10 Things To Consider When Setting Up a New Training Room

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Twenty five years ago, I was fresh out of graduate school. I took a job with LTV (no, it’s not a TV station). Some of my friends thought it was some type of MTV off shoot. They were a defense contractor that manufactured the MLRS (multiple launch rocket system). LTV corporation had filed for chapter 11 and was attempting to give away their pension obligation to the Pension Bureau Guarantee Corporation.

I learned how to do something with nothing at LTV. Budgets were scarce. Facilities were challenging. My office was in a temporary (which soon became permanent) trailer. It wasn’t uncommon for roof links to occur.

My job was training specialist. It wasn’t unusual to get booted out of a classroom because of something better going on in the neighborhood. I found myself carrying overhead projectors from space to space and learning to conduct training in less than ideal locations.

There are hidden costs of bad or inadequate training spaces. Professionals spend lots of time shuffling materials from room to room. Participants are left with less than ideal experiences. The companies reputation can be tarnished.

In 1990, I went to work for Arco Oil and Gas Company. They had an entire floor of a Dallas high rise dedicated to training space. I was salivating! I felt like a kid in a candy store. ARCO had budgets for training. I jetted around the world and in 1 year conducted 183 days of scheduled training in multiple locations.

In 1993, I went out on my own. I have flown well over 1 million miles with American and have seen many examples of training facilities. I will give you my top suggestions if you are planning to create a new training space.

Have you heard of Learnist? It’s available as an iPad app. It allows you to capture learning and create a magazine like compilation of internet research. I compiled a Training Space review at this Learnist link. You may have to sign in with your facebook id.

Here are my top 10 considerations when planning a new training space or facility.

1. Exterior doors are a nice to have. It will prevent people from going in and out of the training room and disturbing others working as well as the training program. The door should be at the back of the room. Have you ever opened a door to realize that the entire class is staring at you? It can be quite traumatic.

2. Good lighting. Nothing is worse than sitting in a dimly lit room for long periods of time. Make sure lighting is adjustable so that LCD projector is easily viewed by all. Also windows should have shades so that it’s not too bright to see a projected image. Automatic shades are preferable; however, sometimes mechanical problems arise after years of usage.

3. Use soft light colors. Research best colors to use in a learning environment.

4. Use industrial carpet to muffle sounds.

5. Pick chairs and tables that are easily moved. Lightweight with wheels is good. Very often trainers will be rearranging room set-up at the last minute. Classroom style is fine for employee communication meetings, U shape is best for interactive discussions. Small tables is best when there will be lots of small group discussions. Room set-up affects the quality of discussion.

6. Install phone line, Internet Ethernet line, or wireless Internet easily accessible to employees and guests.

7. Make sure you select an LCD projector that easily connects to most devices. Read online reviews. Brightness of projection and ease of connection are important. Instructions for usage can help the technically challenged presenter.

8. Buy several high quality flip-charts. There is a difference between easels and flip-chart stands. Buy the stable flip-charts. Nothing is worse than trying to write on a flimsy chart that keeps jumping around. If masking tape is used to hang flip-chart paper around the room, walls may become damaged over time. If it were me, I would probably just plan on repainting every 2-3 years. Another option is to put a cork board strip around the room where you can hang flip-charts with push pins.

9. A refrigerator in room stocked with water and juices and a quality coffee maker can sit in the back of the room.

10. Storage closets should allow flip-charts and equipment storage. Strict ground rules for storage need to be established. Otherwise, the storage room will quickly be filled with old unused training materials and handouts.

Here is a compilation of pictures of nice training facilities.

People Don’t Buy What You Do, They Buy Why You Do It

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Leaders start with the why before explaining the how. Martin Luther King wrote the I Have a Dream Speech, not the I Have a Plan Speech. There is great validity to this concept. Lately, everywhere I turn, I’m seeing a similar message.

Steve Jobs once said, “You’ve got to find what you love. Going to bed at night saying I’ve done something wonderful. That’s what matters.” See the Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs post.

The late Steven Covey says Leadership is an inside out approach that begins with personal trustworthiness, then interpersonal trust, then managerial empowerment.

I enjoyed Simon Sinek’s presentation at the Ted conference concerning How Great Leaders Inspire Action. Simon explores why Apple, Martin Luther King, and the Wright brothers have been successful while others were not. He proposes that all great leaders begin with the “Why”, then “How”, and finally the “What”.

The Why is your purpose. He suggests that marketing communication begin with the “Why”. Apple begins with “Everything we do, we believe in challenging the Status Quo. We believe in thinking differently. The way we challenge the Status Quo is by making our products beautifully designed, simple to use, and user friendly. We just happen to make computers. Wanta buy one?”

Start with the why, then move to the how, and finally the what.

People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.

Simon suggests that the reason is rooted in biology. Emotional Intelligence research suggests that we tend to feel before we think. This data seems to be consistent with Simon’s premise.

Simon tells the story of Samuel Pierpont Langley vs. Orville & Wilbur Wright. He suggests that Samuel Langley was driven by the paycheck and fame, while Orville and Wilbur were driven by a noble purpose. See the history of Samuel Langley here.

Simon says that 2.5% are innovators, 13.5% are early adopters, 34% early majority, 34% late majority, then 16% laggards. The only reason laggards buy touch tone phones is because they no longer make rotary phones.

It seems that the tipping point occurs between 15-18% market penetration. The early majority will not try something until someone else has tried it first.

Simon suggests that TiVo could have been much more successful if their marketing message would have started with the why.

For example, if you are the kind of person who likes to have total control over every aspect of your life….Boy do we have a product for you! It pauses live TV, skips commercials, and memorizes your viewing habits.

In the summer of 1963, 250,000 people showed up to hear Martin Luther King speak. No invitations were sent out. There was no website where you could check the date. How do you do that?

Martin Luther King told people what he believed. He delivered the I have a Dream Speech, not the I have a plan speech. People who believed what he believed took on his cause and made it their own and they told people. 250,000 people didn’t show up for Martin Luther King. They showed up for themselves.

“If you hire people just because they can do a job, they’ll work for your money. But if you hire people who believe what you believe, they’ll work for you with blood and sweat and tears.” Simon Sinek

How can you incorporate the “Why” into your marketing message?

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Leadership Principles from Apollo 13

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Leadership Principles from Apollo 13

Failure is Not an Option

Apollo 13 was on its way to the Moon in April of 1970 when it experienced an explosion which damaged the oxygen system. For 3 days, 3 astronauts’ lives were at stake. Eugene Kranz was the leader responsible for leading the effort to get these astronauts home. For an in depth description of the Apollo 13 mission, see this Wikipedia article.

Here is a clip from the movie Apollo 13. Look for leadership examples in this movie clip.

What leadership did you see exhibited in this video?

In his book The Leadership Moment, cialis Michael Useem identifies several aspects of leadership that were crucial to Kranz’s success in returning the Apollo 13 crew safely to Earth.

Alleviating the Doom

Kranz battled against pessimism. Ground crew members warned “we’re losing it,” “we’re going down” and “we are at a point of losing everybody and everything.” Kranz quickly and firmly put an end to the pessimism. He exhorted his team “let’s everybody keep cool, let’s solve the problem.” He was clear in his expectation that “we don’t concede failure” and “we will never surrender.”

Optimists define bad things that happen to them in terms of causes which are temporary, specific, and changeable. Pessimists define the bad things that happen to them in terms of causes which are permanent, pervasive, and personal. See Martin Seligman’s book on Learned Optimism for more information.

Here is Martin Seligman’s talk on Ted.

Making Fast, Accurate Decisions

Kranz listened to people and encouraged different viewpoints. However, time was a scarce commodity. There was no time for analysis paralysis.

Organizing for Optimal Decisions

Once the crisis revealed itself, Kranz quickly reconfigured the organization to focus on the problem. He pulled one flight control team out of its normal role to work exclusively on finding solutions. He moved staff from team to team to bring in the specific knowledge, skills and experience he needed. Once in place, Kranz provided the team direction and then got out of the way to let them work. As Kranz explained “My job was basically to orchestrate all the players, recognize the problems, point people in the direction if we had more than one way to do a job, get the players to bring their stuff in, listen to them, and send them back.”

In the end, Apollo 13 and its crew splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean. Kranz’s strong leadership proved to be the key factor in the mission’s safe conclusion. As Kranz later said “Firmness at the helm was the only thing that was going to get us through.”

The story of Kranz, his team on the ground and the astronauts in the spacecraft is told in Tom Hanks’ movie Apollo 13. The movie is a great study in how to lead in a crisis. The famous line from the movie “failure is not an option” sums up how Engene Kranz approached his crisis.

As a leader, what opportunities do you have to:

Alleviate the doom?
Make fast accurate decisions?
Organize for optimal decisions?

Double Your Money Every 2-3 Years

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Have you ever heard of the rule of 72? 72 divided by the annualized return that you are able to get on your money and you have the amount of time required for your money to double. Let me give an example. If you were able to receive an annualized return of 36%, 72/36 equals 2.0. Therefore, if you were able to get a 36% annualized return on your money, your money would double every two years. Nice!

I know that 5/4 people aren’t good at math, but hear me out.

I was at a Cracker Barrel in Gainesville, TX. The cashier was having a hard time making change because the register was broken. I told him, “Don’t feel bad because 5/4 people aren’t good at math”. He said, “I believe it”. I said, “I don’t know, maybe it’s higher than that”. But I digress.

You’re next question might be, how can I ever get a 26-36% return on my investment? The 10 year treasure rate is 1.68% Well, funny that you should ask. I am going to show you how I’ve been trading covered calls on AAPL stock and we’ll do the math on them.

AAPL chart

AAPL chart 8/24/2012

Here’s a stock chart of AAPL on 8/24/2012. The closing price on Friday was $663. Here is the option chain for AAPL options.

AAPL option chain

AAPL option chain 8/24/2012

Let’s start by defining what an option is. Here’s an example. Let’s say your house is worth 100K. I pay you $5,000 today for an option to buy your house anytime within the next 5 years for $125,000. Theoretically, I would never exercise that option unless your home became worth at least $130,000.

On stock options, I prefer to sell OTM (out of the money) options expiring within the next 30 days. Why is that my preference? I think it’s human nature not to admit when you are wrong. People hang on to positions hoping that things will change. People probably bought these options 6-12 months ago and are hanging onto them, refusing to admit mistake. I’ll sell them for the last 30 days, because that’s when then most cost erosion takes place. In poker, I make money off of gamblers. In stock trading, I prefer to do the same.

As you can see, the Sept. 22 call options pay $12.50/contract. A contract is for 100 shares. Therefore, if I sold 1 contract, I would receive $1250. If the stock hits $680 by Sept. 22, I would make an extra $17/share or $1700 for those same 100 shares. Now, let’s do the math. $1250(option income)/$66300 (cost to buy 100 shares of AAPL)=.01885 If I multiply that by 12 to annualize it, it comes to 22.62%. I did it about a week ago, and the figure was 26%. If it hits 680 by Sept 22, here are the numbers, $1250 (option income)+$1700 (appreciation made from 663 to 680)/$66300 (cost to buy 100 shares of AAPL)=.04449. When I multiply this number by 12 in order to annualize it, it becomes 53% annualized.

The most common questions that I get is, “What could go wrong?”. Well, AAPL could go down and your covered call next month will be smaller than the 680. Let’s say it goes to 650, then your covered call option might be around 665. However, if you sell the covered call option every month, your cost basis of the stock is gradually reduced. How many years would it take before my cost basis on AAPL stock was 0? Well, using the 12.00 call option premium, 663/12=55.25. Therefore, in 4 years and 7 months, my cost basis for AAPL would be 0.

AAPL PEG 8/24/2012

My favorite stock ratio is the Price to Earnings Growth ratio. Basically, if the growth rate is higher than the Price/Earnings, then the stock is a bargain. Anything below 1.0 is good. Apple’s is .68. You might counter and say that you don’t trust the earnings estimates of the analysts. Maybe, you are right, but there’s lots of good stuff coming down the pike. For example, iPhone 5, iTV, iPad mini, China growth, and the 1 Billion just announced from the Samsung court case. AAPL missed it’s last earnings, but they also missed before the iPhone 4S came out, because people were waiting to upgrade. I think people are doing the same thing and waiting for the iPhone 5 to come out before upgrading.

How do you get out of the rat race? Lily Tomlin once said, “The problem with the rat race is that even if you win, you’re still a rat.” The only way out of the rat race is to have your passive income exceed your monthly expenses. Ever heard of the board game Cash Flow? It’s a great way to teach your spouse or teenager this concept. In the board game, everybody draws for an occupation. You have the chance to make investments along the way. In the beginning, you live “paycheck to paycheck”. You win the game by getting out of the rat race and having your passive income exceed your monthly expenses. Buying trinkets tends to set your back.

In poker, I try and get my chips in the middle when I’m ahead. I think the odds are in my favor. What do you think?

Leadership Lessons from Seinfeld

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Leadership Lessons from Seinfeld

Leadership Lessons From Seinfeld


A few months ago, Dr. Jerry Newman, see CREATIVE new product development, viagra talked to me about Little Bets by Peter Sims. When Seinfeld does a comedy routine during a concert, every comedy bit seems to be successful. However, his comedy routine has been perfected in small comedy clubs. He experiments with his material. He keeps the good stuff and eliminates the waste. See post on eliminate waste, add more good stuff.

I am trying this same concept in my business. I try an experiment and if it works, I keep doing it. If it doesn’t work, I eliminate it. I look at my career as a portfolio career. Just like a stock portfolio, you eliminate the things that are not working and do more of the things which are working.

It’s harder and harder to answer the question “What do you do?” at dinner parties.

I have a training and development company.
I’m a landlord.
I trade stocks and options. My favorite is AAPL.
I play poker. I played in the game with Phil Laak where he set the world record for the longest session.

World record for longest poker game.


I have a suite of apps available for iPad and iPhone under the MyMeetingPro brand.
I’m always trolling for business ideas that work.
I have a blog that I’m experimenting with and looking for ways to monetize.

What experiments are you conducting?

United Breaks Guitars and My Spirit

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Originally, I wanted to title the post, “United Breaks Guitars and Balls”. I struggled with whether that was offensive to anyone. My friend Lance said, “It’s not offensive, it happened in New Jersey and it’s common for them to say ‘Yo, your bustin my balls'”. After consulting several friends; however, I decided to go with the current title.

In my blog, I have given good examples of customer service. See my last post, Are These People Trying To Make My Life Difficult and you will see my recognition of extraordinary customer service at the NJ hotel. This time, however, I encountered an example of bad service and I’m about to tell you the details.

It all started at around 4:00 p.m. on Thursday. In my quest to use public transportation (See blog post Road Warriors Guide to Dallas Dart), I decided to take the NJ transit from Penn Station in NYC to Newark Airport. It was not a problem, the train left at 4:17, and I arrived at Newark airport around 5:00 p.m. It was plenty of time before my 7:00 departure. I arrived at the American ticket counter and was notified that my plane had been cancelled due to weather. Since the cancellation was weather related, I was on my own for hotel and they could reschedule me for the next morning. I clarified at least 3 times that there were no other alternatives. I think I’m rather good at acknowledging reality and making the best of it. I decided to get some dinner while I considered my options.

I arrived at Tony Roma’s and asked to be seated next to a plug in so that I could charge my phone. I was told that there were only electrical outlets behind the bar. I said, “how do you vacuum”. She smiled and said, “we don’t”. I walked away and sat on the cold tile floor in the middle of the airport walkway and plugged in my phone. I’m at Defcon 3. Here’s a description of Defcon if you need it from Wikipedia.

I walked through the restaurant and confirmed that their were no plug-ins. I sat at the bar and asked the bartender if she would plug in my phone which she did. I ordered ribs and mashed potatoes and began to research hotels in the area. I looked at the flight monitor and noticed that there was a United flight leaving at 8:00. It’s not my first flight rodeo. I have flown over 1 million miles with American and am Gold for life. I knew that airlines have cooperative relationships with other airlines and can sometimes write tickets covered by other airlines. However, if United could fly into Dallas airport, why does American cancel its flight due to bad weather? I called the Platinum service desk at American. The service agent was on hold with United for 30 minutes, then came back on the phone and told me that she had me a ticket on United that left at 8:00. She gave me the record locator. I paid my bill and made a mad dash for the United ticket counter.

When I arrived at the ticket counter, there were 2 employees with very few customers. I plopped my bag down in the center weigh area. One lady said, “You have to use the kiosk or you’re gonna have to wait”. She was in the customer area. Apparently she had lost her earring and was looking for it. The other employee was hammering away on his keyboard and had not acknowledged my presence. I stood there for what seemed like an eternity. Then I stated, “I’m not sure who is waiting on me”. He then said, “You need to swipe your credit card in the kiosk”. I said, “I did and it told me to see a service agent”. (I just went to DEFCON 2) He said, “I need your ID”. I gave him the ID and he proceeded to complete his War and Peace typing project. I told him that I had the record locator and gave it to him. He informed me that the Dallas flight left from terminal C. He also said that he would need the United ticket number. I exhaled with frustration, then called the American Platinum service agent. She said, “He should be able to look it up by the record locator. I said, “I know, this is ridiculous.” She agreed and proceeded to read me a list of numbers. I listened and repeated these numbers to the United agent. Being all about efficiency, I asked him if he would mind talking to the American agent himself. He then uttered the magic words that took me to DEFCON 1. “I don’t talk to nobody” Wow…I was amazed. I took out my phone, and took his picture as he ducked his head in shame. From now on, I will refer to him as IDTTN (I don’t talk to Nobody)

Mr. I don't talk to nobody

I don’t talk to nobody

I knew I didn’t get a very good picture, so I went to take another one of IDTTN. He said, “Why are you taking my picture”. I said, “Because, I want to tell the world how rude you are”. He informed me that he was going to go talk to American on my behalf but not anymore! I was then informed by his partner in crime that I could not take pictures in the area or I would be arrested. I don’t know if I said it or just thought it, but I thought, “Arrest me”. After researching this, I think she was totally wrong. Here’s the link to that question at the TSA website.

I then rushed to terminal C where I met a big line. I waited in the line for 30 minutes while an American agent gave me a ticket number which I wrote on a newspaper with magic marker. I got to the kiosk, swiped my credit card and was told that it was too late to check a bag. To my right, there was a lady with a kid screaming at a ticket agent. I found an agent who was talking to a man who didn’t speak English. I asked her about my dilemma and she said that my bags were not too large and could be carried onto the flight. I inquired about baggies for toiletries and was informed that they no longer required them. I went back to check in again at the Kiosk and was told that I could no longer be checked in via the kiosk. I told the ticket agent, who asked for my ID and she printed my ticket. Wow….20 minutes to get there. I ran to security. My bag had a bottle of water that was confiscated. I ran to my flight, barely arrived, and then sat on the tarmac for at least an hour.

On the flight, the flight attendants were pleasant. They informed me apologetically, however, that there were no pillows or blankets on the flight. I was so exhausted, I attempted to use my shoe covered with a magazine for a pillow as I had 3 seats in the back to myself.

Upon awakening, I searched for a United magazine. I knew that there would be some customer service message from the President somewhere. I couldn’t help myself as I tore this page out and smiled. Here is an excerpt from that message.

Welcome aboard, and thanks for choosing to fly United. We appreciate your business, and we’ll do our best to deliver a good travel experience for you. At United, we’re investing in our product, our technology, our fleet, our facilities, and our people so that we can continue to improve your travel experience.

I wonder if he’s been to terminal A at Newark and met IDTTN or I can’t find my earring? Has he seen the third world chaos at terminal C that was as close to a lynch mob that I’ve seen?

I guess I shouldn’t feel bad, here’s a link where United lost a 10 year old girl.

Did you guys hear about the guy who had his guitar broken by United? He tried to get them to fix it and they refused. He told them that he was going to write a song about them. They said, “Good luck with that”. He produced the song and got 14 million hits. They offered to pay for it after that if he would take down the video. He said, “Good luck with that”.

Here’s his video. I love it! Enjoy!

So what do I hope to accomplish with this blog post? I want an uprising. I want you to turn good customer service into heroic celebrations. I want you to expose bad customer service where it exists so that we can send these companies out of business. I want the airline industry to wake up and implement good hiring, selection, training, and incentive programs in order to create “service” companies.

Here are a few customer experiences that should be emphasized.

1. Make eye contact with customers
2. Information Technology should create systems that don’t require so much typing. This is 2012 for God’s sake!
3. Agents should empathize with customers who have been stranded and do whatever it takes to help them.

This is just the beginning. What ideas do you have for improving service in the airline industry?

If you enjoyed the United Breaks Guitars, here’s the second and third video clip.

If we can help improve your service experience, contact us.

Are These People Trying To Make My Life Difficult?

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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There were 4, sildenafil pills now there’s 3.

I’m sitting here at a hotel lobby in New Jersey. While preparing for today’s blog post, an employee sees me and asks if I want cupcakes….YEAH! There are pockets of good service out there. But too often, we seem surrounded by difficult, challenging characters.

Every now and then I get asked to conduct a team-building session where it’s really one person on the team who makes things difficult. Too often, leaders herd everyone into a team-building session where individual coaching or feedback would be the best solution.

I have learned the hard way to look for this tendency ahead of time. This story describes the incident which taught me about feedback, abusive characters, and the challenges of facilitation.

I was asked to facilitate a team-building session at a local community college. It’s been my experience when working with college faculty that sometimes it feels very much like herding cats (See Herding Cats blog post). For one thing, college faculty seem to be independent and accustomed to being in charge. Perhaps, it stems from being dictatorial in the classroom. Perhaps, it stems from a paradigm that “Life is like a PHD dissertation”.

The larger group was divided into smaller groups and they were discussing ways to work together more effectively. One man said to his female colleague, “I’ve been teaching communication for 20 years, I think I know the right definition of communication”. I watched the female recipient of this comment exhale and look to heaven for help. During a break, I went to her and asked, “How did that feel when he said that to you?” She said, “Oh, he’s always ripping somebody”. I said, “Would you ever be willing to talk to him about how you like to be communicated with?”. She said….I think I could do that. I said….I encourage you to.

At the end of the session, I had asked members of the team to offer actions/commitments which improve the team effectiveness. The same man who had made the earlier statement said, “WELL I KNOW THE REST OF YOU WILL FIND THIS HARD TO BELIEVE, BUT WHAT I WROTE DOWN IS TO MORE OPENLY SPEAK MY MIND…..AND TO ALLOW OTHERS TO DO THE SAME THING TOWARD ME”. As I captured this comment on the flip-chart, I thought…….”He just gave you permission to give him feedback”. But in my heart I thought, “But do you have the guts, cause he would just as soon rip you as anybody!”. In that moment, I reminded myself of my purpose, “Feel the fear and do it anyway when it’s the right thing to do“. Was it the right thing to do? Hell yeah! That’s why they hired me to facilitate the session.

What’s the best way to give difficult feedback? Privately……and intervene in the least threatening and embarrassing way, and increase the courage until the behavior improves. As everyone was leaving, I asked my target, “Hey, do you mind sticking around for a second?”. Now it was private.

My goal is to give feedback which is descriptive and not evaluative. Descriptive involves describing the facts just exactly as they happened. Evaluative is to say…..what the hell is wrong with you?

I said, “When you said to your colleague, ‘I’ve been teaching communication for 20 years, I think I know the right definition of communication’, did you happen to notice her body language?”. He said, “As soon as I said that, I knew I shouldn’t have said that, I need to apologize to her”. I said, “I encourage you to do that”.

Several weeks later, I was back doing some more work with this organization. An individual from the team, told me of another tense interaction with the challenging individual. He said the individual was being his normally abusive self…..then seemed to stop himself….apologized….and self corrected. I said, “Great….early warning signs of self-control”.

I bet that guy came from a family where every night they had some knock down drag out fight around the dinner table. Somebody went to bed in tears as a family member said, “They can’t handle the truth”. He then came to work thinking that that’s the way you communicate. He had never had a work group before that was willing to train him. Until now! Most people are trainable. Very few people get up in the morning, look in the mirror and think, “My goal today is to be difficult”.

Learn to say what needs to be said while preserving a good working relationship.

In future blog posts, I’ll discuss the balance between courage and consideration. But tonight, I’m taking my cupcakes and going to bed, because I’ve got a bit day tomorrow.

If you need help forging a more effective team, let’s discuss your strategy.

The great tech divide: Man Vs Woman? [Infographic]

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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From PC Site Wed, August 8th 2012

Who is making the most of computers in the Digital Age? IT is still considered a male dominated area, but as you’ve seen above, womankind is no stranger to computers.

Most people who work in digital publishing will tell you of the importance social media in this day and age, and as the more sociable of the two sexes, you would kind of expect women to be taking the lion’s share of online access.

Men tend to use computers for more individual purposes like streaming sports and computer games. We see in the infographic that from an early age, the fairer sex has had a greater contribution to the online community via blogs and social platforms. The spotty basement dwelling fellas do their bit, but it cannot be denied a lot of them are dismissed as the trolls that they are, or they’re just so niche they’re barely legible to the everyman. They still claim a greater online territory to their female counterparts.

The scales aren’t weighted too much in favour of men; the main difference is, in all likelihood, that women just have better things to do. infographic by PC Site

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Melissa Stewart

Melissa Stewart

Purveyor of Possibility, Passionista, MavHERick, Entrepreneur & Coffee Addict.

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Twitter: MelissaOnline

Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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I’m preparing for a trip to New Jersey. I’m going to be coaching an executive on Presentation Skills. I taught Introduction to Speech Communication at Oklahoma State University many moons ago. I enjoyed the experience and learned a lot about the deep fear that most students have concerning giving presentations. The fear of public speaking is the number one fear among people. The fear of death is number 3.

I’m putting together my plan and in doing so, I was reviewing some information on the Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs.

One of the principles is:

Develop a Messianic Sense of Purpose

Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water, cure or do you want to change the world?

Steve Jobs once said, “You’ve got to find what you love. Going to bed at night saying I’ve done something wonderful. That’s what matters.”

Steve was trying to recruit Sculley to join Apple. Sculley was reluctant and was working for Pepsi. Steve asked John, “Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?”

Steve also was a believer in the rule of 3. One of his most meaningful presentations was put together like a 3 act play. There were 3 musketeers not 4. There were 3 stooges. There were 3 little pigs. Something is powerful about 3.

Steve was also a fan of introducing the antagonist.

Macintosh

Macintosh in 1984

In 1984, Steve Jobs introduced the Macintosh. At the time, Big Blue (IBM) represented the villain. In this long lost video, the new Macintosh speaks in rustic 1984 computer language and says about IBM, “never trust a computer that you can’t lift”.

Thin compute

Computer is so thin it can fit inside an office mail envelope

Steve Jobs uses visual images and demonstrations to make important points. It makes a much bigger impact than bullet points and statistics. It speaks from the heart and touches the emotions,. He translated the 5 Gig iPod into “1000 songs that will fit in your pocket”.

It seems that Steve Jobs informal style came after many hours of grueling practice. See my earlier post about Leadership Lessons from Olympians for a description of 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. For two full days before a presentation, Jobs will practice the entire presentation, asking for feedback from product managers in the room.

Jobs wasn’t born a good speaker. I believe he improved substantially as a speaker every ten years.

Steve Jobs 1974

Steve Jobs 1974

In 1974, Steve Jobs and his friend, Steve Wozniak would attend meetings of the Homebrew club, a computer hobbyist club in Silicon Valley. Together they started sharing their ideas and Apple was soon formed.

Steve Jobs 1984

Steve Jobs 1984

Then ten years later, In 1984, Jobs gave a magnificent presentation when he launched the first Macintosh. But his style was stiff compared to the Steve Jobs of today – he stood behind a lectern and read from a script. You’ll see the difference.

Fast-forward to 1997. A decade later, Jobs returned to Apple after an 11-year absence. He was more polished and more natural than in previous years. He began to create more visually engaging slides.

Steve Jobs 2007

A much more polished and refined Steve Jobs introduces the Iphone

Ten years later, 2007, Jobs took the stage at Macworld to introduce the iPhone. It was without question his greatest presentation to date – from start to finish. He hit a home run. But he was a vastly more comfortable presenter than he was twenty years earlier. The more he presents, the better he gets.

Here is a video clip of the 2007 presentation.

Look at how far he progressed. Perhaps there is something to the 10,000 hours of deep and deliberate practice.

I’d like to end with a piece of advice that Steve Jobs offered Stanford graduates during a commencement speech in 2005. He was talking about the lessons he learned after doctors discovered that he had pancreatic cancer. “You’re time is limited so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the result of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. Stay hungry, stay foolish.”

Think Different

Posted on by February 13, 2017
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Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The trouble-makers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.