168 Posts Found

…the moral, however relevant, is not what’s most notable to a student of storytelling. What’s remarkable is that when listeners hear the start of such a story – whether fable, personal remembrance, or corporate myth – they implicitly agree to a certain set of rules as an audience. Rather than judge the veracity of each fact presented, as they would in a traditional analytical presentation, … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: strategy+business | Subjects: Communication, Persuasion

There are two ways to persuade people. The first is by using conventional rhetoric, which is what most executives are trained in. It’s an intellectual process, and in the business world it usually consists of a PowerPoint slide presentation in which you say, “Here is our company’s biggest challenge, and here is what we need to do to prosper.” And you build your case by … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subjects: Communication, Organizational Behavior, Storytelling

[stories] fulfill a profound human need to grasp the patterns of living-not merely as an intellectual exercise, but within a very personal, emotional experience.

Content: Quotation | Source: Harvard Business School (HBS) Working Knowledge | Subjects: Communication, Management

Since bullshit need not be false, it differs from lies in its misrepresentational intent. The bullshitter may not deceive us, or even intend to do so, either about the facts or about what he takes the facts to be. What he does necessarily attempt to deceive us about is his enterprise. His only indispensably distinctive characteristic is that in a certain way he misrepresents what … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: Ivey Business Journal | Subjects: Communication, Personality / Behavior

When you make a request of someone, take a little extra time to explain why you are making it. Put it in context and explain why it’s important to the goals of the business. Then the person can provide a more robust solution because she understands the purpose of the task and how the information will be used. Ask what the person needs to complete … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: Kiss Theory Good Bye | Subjects: Communication, Delegation

Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, ‘Make me feel important.’

Content: Quotation | Source: USTelecom dailyLead | Subjects: Communication, Leadership, People, Personal Development

Never give people unsolicited advice. If they want your opinion, they’ll ask for it. And only those who ask for it and pay for it will value it.

Content: Quotation | Source: bly.com | Subject: Communication

Examine a business situation gone bad and there is a good chance you will find, somewhere in the chain of failure, an executive who did not listen. The executive was told but never heard.

Content: Quotation | Source: Ivey Business Journal | Subject: Communication

A good story and a well-formed argument are different natural kinds. Both can be used as means for convincing another. Yet what they convince of is fundamentally different: arguments convince one of their truth, stories of their lifelikeness. The one verifies by eventual appeal to procedures for establishing formal and empirical proof. The other establishes not truth but verisimilitude.

Content: Quotation | Source: Storytelling: Passport to Success in the 21st Century | Subjects: Communication, Persuasion

People need to be reminded more often than they need to be instructed.

Content: Quotation | Source: 43 Folders | Subjects: Communication, Leadership, Management, Training & Development

What makes people great at small talk? However quickly they can transcend the meaningless chitchat about the weather and what company they work for and engage their conversation partners in discussions about stuff that really matters – like their favorite hobbies, their troublesome teenage children, their frustrations at work, their family relationships that really put a strain on them. Only when you talk with someone … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Sources: 800-CEO-READ (8CR), ChangeThis | Subjects: Communication, Personal Development

When two people in business always agree, one of them is unnecessary.

Content: Quotation | Source: Ivey Business Journal | Subject: Communication

The orator persuades by moral character when his speech is delivered in such a manner as to render him worthy of confidence; for we trust such persons to a greater degree, and more readily. This is generally true for all types of arguments, and absolutely true when there is uncertainty and room for doubt.

Content: Quotation | Source: IESE Insight | Subjects: Communication, Persuasion

What you’re saying with jargon is: A) You belong, and B) If you don’t get it, you don’t belong.

Content: Quotation | Source: brandchannel.com | Subjects: Communication, Organizational Behavior

The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion that it has taken place.

Content: Quotation | Source: CEO Refresher | Subject: Communication

People do care about the truth of an idea, but they also want to tell stories that produce strong emotion, and that second tendency sometimes gets in the way of the first.

If we could understand what kinds of stories succeed beyond all expectations, even when they are not true, we might be able to take legitimate information, about health for example, and change people’s behavior … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: Stanford University | Subjects: Communication, Organizational Behavior

When one person speaks and is encouraged to develop his or her ideas, then it is we, the audience, who provide the challenge. We provide the democracy. In each of our hearts and minds, we absorb, judge and come to our own conclusions. The dialectic is, thankfully, not between a group of equally ignorant people thrashing out a series of arbitrary subjects about which they … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: Guardian Unlimited | Subject: Communication

I define dialogue as having three indispensable elements. First, park status outside – so that people feel free to interact with each other as equals. That’s not easy to do. Second, suspend judgment while listening. Dialogue is the opposite of debate. You can’t win or lose. You don’t rush to judgment; you leave yourself open to actually hearing with empathy what other people say. Third, … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: strategy+business | Subject: Communication

The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.

Content: Quotation | Subject: Communication

There is a near-universal tradeoff between richness and reach of information. Richness is variously the amount, quality, specificity, recency, or trustworthiness of the information shared in a transaction; and reach is the number of people or entities involved. Typically, we can transact with lots of richness if we are willing to give up reach (a conversation) or with lots of reach if we are willing … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subjects: Communication, Information