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This evening at the District 30 Toastmasters Leadership Institute I gave a presentation called “ESL, Foreign Language Learning, and Toastmasters.”    It is the official kickoff of my High Performance Leadership project for Toastmasters, which will run for one year, and will culminate in a presentation that will officially close the project in June 2015.

1.  What is a High Performance Leadership Project

This is one of the requirements for getting the Advanced Leadership Silver award, which along with the Advanced Communicator Gold award, are the two awards needed to get the final capstone of one’s individual educational and leadership training at Toastmasters International, namely, the Distinguished Toastmaster Award.

2.  What is MY HPL Project?

My HPL project consists of two projects

–one is to provide resources for English as a Second Language to the Toastmasters Clubs in District 30 (Chicagoland)

–the other is to support bilingual clubs in District 30 and to create new ones

This first post

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This evening at the District 30 Toastmasters Leadership Institute I gave a presentation called “ESL, Foreign Language Learning, and Toastmasters.”    It is the official kickoff of my High Performance Leadership project for Toastmasters, which will run for one year, and will culminate in a presentation that will officially close the project in June 2015.

1.  What is a High Performance Leadership Project

This is one of the requirements for getting the Advanced Leadership Silver award, which along with the Advanced Communicator Gold award, are the two awards needed to get the final capstone of one’s individual educational and leadership training at Toastmasters International, namely, the Distinguished Toastmaster Award.

2.  What is MY HPL Project?

My HPL project consists of two projects

–one is to provide resources for English as a Second Language to the Toastmasters Clubs in District 30 (Chicagoland)

–the other is to support bilingual clubs in District 30 and to create new ones

This first post

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In this eighth chapter of his book Everyone Communicates, Few Connect, John Maxwell explores the third out of fifth practices for connecting with others, by creating an experience everyone enjoys.

You need to get the audience interested by being interesting, and you do this by not just sharing information, but by sharing an experience which will have the audience engaged on many levels.   There are 7 ways to achieve this; I am splitting the post into two, with today’s post discussing the first 3 out of 7 ways and tomorrow’s post covering the last 4.

1.  Take Responsibility for Your Listeners

Many teachers feel that they are going to present the information in the way  they want to or feel comfortable doing, and it is simply up to the student to “get” what the teacher is saying.   Skilled teachers take responsibility for the student learning, so that if a particular student doesn’t “get” what the teacher is saying, the teacher will automatically try another way to get through to that student.

In a similar way, a skilled speaker must take responsibility for the audience getting what you are trying to convey, and that requires the speaker to create interest in the listeners, to active them to enjoy the experience, and to be consciously aware of adding value to their lives for having listened to your presentation.

If you are writing something that others want to read, ask yourself “what would make me want to read about this?”

If you talking to others, ask yourself “what would make me get involved and take notice?”

2.  Communicate in Their World

You can’t assume that everybody has the same interest in the subject you are about to present.   You need to explain why it is relevant to them, wherever they may be.   You link what you want to say with what you perceive to be your audience’s needs.   That’s why you should avoid using abstract terms and use language that is evocative and personal to the audience.    This is why Abraham Lincoln was an inveterate storyteller, because he could express a complex idea in less time and with more effect by using stories, often with a humorous twist, rather than academic prose.  His opponents in the race for the Republican nomination for the presidency were all learned men, and their speeches used phrases like “Trojan horse” to describe the institution of slavery.    That phrase would be understood by educated people but wouldn’t mean a damned thing to an uneducated farmer.  Abraham would say slavery was like a “snake that made its way into the baby’s crib, and you needed to try to get rid of the harmful snake without harming the baby at the same time,” the baby, of course, being the American Republic.  He communicate in the world of everyday people, yet his rhetoric was capable of soaring far above it if he needed to use words that inspired and lead the people to his vision of the future.

3.  Capture People’s Attention From the Start

According to Myrna Marofsky, a management consultant, said about people that “if you don’t catch their interest, they just click you off” like a remote control.   You need to make a good first impression and start off well when you communicate.

Here are some suggestions for doing so:

• Start with a Comment About the Situation or Setting–say something based on what everyone has just experienced, whether it’s inclement weather, a recent sports upset, or a piece of information in the news.  That puts you on the same page as your listeners.
• Introduce Yourself–Say your first name, even if the presenter has introduced you.   It will make feel people like they are on a first-name basis with you.
• Relax–Find a pose and gestures which show that you relaxed but attentive to the audience.
• Begin with Humor–By telling a humorous story, anecdote, joke or even a quote, you get the audience to relax and be more receptive to what you are saying next.
• Create a Sense of Anticipation–Let the audience know that they are going to learn something, or be given something of a value which they can use to improve their lives.   It will increase the sense of anticipation, and will make sure they don’t drift off.

These three ways are excellent ways of going being merely presenting information, which is prose, and getting people to share in the experience, which is what poetry is about.    You are there to give words in such a way that will resonate within your audience so that they echo in the hearts and minds of your audience long after they have left the theater, gone home, and continued on their daily lives.

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In this seventh chapter of his book Everyone Communicates, Few Connect, John Maxwell states a practice that is true of all communication if you want to connect to other people:   keep it simple!

My favorite story in the introduction of the chapter is of a U.S. Navy ordnance officer who explained in great detail how guided missiles work.   One man who listened to the talk came up to him after the presentation and said, “Before hearing the lecture I was thoroughly confused about how these missiles work.”   “And now?” the officer asked.  “Thanks to you, I’m still just as confused, but on a much deeper level.”

As funny as the story it is, it does make the point that you should aim to oversimplify rather than to over-complicate.   This will depend on several factors:    how much time you have for your presentation, how familiar the average person in the audience is with your subject matter, and what their purpose is in listening to the information.   Are they there to be entertained, and get a glimpse of the subject matter?   Are they there to actual use something of the information you present in their everyday lives?    Or are they already conversant with the subject matter, but perhaps not from the particular perspective that you intend to share with them?   All of these questions should go into how much detail you should give in your presentation.

Here’s the summary to this seventh chapter.   Remember the following points …

• Don’t try to impress your audience with your intellect or overpower them with too much information
• Give them clarity and simplicity.
• Involve your audience by asking for feedback, to share some stories they might have to illustrate your points, or ask them how they will use the information to improve their daily lives.

This concludes the seventh chapter, and tomorrow I’ll move onto the eighth!

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In this seventh chapter of his book Everyone Communicates, Few Connect, John Maxwell states a practice that is true of all communication if you want to connect to other people:   keep it simple!

My favorite story in the introduction of the chapter is of a U.S. Navy ordnance officer who explained in great detail how guided missiles work.   One man who listened to the talk came up to him after the presentation and said, “Before hearing the lecture I was thoroughly confused about how these missiles work.”   “And now?” the officer asked.  “Thanks to you, I’m still just as confused, but on a much deeper level.”

As funny as the story it is, it does make the point that you should aim to oversimplify rather than to over-complicate.   This will depend on several factors:    how much time you have for your presentation, how familiar the average person in the audience is with your subject matter, and what their purpose is in listening to the information.   Are they there to be entertained, and get a glimpse of the subject matter?   Are they there to actual use something of the information you present in their everyday lives?    Or are they already conversant with the subject matter, but perhaps not from the particular perspective that you intend to share with them?   All of these questions should go into how much detail you should give in your presentation.

Here are 5 ways of keeping it simple …

1.  Talk To People, Not Above Them

When you are starting off learning how to be a speaker, your first impulse is probably to try to impress others–you should replace this with the desire to have an impact on them instead.    The direct and simple approach is usually best in all forms of communication–greater complexity is never the answer in communication if your desire is to connect.

2.  Get to the Point

You should start thinking about the reason for your communication before you begin to speak.   You need to ask the two questions:

• What do I want them to know?
• What do I want them to do?

In a difficult situation, where you have to give unpleasant news to an employee, from a problematic evaluation to having to let them go, it’s best to a) establish a connection with the person that you are trying to talk to, and b) tell them clearly the reason why an action or a recommendation is being taken.

Less is more when it comes to communication.    Thomas Jefferson once remarked of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, “I never heard either of them speak ten minutes at a time, nor in any but the main point which was to decide the question.”    They not only said the minimum needed for effect, but they also chose the best moment to say it.

3.  Say it Over and Over …. Again

William Rastteter, who taught at MIT and Harvard, once said, “The first time you say something, it’s heard.  The second time, it’s recognized, and the third time, it’s learned.”    You should start of with your main point, illustrate the main point with examples, and then repeat the main point again.    The repetition takes your speech from prose and turns it into poetry, where lines echo and reinforce each other backwards and forwards throughout the speech, guaranteeing that they will be absorbed fully by the audience.

4.   Say it Clearly

Professional speaker Peter Meyer says that when you are trying to put a puzzle together, you put the boxtop of the puzzle next to you so that you have a clear picture in front of you to compare the pieces with in order to figure out where they should go and how they should connect to each other.   Likewise with a speech, you should have no more than three main ideas (the boxtop) if you are doing a talk that lasts an hour, with all of the illustrations coming after the presentation of the main ideas like the pieces of the puzzle.

5.  Say Less

You should always aim to end a little on the early side.   So if you are scheduled to do a 5-7 minute speech, don’t write a script which takes you 7 minutes on the dot to complete in rehearsal.   When you get to the real thing, you may have added gestures, pauses, or stage directions that take time from the “ideal” timing you had in rehearsal.   Rather aim for the 5 minute mark.   Don’t forget time for pauses BETWEEN the main points of your speech.   This will signal to the audience that there is the equivalent of a new paragraph starting.   It will also give them some time to digest what you have just gotten through saying.

As Winston Churchill once said, “the short words are the best, and the old words best of all.

The next post will conclude this chapter.

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The seventh chapter of John Maxwell’s book contains the third practice out of five on connecting, namely, keep it simple!

Let me tell you a story of when I was studying physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign back in the early 1980s.   There was an international physics conference and one of the U of I professors was writing an equation on the board.   He realized he didn’t have time to show how to solve it in the short amount of time he was allotted, so he just wrote down the solution and said, “here’s the solution–it all comes out in the wash.”

One Russian physicist asked a question at the end of the physicist’s presentation through an interpreter:   “what means ‘answer comes out in laundry’?”   Using a slang or colloquial expression in English turned out to be a perilous prospect when it came to interpreting into Russian.    This is why you should always keep it simple–especially if you are speaking for an international audience for whom English may not be their native language.

Let’s start out the chapter by sharing the four criteria that John Maxwell gave to his professional “finder”, Charlie Wetzel, who comes newspapers, magazines, and (now) the Internet to find interesting material for John to illustrate the points of his talks.

1.   Humor–something that will make people laugh

Telling jokes that pertain to a particular topic is a good way to get people’s attention.   However, just remember that humor that depends on word play may not translate well to an international audience.    Funny stories about characters or situations, however, translate more readily across cultural boundaries, but even there you have to be careful.

2.  Heart–something that will captivate people’s emotions

Remember the four communication preferences:   ideas, people, action, and process.   Those with a “people” communication preferences tend to influence what people “feel”, and one way to do this is to tell a story that gets you emotionally involved.

3.  Hope–something that will inspire people

You are going for an attitude here, a way of looking at life with focus on the positive, and, even more importantly, transfer the negative INTO a positive.

4.  Help-something that will assist people in a tangible way

One time I gave a technical presentation on Integral Theory and did it from the perspective of an intellectual trying to convey an idea.   However, several people in the audience who were engineers came up to me and said, “I didn’t get it!   What am I supposed to do with all that information?”   They were the ones who had an action communication preference, and I needed to include them in the picture.

In all cases, you are dealing with perspective and transformation.    Being able to see a situation from a different perspective involves a transformation of your consciousness.    But explaining this in an intellectual way may not work for some people, and it will certainly not act quickly.    Rather than explaining it to your audience, lead them to experience it themselves through a story that has humor, heart, and hope, and then gives them something to take home that will help them take that transformation and apply it to their lives.   When you pick material to illustrate your points, do what Charlie Wetzel does for John Maxwell, and use the four pointers above to give your presentation more power–in a simple way!

The next post discusses the five ways of practicing the art of simplicity when you communicate in order for you to connect to others.

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So you’ve just been elected to be the Vice President Education for your club at Toastmasters.    If you want to be successful at your club officer role which starts on July 1st, you need to start TODAY to prepare for it.   This post is designed to give you advice on how to do this, based on my previous experience at three different clubs, both in the Founders District in Orange County, CA, and here now in District 30 in the Chicagoland area.

1.   Register for the Toastmasters Leadership Institute

The Toastmasters Leadership Institute (some other Districts make call it something different) is where club officers are formally trained.   When I say formally, this means that you are given formal credit towards your club’s Distinguished Club Program for having 4 out of 7 officers trained.    However, every club should have the goal of having all 7 officers trained EVEN IF they have done the training before in a previous version of the TLI.

Don’t stop with your own registration–ask all of the officers to confirm that they are going to a TLI session sometime in June.   The way it works in our district is that there is a “main” TLI that takes place on June 14, and there are “satellite” TLIs that take place in other areas of the District in the following weekends in June (21st and 28th) in order to accommodate those who either have some conflict with the June 14th date or who want to go to a TLI that is closer to where they live.

Make it easier for the other club officers to attend the TLI and car pool.   Be sure to mention that, although TLI is an all-day affair, that doesn’t mean that each officer has to attend all day.    There is only a one-hour training session that is required for the club officer to attend, and most TLIs have a morning and an afternoon session to accommodate those with a busy schedule.

There is a Plan B, and I’m not just talking about the additional satellite TLIs.   Each Division Governor should coordinate with the Area Governors to make available to each area a make-up training session in July so that every club officer has an opportunity to be trained, even if they can’t make any of the TLIs.

2.  Read the Club Leadership Handbook

Once you’re registered for the Toastmaster Leadership Institute, then go to the following web page at the Toastmasters International website and download the Club Leadership Handbook

http://www.toastmasters.org/clh

You should read at least the section on the Vice President Education role.

3.   Read about the Distinguished Club Program (DCP)

You should read the following document, which outlines the Distinguished Club Program–it can be found at the following web page at the Toastmasters International website.

http://www.toastmasters.org/1111_dcp

One of your most important duties to be performed at the beginning of your term as Vice President Education is to consult with the President and to determine what the club goals will be in the upcoming Toastmaster year.    One way to do this is to look at the Distinguished Club Program, and determine which level your club will try to achieve, which in turn is based on how many out of the 10 possible Distinguished Club Program or DCP goals your club will be able to obtain):

• Basic Qualification (either 20+ members or a net increase of 5 members)
• Distinguished Club (5 or 6 out of 10 DCP goals)
• Select Distinguished Club (7 or 8 out of 10 DCP goals)
• President’s Distinguished Club (9 or 10 out of 10 DCP goals)

Each club should at least try for the basic qualification and the Distinguished Club level of achievement.    Here’s a list of the 10 possible goals of the Distinguished Club Program:

1. Two CC awards
2. Two more CC awards
3. One ACB, ACS, or ACG award
4. One more ACB, ACS, or ACG award
5. One CL, ALB, ALS, or DTM award
6. One more CL, ALB, ALS, or DTM award
7. Four new members
8. Four more new members
9. A minimum of four club officers trained during each of the two training periods
10. On time payment of membership-renewal dues accompanied by the names of renewing members for one period and on-time submission of one club officer list

4.  Determine the Educational Record of the Members of Your Club

Your end goal should be the creation of a Club Success Plan, which outlines how in particular your club will reach each of the 10 goals above.    The first six out of the 10 goals, however, have to do with the area you are in charge of, namely, the educational program of all the members of your club.

In order to determine how many of the six goals your club can achieve, you have to see how many members can realistically get the CC, CL, or advanced awards needed to fulfill that goal.   You can only do that by knowing where the members are NOW.    Don’t wait for July 1st:   contact your outgoing Vice President Education and determine if he or she has an educational record, which shows

–how far along each member has gotten on the educational track, and

–how far along each member has gotten on the leadership track

If the Vice President Education has no such document, then you need to have him or her CONTACT all club members to ask them how far along they are.    Most will be able to tell you how many speeches need to be completed to fulfill their CC or advanced communicator award; few will be able to tell you how many roles or projects need to be completed to fulfill their CL or advanced leadership award.   In the latter case, you may have to ask the Vice President Education to remind members to bring their CL manuals to the club meeting so that he or she can look through their members’ manuals and determine which out of the 10 projects need to be completed.

5.  Create Club Success Plan

The Club Success Plan is important not only for your club, as it is the road map of how your club will achieve its goals successfully, but it is also important for your Area Governor, because it will be the road map that they will monitor your club’s progress towards that goal.

The Club Success Plan is contained in the same document listed above, namely,

http://www.toastmasters.org/1111_dcp

If you print this out  now, you will be able to take the goals discussed at the first Executive Committee Meeting of your club called for by the Club President, and start planning out who is responsible for whatever activities need to be accomplished to get there.   This creates accountability for all club officers and knowing this at the beginning makes everybody buy into the plan that you set up.

If you follow these five steps, and start NOW, you will have a headstart on your journey to being a successful Vice President Education, and through your success, to help your Club achieve the success that it deserves!

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A couple of weeks ago, I was informed by the incoming District Governor Donna Weston that my nomination as an Area Governor was approved.    Today the Area Governor training takes place, and I wanted to give some advice passed on to me by the previous Area Governor for my area, Felton Armand.

1.   Be an Assistant Area Governor

What if you are not an Area Governor now, but would like to be some time in the future?    The best way to prepare is to become an Assistant to the Area Governor.    It’s not an official position in the sense of getting credit for it towards your DTM, like you do when you are an Area Governor.    What you do is you essentially shadow the Area Governor, f0llowing his or her lead when it comes to

• Reviewing Club Success Plans for the various Area Clubs
• Creating an Area Success Plan
• Visiting Area Clubs and filling out Area Visit Reports
• Conducting Area Speech Contests and assisting with Division Speech Contests
• Following leads for new clubs in your Area

Each club has a Club Success Plan, which essentially picks a goal for the club to make the designation of Distinguished Club by the end of the Toastmaster year.    This is achieved when a club gets 5 out of 10 points in the Distinguished Club program.    If the club gets 7 out of 10 points, then it is Select Distinguished, and if it gets 9 out of 10 points, then it is President’s Distinguished.

The Area Success Plan is built from the building blocks of the Club Success Plans.   If 50% of your club base in your area is Distinguished or higher, then you are a Distinguished Area.    If MORE than 50% of your club base in your area is Distinguished or higher, then you are a Select Distinguished Area.   If MORE than 50% of your club base in your area is Distinguished or higher, AND you start a new club in your area, then you are a President’s Distinguished Area.

Here’s an example.    Our Area, S56 in the South Division of District 30, had 4 clubs.   So in order to make Distinguished Area, we had to have 2 clubs that were Distinguished Clubs or better.    In order to make Select Distinguished Area, we had to have 3 or 4 clubs that were Distinguished Clubs or better.    In order to make President’s Distinguished Area, we had to have 3 or 4 clubs that were Distinguished Clubs or better PLUS we had to start a new club.    We were fortunately able to have 3 clubs reach their goal of being Distinguished Clubs or better, AND we had a new club open in our area, so we made it to that goal.

The Area Success Plan for next year which have to show which clubs are going to go for which level of Distinguished Club designation, and how they are going to achieve it.

Once you have helped the Area Governor run Area Speech Contests as an Assistant Area Governor, the process isn’t so mysterious, and you can essentially use the best practices from the previous year as a springboard on how to run your own contests when you become new Area Governor.

2.  Get to Know the Division Governor

Usually the Division Governor puts that “hat in the ring” to become the Governor starting around the time of the Spring Contests, so if you have a chance to meet a prospective Division Governor, especially one that is running unopposed, get to them early on and indicate your interest in being an Area Governor.   In that way, if more than one person wants to be the Area Governor, it is the Division Governor who ways heavily in the deciding vote by the District leadership.

Indicate to the Division Governor that you are just there to make sure your own goals as Area Governor are fulfilled, but you are there to assist other Area Governors in the same division, particularly with club contests.

3.  Get to Know the Other Area Governors

This is important because when it comes time to look for Chief Judges and regular Judges for your Area Speech Contest, it is easy if each Area Governor agrees to be a Judge for all the OTHER Area Speech Contests.    It is the most painless way of getting the requisite amount of judges or other assistants for your own contests.

Also, if you miss a District Executive Committee meeting, you can designate another Area Governor to get a copy of the meeting minutes and other documents discussed, with the understanding that you will do the same for them if they have to miss a meeting.

4.  Get to Know the President and Vice President Education of Each of the Clubs in your Area

If you have a President and Vice President Education who are unresponsive to your requests, it can make your job a lot more difficult.   But looking on the bright side, if they ARE responsive, you can get a lot of the Area Visit Reports done BEFORE and AFTER the area visits, leaving the area visit for networking, establishing relationships, and close observation as to how the club is doing.

You need for them to set up a Club Success Plan as soon as possible, so that you can in turn set up your Area Success Plan.    This needs to be done BEFORE the area visits.

In addition, setting up a regular monthly meeting with the President and Vice President of each Area, particularly when it comes to time for the Area Speech Contests, is an excellent way to make sure they are continuing to follow the Club Success Plan.   If problems regarding membership levels starts to occur, you can address the issue proactively rather than waiting for a club to require a Club Coach.

5.   Search for your own Assistant Area Governor

This will serve two purposes, it will reduce your work load, but it is also a good risk management strategy, because if you are transferred due to a job change or promotion that requires you to move to another District, or if there is some personal matter such as the death of a parent, spouse, or child that requires your attention for months at a time, you can rest assured that the Assistant Area Governor will continue getting the work done as required by the position even if you are temporarily incapacitated or permanently removed from the position due to circumstances beyond your control.

If you establish vertical relations (to the Division and District leaders going upwards and going downwards, to  the club Presidents and Vice Presidents of Education) and horizontal relations (to other Area Governors), and get to know the previous Area Governor as well as grooming an Assistant Area Governor to take over your position in the following year, you will make sure that your Area does well and that you achieve the maximum growth not only of your Area, your Division, and all the clubs in your Area, but of your professional development as a leader within Toastmasters.

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In the book “Everyone Communicates, Few Connect”, John Maxwell has five chapters devoted to principles of connecting, and five chapters devoted to practices of connecting.   I have spent five weeks on the first five chapters covering those principles, and today I start on the second part of the book, with the practices. The first practice of connecting is in the sixth chapter, and it is “Connectors Connect on Common Ground”.

In the final section of his chapter on finding common ground, John Maxwell gives some pointers on connecting with various size groups, from a single individual, to a small group, to a large audience.

1.  Connecting with an Individual.

Ask questions with an eye towards common interests and experiences.    When you find that common ground, then share your emotions, tell stories, and offer lessons you’ve learned.

If you really want to gain insight in a hurry into someone’s heart, ask the following question:

• What do you dream about?
• What do you sing about?
• What do you cry about?

2.  Connecting in a Group

Although you can’t focus on a single person, you can focus on a single purpose or goal for which the group was assembled.   Ask “What brought us together?”

If you are having a planning meeting for a project, then ask the two key questions, “What are we trying to accomplish?” and “Why?” This will bring both the execution of the project and its strategic goal into focus, both the business need for the project (from the standpoint of the ultimate user of the product, service, or result that the project is going to create) and the strategic goal (the benefit to the organization creating the project).

If your group achieves a goal, then celebrate that win together!

3.  Connecting with an Audience

People come to hear someone speak because they want to learn something that will help them or inspire them in their everyday lives.    There are some in the audience who are eager to hear what you have to say; there are others who may be more hostile, and need to be convinced to hear what you have to say.    You have to make it worth their while.   Tap into this desire on the part of the audience to benefit from your speech by using the following pattern of four F’s:

• FEEL:  Try to sense what they feel and acknowledge and validate their feelings.
• FELT:  Share with them that you have also felt the same way.
• FOUND:  Share with them what you found that has helped you.
• FIND:   Offer to help them find help for their lives.

You create a sense of reciprocity with the audience this way.   It reminds me of the way the Indian musical instrument called a sitar makes music.    There is one set of strings that are flat and never played; there is one fret of strings that are curved over the other set and are always played.    Why this arrangement?    When the second set of strings is played, they set up a sympathetic vibration with the first set of strings, which is why the instrument has this sing-song, echoing quality to it.

You are pluck your own strings with your speech so that it sets up a “sympathetic vibration” with the people in the audience.    And together, these two sets of vibrations will make a wonderful piece of music!

The next chapter, chapter 7, will be covered in next week’s posts.   Chapter 7 is about Connecting by Keeping It Simple.

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In the book “Everyone Communicates, Few Connect”, John Maxwell has five chapters devoted to principles of connecting, and five chapters devoted to practices of connecting.   I have spent five weeks on the first five chapters covering those principles, and today I start on the second part of the book, with the practices. The first practice of connecting is in the sixth chapter, and it is “Connectors Connect on Common Ground”.

After discussing on what the various barriers are to finding common ground with others, and suggesting various qualities that connectors have, John Maxwell in the last section of his chapter discusses four pointers towards improving your ability to connect, no matter how good or how ineffectively you connect at the present time.

These four pointers take the common theme of “Connectors Go First”, meaning that you have to take the initiative and make the connection first in order for you to become more effective at connecting.

1.  Ask “Do I Feel What You Feel?” BEFORE Asking, “Do You Feel What I Feel?”

You cannot drag people on a journey, you have to connect with them and lead them to where you want to go, so that they do so of their own volition.   Why would somebody want to go where somebody else tells them to go?   Because that person took the time to describe that destination in such a way that the others WANT to go there.

Before they want to go there, however, you have to find out where they are NOW.   And this involves understanding their feelings, and connecting with them on an emotional level.

2.  Ask “Do I See What You See?” BEFORE Asking, “Do You See What I See?”

Many leaders think, if others could see the future the way I see it, then we could move forward.    However, that would only be possible if others are standing in the spot you are standing.   What does that future look like from where they are standing?    Would they be even able to see if from their vantage point?    Are there obstacles in their way to seeing it?    Is there debris on the ground that would prevent them from getting from where they are now to that future you are imagining?    The more you ask yourself these questions, the better you will be able to let people you understand the magnitude of the journey you are asking them to go on, a journey which is made easier by the fact that they are not going to be going alone, but with you along the way.

3.  Ask “Do I Know What You Know?” BEFORE Asking, “Do You Know What I Know?”

If you are trying to resolve a conflict between two people, you must ask each of them what the situation is from their viewpoint; the order of who goes first to tell the story doesn’t really matter.   But if that conflict of the other person is with you, you must FIRST ask them what the situation is from their viewpoint before you tell your side of the story.   Often times, you will be able to locate the source of the conflict in a misunderstanding or misinterpretation of what you have said, rather than a conflict of personalities (although that is certainly a possibility as well).

If you are just having a conversation, remember what Abraham Lincoln said, where he said one-third of his mind is thinking about himself and what he is going to say, but two-thirds are devoted to thinking about the other person and what he is going to say.”    You cannot just rehearse your next response, because it might change depending on what the person is now saying.    So don’t stay in your own head, but enter that of the person you are talking to, and the communication will turn into a connection.

4.  Ask “Do I Know What You Want?” BEFORE Asking, “Do You Know What I Want?”

You can know a lot about a subject and not really understand it.    If you explain it to someone, and they don’t understand it and ask questions, this gives you a chance to try another way of explaining it so that they will.   I owe the readership of this blog on the subject of project management because the posts came out of a series of study groups I did for people studying to pass the certification exam for becoming a project manager.    I love math, so in explaining questions about earned value management, I would naturally write equations.   I found out soon that not everybody shares my love of mathematics, so I had to draw diagrams for those who preferred learning visually and I told stories for those who preferred learning aurally.    By approaching a subject with different learning styles in mind, I found that most of the people in the study group would understand what I was saying on any given topic.   It was an example of not giving them what I wanted, but my giving them what they wanted.

In the last and final post for this chapter, I will discuss three key questions that John Maxwell says give the maximum amount of insight into a person’s character in the shortest amount of time.    Use these if you are on the express train to being a connector!

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