introverts are the presenters, consider how often we get emotionally overwhelmed when presenting that we only focus on what we know, forgetting the audience. That's when the spigot is turned on and our presentation flows on and on from an endless supply of information that often makes our listeners feel they are facing a fire hose. We have blasted them with information. Now they must defend themselves by throwing questions our way or escaping.

We presenters must make ourselves clear.

We presenters not only must relate to our audiences, we must remember that any time we are addressing them, we must connect what they know to what we know and from there move forward to inform or motivate.

Notice the order here: connect what they know to what we know. This order defers to our listeners first and then respectfully connects their world to ours. Not the other way around.

The first order of business for us presenters to defer focus to an audience is to discover their world, relevant to the presentation topic. Discovering the world of others may not be usual for an introvert, yet using our research and analytical abilities, it is in our skill set. While it puts our value on hold temporarily, deferring to our audience creates a relationship that leads us to be highly valued.

Therefore, we presenters must connect our audience circumstances to our topic. From there we presenters have a connection with our audiences that keeps them from escaping, instead, focused on familiar territory and following your lead.

Remove this second most common audience fear and make yourselves clear!

What Your Audiences Fear

When I first started speaking in front of attorneys, I feared they would not value topics in communication.

Why? I didn't relate to their world. Their training, their intelligence, their experiences all seemed a world apart from mine. Could I position the value I experience in such a way as to relate to them? If not, I would be wasting their time.

Fortunately I quickly learned several ways to relate to attorneys, and therefore, I learned how to NOT waste their time.

The number one fear of our very important listeners is we will waste their time.

Stand Up for Confidence

My mentor has me reading the book, Selling to VITO, the Very Important Top Officer by Anthony Parinello. Full of perspective on how to think, behave and speak like a top officer, Parinello echoes what I have heard others say about boosting your confidence level - stand up.

When it's Time to Uproot

One of the things that shakes my values is the Bible.

This isn't going to be a rant on religion or Christianity - simply a focus on everything being acceptable. I hope you get my point in a few minutes.

 If you are a regular reader, you know that about 5 days ago we moved, because I focused a post on the impact of clutter.

But today I am recalling what it takes to shift from being settled to unsettled and then finding our way back to becoming settled again - until next time.

Getting uprooted is a true test of my values.