The First Minute: How to Start Conversations That Get Results (Business Communication Skills Books)

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Last week I published my second book The First Minute — How to Start Conversations That Get Results. Step 1: Frame the conversation in fifteen seconds or less. Framing provides context, makes your intentions clear, and gives a clear headline. What would you give to go from a poor or average communicator to a great communicator in just eight conversations? The first minute starts when you start talking about the work topic. Why is the first minute important? Book Genre: Business, Communication, Language, Leadership, Management, Nonfiction, Personal Development, Self Help

We spend over eight hours at work every weekday. Over 50 percent of that time is spent communicating either verbally or through writing. ³ That is a lot of time. All those interactions leave either a good or a bad impression about our ability to communicate. Overall, it was a decent read, I liked the framework he set up for planning out how to start a work conversation. It’s got six key elements - Context / Intent / Key Message and Goal / Problem / Solution and he explains these very clearly. You will also learn about the three components of framing—context, intent, and key message—and how these provide the foundation for a successful conversation. It is possible to make a great first impression with a colleague, only to ruin that impression when the conversation shifts to work. It doesn’t matter how much people like you; if you cannot deliver information in an organized way, you will have a hard time being respected professionally. WHY IS THE FIRST MINUTE IMPORTANT? Along the way you’ll meet managers, software developers, secretaries, and executives; witness the frustrations of missing out on dessert; ride the conversation rollercoaster; learn a valuable lesson in communication from a car mechanic; and even learn why it costs so much to put people into space.The secretary most often takes meeting minutes. Nonprofits, government entities, schools, public companies, and trade unions are usually required to record official meeting minutes. However, many other companies also use meeting minutes to maintain an official record. How to write meeting minutes Meeting minutes are the written record of a meeting or hearing. Minutes are usually structured and formal so that they can be shared after the meeting and serve as historical documents in the future. In the coming chapters, you’ll learn how to create a great first minute no matter what you want to talk about at work. When you apply this to all your work conversations, it will become a natural part of how you convey information, make requests, and engage in all other types of daily work communication. CHAPTER 2: FRAMING

Many books describe how to start conversations that establish and build relationships. Others show you how to make a great first impression in an interview or on a date. Still more show you how to start challenging conversations the right way. What none of those books teach is how to start conversations about everyday work topics. This book is a result of more than 20,000 conversations in both business and technical jobs. I’ve trained individuals and teams around the world in these techniques. I’ve worked with organizations from start-ups to Fortune 50 and FTSE 100 companies. These methods work for them all. Research shows that poor first impressions can be reversed by a consistently strong performance. It takes eight good impressions to overturn a bad one. That may sound like a lot, but we have so many interactions at work that it doesn’t take long to have eight conversations. Small Message BoardTypically found in classrooms and offices to visually notify staff and students that Plus, while you may have some work to do to change the impressions of the people you work with, there are many more chances to give first impressions. New first impressions happen when you meet new people in other teams.Service, installation and support is delivered 24x7 through our network of certified distributors, with support from a team of on-staff Rauland engineers. We communicate with dozens and sometimes hundreds of people every day at work. Every conversation relates to a different task or topic, and they all have different goals and outcomes. Each time we start a conversation, we know what we are going to talk about and why it’s important. Unfortunately, the people we speak to don’t know either of these things. As I’ve written before, the telephone used to be one of the most reliable communication technologies around. Once wired into homes and businesses, the public switched telephone network facilitated calls with resilience, even in the event of power failure. But when phone networks went digital and then cellular, a combination of factors made calls less reliable: Digital sampling captured voices poorly; environmental noise made calls hard to hear; wireless networks offered a signal in some places but not others. The speakers and earpieces were smaller and designed for looks rather than acoustics, making already tenuous calls even more unintelligible. And so, as digital, mobile telephony overtook copper-wire analog calls, telephony degraded forever. This award-winning book is a step-by-step guide for clear, concise communication in everyday work conversations. Many books describe how to start conversations that establish and build relationships. Others show you how to make a great first impression in an interview or on a date. Still more show you how to start challenging conversations the right way. What none of those books teach is how to start conversations about normal, everyday work topics.

A study by Siemens Enterprise Communications found that a business with one hundred employees spends an average of seventeen hours a week clarifying communications. ¹ That is 884 hours a year that could be spent delivering value to customers instead of repeating information to make sure it’s understood. To avoid this repetition, every conversation should start clearly and concisely. This is true whether you are communicating about printer paper or the launch of a million-dollar advertising campaign. Plus, while you may have some work to do to change the impressions of the people you work with, there are many more chances to give first impressions when you meet and work with new people in other teams and in new companies as your career progresses. This book is a result of more than 20,000 conversations in both business and technical jobs. Chris Fenning has trained individuals and teams around the world in these techniques. He has worked with organizations from start-ups to Fortune 50 and FTSE 100 companies. These methods work for them all. When we start communicating, our audience’s brains must work to understand the context of the words. They try to work out why we are talking to them and what they need to do with the information. If these things aren’t clear in the first few sentences, their minds create their own version of the facts. This leads to many problems, from wasted time to incorrect assumptions and high-cost mistakes.How would you rate your communication skills? Do you leave a good impression, or is there room for improvement? an emergency is active. Send important emergency instructions to the message boards to visually instruct people on what to do. Step 2: Create a structured summary of the entire message you need to deliver. State the goal and define the problem that stands between you and achieving that goal. Then focus the conversation on the solution. Visually notify staff, students, and even first responders with building and classroom statuses. The light has two independently controlled

visually notify staff and students that an emergency is active. Send important emergency instructions to the message boards to instruct people on what to do. The larger message boards allow more customization with double line text.

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Finally, you’ll discover the three components required of a structured summary: 1) the goal you are trying to achieve, 2) the problem stopping you from reaching that goal, and 3) the solution to the problem. These three things will enable you to summarize any topic, no matter how complex. Instead, this: Hello? … Wait, hello? Can you hear me? Okay, hold on. Ugh. Okay, okay, just a second. I have to get my earphones to connect. Damn it. Okay, never mind, I’ll just hold it up to my head. Hi, ugh, sorry about that. Meeting minutes document what happened during a meeting. They are often shared within an organization after a meeting and serve as a reference document in the future. Why are meeting minutes important? The techniques in this book show how to give the information your audience actually needs. The first minute is not about trying to condense all the information into sixty seconds. It is about having clear intent, talking about one topic at a time, and focusing on solutions instead of dwelling on problems.