If you have watched a presentation, you have heard these things. But just because you’ve heard them, doesn’t mean you should say them! If you want to be more effective in giving your presentations, avoid these words.
By Wayne Turmel
If you’ve ever had small children, you know that moment when all the chaos and noise stops and it’s…too…quiet. You immediately go in search of the little hellions, because they must be up to something, and you’re not sure you want to know what it is. Managing a remote team can be a little like that. Silence is often not necessarily good news.
When things suddenly get quiet, there’s a tendency to enjoy the moment. No crises, no panicky emails or voicemails, you can get your own work done for a change. However, when you lead in a remote environment, you need all the information you can get. A sudden change in the amount, type or flow of information may be a sign of trouble ahead.
When you work in the same location, you pick up signs of tension on the team. Conversations might stop when certain people enter the room (maybe even you!), or voices get snippy. Most of us can walk into an area and “feel the tension” in the air, even if we can’t tell exactly what’s going on.
The challenge with picking up those subtle signs when you work remotely is that most people find it easier to just avoid trouble when they don’t have to be in physical proximity to each other. One of the most common negative behaviors teams exhibit when things go wrong is exclusion: not including people in written communication, or “forgetting” to invite them to certain meetings. Maybe people tune out and stop contributing in meetings or on conference calls.
It’s what you’re NOT hearing that is the most obvious sign of trouble between team members when they don’t share a physical space, and as your Logic professor taught you, it’s hard to prove a negative. Here are some things to watch for:
It takes a conscious effort to listen for what isn’t being said. As any parent of small children will tell you, though, it’s a skill you can—and should—develop.
The Remote Leadership Certificate Series is the complete package when it comes to successfully managing a remote team. You’ll learn the practical skills to lead remote employees, virtual teams and mobilized work forces. The Series teaches techniques and methods to effectively motivate and manage virtual employees and teams with ease and success. LEARN MORE HERE.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wayne Turmel
Co-Founder and Product Line Manager
Wayne Turmel is the co-founder and Product Line Manager for the Remote Leadership Institute. For twenty years he’s been obsessed with helping managers communicate more effectively with their teams, bosses and customers. Wayne is the author of several books that demystify communicating through technology including Meet Like You Mean It – a Leader’s Guide to Painless & Productive Virtual Meetings, 10 Steps to Successful Virtual Presentations and 6 Weeks to a Great Webinar. His work appears frequently in Management-Issues.com.
I have the good fortune of working with lots of leaders, and often have the chance to talk with, teach or consult with them on a variety of issues including their role as a coach. The vast majority of those I work with truly want to be more effective and make a difference for their people and their organizations.
When the subject of coaching comes up, invariably the conversation moves to how to coach underperformers. This makes sense for a variety of reasons, including:
So while it is logical that leaders would ask about these challenges, it masks the bigger question. The question I am always thinking, and sometimes ask is: “Hey, Coach, why are you so focused on your poor performers?”
I’m not suggesting that you should accept poor performance and let people continue to work at levels below the needed expectations, nor I am suggesting that you should fire poor performers. You should still coach them and offer them the chance to grow and develop. So what am I suggesting?
Based on years’ of experience and observation, I’ve found that most leaders are spending 70-90% of their coaching time, effort and focus on their poorest performers. That just doesn’t make sense, because when they do that, they don’t have time for everyone else.
The best coaches spend at least 50% of their time coaching their top performers to even higher levels of success. Here is why:
Your employees should understand their strengths and weaknesses, and they should spend at least as much time working to enhance their strengths as they do to improve their weaknesses. That applies to your coaching too, both on an individual basis and for your team as a whole. When you hold coaching sessions with an employee, spend half the time focused on the person’s areas of weakness and the other half on building strengths.
Additionally, think of your whole team as a pool of strengths and weaknesses, and spend at least half your time working on the strengths (or top performers), and the other half on your weaknesses (your poor performers). If you do, you will see boosts in productivity, morale and performance across the board.
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Tough conversations. You know, the ones we need to have, but are concerned about. The ones that remind us of the similar conversations that didn’t go so well in the past.
Popular books have been written about these types of conversations, and have changed what we call them. Now many call them crucial conversations or fierce conversations. Call them whatever you want, they are hard.
And, as a leader, they are often necessary.
Perhaps as a leader we find ourselves needing to have them more often due to the nature of our job. And perhaps, sometimes you put them off because they are hard; but you also likely know from experience that avoidance isn’t a good strategy either.
I have eight questions (yes, there are eight, not just seven as promised) for you to ask as a part of your preparation for these difficult conversations. These questions will challenge you to think in new ways about the situation and your preparation for it. They will point you to a mindset that might change your whole approach to difficult conversations too.
What is your goal? Determine the outcome that you hope for from this conversation.
Am I in the right frame of mind to discuss this now? If you know you aren’t, wait, but don’t wait forever. If you must discuss it now, change your mindset first!
What are some options to solve this problem? There is always more than one way. Make sure you have options in mind going into the conversation.
What information do I or we need? Sometimes the right information will make all the difference in the world in creating better outcomes.
What role did my behavior play in this situation? This is always an important question, but as a leader it is critical.
How do you think they view the problem? This question puts you in the mind of the other person. You may not know the answer, but thinking about it first will make you far better prepared for a successful conversation.
Am I ready to apologize or take responsibility? (and for what?) Well, are you? If not, the conversation may be harder than you are even speculating.
How can I contribute to a better outcome? If you have answered the first seven questions, you likely have some ideas here. Don’t go into a difficult conversation without an answer to this one.
Perhaps you hoped that these questions would magically make difficult conversations easier – they will not.
But they can be magical. If you take the time to ask yourself these questions, and answer them, you will be better prepared and it is very likely that while the conversations might not be easier, they will arrive at far better outcomes.
Reprimanding employees in front of other employees is never a good idea. Embarrassing staff members in that way damages morale and can put people on the defensive, making it less likely that they will fix their bad behaviors.
Scolding employees in front of customers is worse.
Even if employee has done something that deserves a good talking to, and even if you think the customer is expecting you to come down hard on the employee, don’t.
First, the situation could escalate with the employee going on the defensive. A full-on argument could break out, and you could end up making your entire business look bad. However, even if the employee keeps his or her cool, you will likely humiliate the employee. That’s a sure-fire way to destroy that person’s morale and cause more performance or behavior issues. Those issues could spread to other employees who are offended by your tactics. Finally, you could make customers feel incredibly awkward, embarrassed for the employee or even outraged by your behavior.
You shouldn’t insult, lecture or patronize employees, but sometimes a reprimand is necessary, especially in these three situations:
In all three cases, be firm, but respectful. In all other cases, you can correct the behavior away from an audience. Simply say “May I talk to you for a second?” and move out of earshot of customers.
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By Kevin Eikenberry, co-founder of the Remote Leadership Institute.
While we’ve all sat through one too many presentations in our lives, most of them are very important when it comes to disseminating information and training employees. Especially when all or part of your team is remote, your presentations need to be crystal clear so as not to cause confusion among employees.
That’s why you should never make these seven statements during a presentation to your virtual staff:
First of all, if you are referencing any documentation, slide, image, etc., make sure remote employees have a copy of it in front of them. Don’t say “I’ll send it after the meeting” or “I’m sending it over now.” Make sure everyone has a copy of the final presentation with all documentation well before the meeting so that employees can review it. Second, don’t include anything on a slide that all your team members won’t be able to clearly read. If you are unsure about a graphic or image, recreate it.
Don’t assume that people will see what you see. After all, you created or provided an image to support a point you want to make. Your employees are seeing the image for the first time. Skip this phrase and explain the image thoroughly, even if you think people “get” it.
That statement sends up a red flag that your presentation is going to be painful for your employees. Worse, you essentially tell them that their time isn’t important to you. Neither of those things set you up to succeed. Maybe you aren’t as prepared as you should be, but don’t announce it. Just do your best.
Again, this says to people “My finishing this is more important than your time,” and people will become frustrated or even tune you out. The time to realize you are behind isn’t at the end of your presentation. You need to be pacing yourself and sticking to an agenda to make sure you are on track to finish on time.
Preparation will help you to ensure you are covering your main points. However, it’s also key that you don’t try to cram too much into your presentations and that you allow time to answer questions and clarify information.
You might as well just tell people “I’m about to bore the heck out of you.” Presentations are best when they are focused. If you try to cover too much, you will rush through certain topics, and you can be sure that the information won’t be clear. The next time you feel like you have “too much to cover,” start editing. Decide what the audience must hear and cut everything else out. Or schedule multiple shorter presentations, rather than one long one.
It happens, but most technical problems can be prevented. Text your equipment and software well before the meeting/presentation starts, and send your slides or documents out as PDFs prior to the meeting as a backup. When something out of your control happens, rather than getting flustered, focus on your group and how you can move forward, even if it is without your technology. Ask someone else to work on fixing the technology as you begin your comments. Worst case scenario, reschedule the meeting. Don’t force people to sit there while you troubleshoot.
There is nothing truly wrong with this question, except when you ask it after you have finished (and everyone knows it). When you wait to ask questions at the end, two things typically happens. One, employees don’t ask questions, because they don’t want to prolong the meeting or they forget to ask a question that popped into their head early in the discussion. And two, you end up closing with a weak Q&A session, rather concluding with your most important points. Either way, people can leave the meeting confused or misinformed. Avoid that scenario by asking for questions early and throughout your presentations.
What other phrases do you hate to hear during virtual presentations?
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We have recently started asking a One Question Survey in our weekly newsletter, Unleashing Your Remarkable Potential. And a few months ago, we asked about some of our readers what their biggest barriers to change were in their organization. And the #1 answer was: the lack of understanding of the change.
So in today’s episode, I’m giving three tips to help leaders break this barrier and better communicate change to their team and organization.
Change will be accepted far faster when people understand the change clearly. @KevinEikenberry
From This Episode:
By Wayne Turmel
Have you ever heard these complaints from your team?
The problem may lie with what people see—or don’t. As a leader, we talk all the time about “transparency,” the need to see what’s going on and why we do the things we do. The problem is that it’s hard to see anything from a hundred miles away.
The difference between leading from a distance and leading when everyone’s all in the same location is the sheer volume of clues and cues people get to tell them what’s going on. Here are a couple of examples of how we need to be intentionally transparent with our people when they don’t all share a workplace.
Delegation can feel like picking on people. One of the most common complaints from mixed teams (where part of them are in the office, part are working from home or elsewhere) is how tasks get delegated. Often the manager requires something done, and they reach out to the first person they think of. Often that’s the first person they see. This can lead to the notion that the reason remote workers are so productive is that they’re not getting the last-minute tasks and grunt work the folks in the office have to deal with. The thing is, the home team doesn’t know what’s been assigned to the remote folks either. When delegating a task, make sure everyone knows who is doing what. That way, the perception of fairness matches the reality. Also, if you are assigning tasks unevenly, knock it off.
Praise and recognition should not be (just) one-on-one. How do you know that the people you work with are competent and doing a good job? Usually that comes when the manager commends them for a job well done, or points out the work to the rest of the team. One of the unintended consequences of managing remotely is that sometimes leaders do a good job of recognizing work to the individual in question, which is great. The problem is that no one else hears it. Take time in meetings or in emails to share the good news about teammates so that everyone can build trust in their colleagues, even if they don’t see each other very often.
Your requests become their priority—help them get the big picture. When someone’s working from home, and we ask them to do a task for us, it sometimes has unintended consequences. For example, if we just send an email asking for information, we may not need it right away (or at least at the expense of other work they’re doing at the moment.) We don’t see them roll their eyes or curse us for re-prioritizing their work. That’s because we can’t see what they’re doing at that moment any more than they can see how your priorities and needs have changed since last you spoke together. Leaders must be transparent about what they’re asking for, why it matters and how it impacts other priorities. This may mean an actual conversation rather than an emailed request. It matters.
We must remember that when people work apart, they don’t have—in fact can’t have—the same depth of information and context as you do. It’s your job as leader to give them all the information they need. That means taking the time to be open and honest about what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and being conscious of information they may need to do their job.
To better understand how leading in a remote environment is different than traditional leadership, consider attending The Remote Leadership Certificate Series. From communication…to performance management…to motivation…and more, as a remote leader, you’ve got to be prepared to stay connected, handle meetings and schedules and provide the support your staff expects and needs. The Remote Leadership Certificate Series brings together experts in leadership and tools and technology to help you get the results you want. LEARN MORE HERE.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Wayne Turmel
Co-Founder and Product Line Manager
Wayne Turmel is the co-founder and Product Line Manager for the Remote Leadership Institute. For twenty years he’s been obsessed with helping managers communicate more effectively with their teams, bosses and customers. Wayne is the author of several books that demystify communicating through technology including Meet Like You Mean It – a Leader’s Guide to Painless & Productive Virtual Meetings, 10 Steps to Successful Virtual Presentations and 6 Weeks to a Great Webinar. His work appears frequently in Management-Issues.com.
Wayne, along with Kevin Eikenberry, has co-authored the definitive book on leading remotely, The Long-Distance Leader: Rules for Remarkable Remote Leadership.
A handshake has way more significance that you might think. It’s often the first impression that people have of you and it is communicating a lot.
In today’s video, I’m giving you a few pointers (pun intended?) to make sure that your handshake is saying what you want it to say.
Tweet it out: Your handshakes say much about you. Is it saying what you want it to? @KevinEikenberry
From This Episode:
If you want to be a great manager and leader, heed these 10 important bits of advice:
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