Dahle Communication

Is Good the Enemy of Great?

One of my silent partners and I were talking about this over the weekend. Should you ever let 'good' be enough? Are there times when you need to just get something finished, so you say "That's good enough." If you answered yes to either of those questions, you may want to re-evaluate what you want to accomplish.

Doing something good is fine - but if you want to be great in any industry you must avoid being good. This is especially true when it comes to your presentations. Anyone can give a 'good' presentation. When giving a great presentation however, only those who do the work and have the want, will rise above mediocrity.

Why is this important? As in any business or endeavor, being great instead of good separates you from the crowd. When you are the most dynamic presenter you will set yourself apart. After that, success will follow.

Keep this thought in mind: "Don't let anything I do be good enough - let it be great."

Travis

Me, Myself and I

The following post comes from my wife and business partner Megan Dahle. Megan is an extremely intelligent person who gets irritated when people screw things up constantly - as you will see with the following post. It is some great advice if you are going to give a presentation or speech, so pay attention, you might just learn something - and while the picture is of De La Soul, that's not what the post is about.

Warning:  I’m about to get on my high horse about grammar. I’m not claiming I use grammar perfectly whenever I speak or write, but thanks primarily to my mother and Mr. Beck (a great English teacher from Milbank - a little weird, but great), I get it right most of the time. That said, I have a pet peeve I’d like to share with you that can prevent you from sounding like an idiot.   

Kids are raised to never say “me”, mainly because they’re using it in the wrong context. Does this sound familiar? 

“Jake and me are going to the pool!” 

“No, dear.  Jake and I are going to the pool.” 

And so it continues all through childhood. We get to the point where “Me” = BAD so we stop using it.   

And what has replaced it? “Myself”. It’s disgusting. I once read an email that ended in “If you have any questions, please get back to myself”. What?! That doesn’t make a lick of sense. 

People even use it to replace “I”.   

“Jake and myself are going to the pool!” 

“That’s nice, honey.  Don’t forget to take sunscreen.  Bring it back to myself when you’re done.” 

“Myself” doesn’t belong in either of those sentences. “Myself” is reflexive, meaning you’re doing something to yourself. “I put sunscreen on myself.”   

So here are a few hints for you: 

1) If there’s an “and” right before “myself”, it’s probably wrong. It should most likely be “me” or “I” in that location. 

“Jake and I are going to the pool.” 

2) How can you tell which one it should be? Can your replace the “_____ and myself” with “we” or “us”? If it’s “we”, use “I”.  If it’s “us”, use “me”. 

Grammar is a huge part of presentations. Anyone that uses grammar improperly in front of an intelligent audience looses credibility instantly. And all audiences are intelligent, or at least you should assume so, but that’s a topic for another time.

-Megan

Out of Town and Out of Contact

I just wanted to put a quick post up today. I am at the National Debate Tournament in Birmingham, AL coaching students from Washington High School all week. Needless to say it's been a busy week and internet connections are a little sketchy at times in our hotel and the schools have cut off wireless at the schools where students are competing.

Basically what I am saying is - sorry for not getting a post up and running this week - hope to be back at it early next week with some thoughts from this past week at the national tournament. There are a lot of great things that go on at the national debate tournament and I'll share them with you soon.

Thanks for reading, I appreciate all the comments (both on-line and off) that I've gotten over the months.

Travis

Give People a Reason to Listen

This is a simple mantra for your speeches. Your presentation or speech, regardless of how big of an audience you are giving it to, should be important enough that people will want to be there and get something out of it. If people are sitting there asking themselves "Why am I here?" then you need to work on your speeches.

The problem with a lot of speeches that I hear is that I am asking myself that question a lot of times. Many times the speaker is droning on about something that I don't need or they are reading their slides to you. They do this even after they have given you their handouts with their slides on it. Which means I've flipped through the slides, read all the material and yet I have to sit here for another 30 minutes while you read all of your slides!

So please, take a cue from myself and Seth Godin - when you are preparring your speeches ask yourself "Are people getting something out of this speech or are they asking themselves - why am I here?" This simple guideline can help you with your speeches. Make sure that you cut out information that you don't need and make sure you are giving a speech that people are going to want to be present at.

Travis

The Curse of Knowledge

One of the downsides of being involved in the high school debate world since I was a freshman in high school is that I pretty much know everything about Policy Debate. The reason that it is a downside is that I tend to assume that the freshman students I am teaching will understand what I am talking about quickly.

The problem is that a lot of times the students DON'T understand what I am saying. Luckily in my classrooms, the students are allowed to interrupt me and ask me questions to help clarify things. That way, if they don't know something they can ask questions right away. This allows the students the opportunity to make sure they do understand it - if they actually ask questions.

The problem with most speeches that people give is that they don't allow any questioning until the end of their speeches when it will be too late. If people don't understand something, they are going to be lost when listening to your speech. If this happens, they can't hold up their hands and ask you to clarify it or they will feel stupid making you stop to clarify something.

What you have to do as a speaker is make sure that you don't talk over your audience. Just because you know something doesn't mean that the audience is going to know what you are talking about. This is especially important when you are talking about a technical issue or something that is new to a lot of people. A word of caution on this: don't talk under the audience as well. There is nothing that irritates me more than when someone talks to me like I'm a 6 year old. So don't treat people like they don't know anything either.

So when preparing your next speech or presentation, take a look at what you are going to talk about. Are you covering any key terms or technical aspects that the audience may need to know to understand your speech? Are you ensuring that everyone is going to be able to follow you along? Making sure that you answer these questions will ensure that your speech and presentation will be a success.

Travis