Twelve Tips for Involving Your Audience:Wake ‘Em Up with Questions

By Karen Susman

If you want to engage your audience and keep them listening all the way through from your introduction to your conclusion, then get them to participate. Participation doesn’t have to mean role-plays, team activities, or scavenger hunts.

Here are easy ways to use questions to keep your audience with you.

1. Ask for a show of hands. This is non-threatening if you haven’t asked an embarrassing question. And, why would you ask an embarrassing question unless your aim is to curb participation? A show of hands can give you valuable information such as, “By a show of hands, how many of you are first timers at the conference?” Or, “Who here manages ten people or more?”
   
   
2. Ask questions everyone can answer. Adults don’t like to look foolish and may refrain from risking a wrong answer. The goal here is to make the audience feel comfortable about participating. An example might be, “What is your favourite vacation spot?”
   
   
3. Ask participants to make a guess about something relevant to them and your topic. For instance, if you're talking about how to organize an office, you might ask the group to guess what percent of emails are printed out and saved thus adding to the paper clutter.
   
   
4. Ask a question and have participants write down their responses. You involve them twice here. Once by having them think about an answer and secondly by having them write something down. You can have them refer to their answers again and again as proof of your thesis. For instance, let’s say you ask audience members to jot down their biggest source of stress and how it affects them. Then, later in your presentation when you’re talking about the mind/body connection, you can ask them to look at those answers again. If earlier an audience member wrote down “Traffic/Headache,” he or she can clearly see that traffic stress leads to Excedrin moments.
   
   
5. Have the audience answer questions on a handout. Ask them to give feedback after each question. By the way, writing down an answer before being asked to answer aloud takes away the fear of being called on. They are prepared should you volunteer them.
   
   
6. Use a handout with blanks to be filled in as you proceed through your presentation. The audience will listen so they can fill in the blanks.
   
   
7. Use a quick self-assessment to determine knowledge, skills or attitudes.
   
   
8. Develop an action plan handout. Have audience fill in an action after each point you make. For example, if you’re talking about financial planning, one area you might cover is credit card debt. After your credit card debt discussion, have the audience write down what action they will take to eliminate credit card chaos.
   
   
9. Ask rhetorical questions for reflection and silent answers. “Ask yourself, ‘How could you make the world a better place?’ ” Or, “Think about where you’d like to live during your retirement years.”
   
   
10. Collect responses written on 3” x 5" cards and transcribe to a flip chart for general discussion. There’s a degree of anonymity here that encourages participation.
    
    
11. Ask the question to the entire group first. Let the group think. Then ask for individual responses.
    
    
12. Don’t ask “Gotcha” questions. These are trap or embarrassment questions. Respect your audience. The goal is not to show how smart you are, but how smart the audience is. Involve them with questions and they’ll learn from themselves, from each other, and from you all the way through your presentation.
    

NEW! Best Practices Report on How to Involve Your Audience. 53 Powerful Ideas – just $7.00 U.S. To order, email KDSus@aol.com. I'll send it to you immediately via email attachment. You can be a more dynamic, effective speaker no matter how technical your presentation. Download today. Your audiences will applaud your $7 investment in your success.

Karen Susman is a Speaker, Trainer, Coach, and Author of 102 Top Dog Networking Secrets. Karen works with organizations that want to maximize performance. Programs include Humour at Work; Balance In Life; Networking Skills; Presentation Skills; and Building Community Involvement. Order new guidebooks on humour, networking, time management, and community involvement by calling 1-888-678-8818 or e-mail Karen@KarenSusman.com.. www.KarenSusman.com.

Published in Networking Today, February, 2003.

Why Diets Don’t Work!

By Mary Desaulniers

It has become a familiar scenario: you start the day with black coffee; you lunch on carrots and celery sticks. You eat a mouse-size dinner. By the end of the week, you’ve barely lost a pound.

Sound familiar? Most people who begin a diet-fasting regimen regain their weight, plus more, within a year. The reason is simple: a body in starvation mode will fight to hang on to every fat cell. Your body thinks it is starving if you skip meals and/or eat junk food, that is, food rich in calories but is nutrient-deprived.

What kind of message are you sending your metabolism if you skip a meal or two every day – or if you insist on Big Macs and Fries?

The message is simply this: Times are tough; you need to buckle in the fat!

So, how does your body respond?

• Your metabolism slows
• Your body tries to save calories, not burn them off
  
• Muscle, rather than fat, gets burned off for energy
• Any food you eat (even black coffee) is stored as fat in preparation for what your body thinks is THE LONG FAMINE.

Result: You gain weight; you are tired. Food and fat have become a vicious circle.

Add exercise and you stress the body even more by increasing caloric requirements without giving the body proper nutrients. Starvation and exercise (eat less, exercise more) is just another Urban Legend for weight loss.

There is a way out of this circle, however, and it takes no more than a basic understanding of the “psychology” within the body’s metabolism. The body has a mind of its own, a mind that controls the thermostat of its metabolic functions.

• Starve the body and it turns the thermostat down so that no fat is burned and everything ingested becomes stored fat.
• Feed the body and it turns the thermostat up and happily burns fat as fuel and builds lean muscle tissue.
  

You’ve heard it before: your thoughts create your reality and nowhere is this truer than in the body. Feed it proper food, give it optimal cellular nutrition in the form of proteins, low-glycemic carbs, vitamins, mineral, botanicals, and water and your body will purr away like a well-tuned engine. Your body thrives on abundance.

Only through adequate cellular nutrition can exercise be a safe and effective means to building muscle and breaking down fat. Your goal should be as much lean muscle as possible and as little stored fat as possible.

This goal can be achieved by increasing your protein intake. Why? When you eat protein or fat, your body releases glucagons, which:

• raises blood sugar by converting protein and fat into glucose
• burns fat
• decreases cholesterol production
• increases release of Human Growth Hormone
• makes kidneys release fluid
• releases fat from fat cells for energy
• turns dietary fats into ketones for energy
  

In short, glucagon shifts the metabolism into BURNING MODE. Compare this scenario to that produced by Insulin, which is released when you eat carbohydrates. Insulin

• lowers blood sugar
• increases storage of fat
• stimulates the liver’s synthesis of cholesterol
  decreases growth hormone release
• increases appetite
• makes kidneys retain fluid
• shifts metabolism into STORAGE MODE
  

What does this all mean to the contemporary dieter? A sense of abundance goes a long way. Feed your body lean!

Mary Desaulniers is an independent Herbalife distributor in London, Ontario. For more information, visit MD Marketing or call (519) 652-9665.

Published in Networking Today, February 2003.

Making “It” Happen

By Janet Christensen

One of the great gifts of being human is the ability to think, think big and dream dreams. If you are like me, you have fantasized about travelling the world, experiencing great adventures, perhaps even fame and fortune. I have even turned some of my bigger dreams into reality, such as taking three months off to live in a motor home and travel, completing my university degree with honours at age 41, and more recently losing 55 pounds to achieve my ideal weight.

Why is it that some of our thoughts and dreams become our reality, while others remain unrealized, and left in the “one of these days” category? What is the difference? The ability to set goals? Whether the dream is realistic or practical? The resources we have available, or lack of them? The obstacles we encounter?

The difference between dreams remaining dreams and making them happen is commitment. You cannot be 50%, 80%, or even 99% committed. The very essence of commitment is 100% – you either are or you’re not. When you are committed to something you make it happen – no excuses, no ifs, ands or buts.

With commitment comes the determination to turn your dream, big or small, into reality. Out of commitment comes the meaningful goal setting, the ingenuity to find the resources to make it happen, and the ability to overcome the obstacles that arise, and even see them as opportunities! This is the difference between having dreams and making them happen. Decide what you want as your reality and commit to it. You will be amazed at the people, the resources, the ideas and the opportunities that will appear to support you and make a difference in your life when you make the commitment.

“Do or do not, there is no try.”

Yoda

Start the New Year by investing in yourself and attend Janet’s workshops – check them out at www.janetchristensen.com.

Also read: Turning Goal Setting into Results

Janet Christensen’s passion is to empower people to live their full potential. Through her company, Unlimiting Potential, she provides personal coaching, experiential workshops, inspirational speaking, and is a Reiki practitioner. To contact Janet, phone: (519) 434-5397 fax: (519) 434-8344 or email info@janetchristensen.com www.janetchristensen.com

Published in Networking Today, February 2003.

Is Your Boss a Bully? Is Your Co-Worker a Jerk? 6 Steps to Positive Confrontation at Work

By Joyce Hoff

Your boss yells at you in front of your co-workers. Your co-worker is not doing her fair share on the team project. Your employee is chronically late. What can you do about these and countless other annoying, bothersome, or even intolerable situations at work?

“The American workplace can seem full of conflict,” says business communications trainer Barbara Pachter. “For the employee, this conflict translates into added work stress and dissatisfaction. For the employer, this conflict translates into missed deadlines, poor work habits, unhealthy work relationships and poor communication between co-workers.” And, in a few extreme cases, some people have even resorted to violence!

achter, author of "The Power of Positive Confrontation: The Skills You Need to Know to Handle Conflicts at Work, at Home, and in Life" (Marlowe & Company, paperback, 2001) says that many work conflicts aren’t dealt with properly. “Most people are simply never taught how to handle themselves politely and powerfully in confrontational situations,” she says. “Many people blow up or wimp out.”

But there is a middle ground. And Pachter reminds us that, “Most people are not jerks who are out to get us.” Yet she adds, “Many people become preoccupied and don’t realize how their behaviour affects others. They simply need to be told in a polite and powerful way.”

So instead of becoming a bully in order to express yourself or having to wimp out because you don’t know what to say, try positive confrontation. Here are 6 steps to help you confront others in a dignified and effective manner.

1. Pick your conflict. You can’t fight them all. You can’t win them all. And beyond all that who cares! Pick the ones that matter to you and have an effect on you. If they don’t, let them go. You’ll be less stressed out.
   
   
2. Give the person The Jerk Test. We are very quick to make negative assumptions about others. Yet often we have no idea what is driving the other person’s behavior. If you approach someone thinking that person is a jerk, it is very easy to explode. So give the person The Jerk Test. Ask yourself some questions about the other person, including: Did the person really mean any harm? Is it the person or the policy? What’s the other person’s culture? You may find out that the person is not a jerk after all. Or, if you still choose to confront, you are less likely to explode.
   
   
3. Pick the right time and place. Confront others in private and when you are calm. Also pick a time that’s good for the other person to talk. If the person is walking out the door for a meeting, it’s not the time to confront!
   
   
4. One issue at a time. You don’t want to confuse things. Keep the discussion to one issue. Also, you are less likely to get side tracked if you stick to just one issue.
   
   
5. Prepare and practice. You want to prepare and practice what you will say. You are less likely to explode or wimp out if you do. Your wording is to be specific, direct, polite, and non-accusatory. My Don’t Attack’em, WAC’em™ model can guide you. WAC’em stands for: What’s really bothering you? – What do you want to Ask the other person to do or change? and Check-in for his or her reaction.
   
   
6. Pay attention to your nonverbal body signals. Have you ever heard yourself say, “But I didn’t mean it that way!” Chances are your words said one thing but your body language or voice sent a different message.
   

Joyce Hoff is the Public Relations Coordinator for Pachter & Associates and can be contacted by email at pachter@ix.netcom.com. For a free copy of Pachter's newsletter, Competitive Edge, call (856) 751-6141 (NJ) or visit www.pachter.com. Published three times a year, it contains tips and strategies for business professionals on a wide range of business communication and etiquette issues.

Published in Networking Today, February 2003.