Fresh Ideas Are Rare – Here’s How Geniuses Find Innovative Solutions
A soccer coach can learn a lot about winning games by watching basketball. That's the philosophy that drives Gareth Southgate, the coach for England's World Cup team. By combining ideas from different fields--literally--Southgate has helped England advance...
What Leaders Today Can Learn From The Declaration of Independence
Americans celebrate the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, but Thomas Jefferson wrote it with an eye on July 6, 1776. Two days after the Continental Congress approved the document, it was read aloud for the first time from poster-size sheets called...
Starbucks Ditches 1 Billion Plastic Straws After A YouTube Video Went Viral
Big numbers rarely spark action, but a sea turtle with a straw in its nose can trigger a movement. By now you’ve probably heard that Starbucks has announced it will eliminate plastic straws globally by 2020. The straws will be replaced with recyclable lids...
Spark Your Best Ideas With These Four Mind Hacks
In today's knowledge economy, you are only as valuable as your ideas. My job is to teach leaders how to communicate their ideas persuasively. But I can't help unless they have an original idea. Fortunately, there are some simple tips that you can use to...
The Life Or Death Consequences Of Bad PowerPoint For The Elite Navy SEALs
In business, an overloaded and confusing PowerPoint presentation is a nuisance that can result in lost sales. In a Navy SEAL mission, bad PowerPoint presentations could be deadly. While conducting my research for a new book on persuasion, I talked to Navy...
A Billionaire Investor And A Great Soccer Coach Reveal The 4 Habits Of Winners
Millions of soccer fans watched Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo steal the show by scoring three goals in the 2018 World Cup match against Spain. What television doesn't show are the habits that turned Ronaldo into a legend: discipline, drive, conviction and...
GE’s CEO Takes On The Challenge Of Communicating Big Changes To The Company
When GE announced a major strategic change (spinning off its healthcare unit and selling its stake in Baker Hughes), GE chairman and CEO, John Flannery, had to reassure employees, shareholders, and the financial media that he was doing the right thing by...
The Five Interview Tips You Didn’t Learn In Business School
The tools of communication have changed; the human brain has not. Business school grads who understand this fact of human psychology will find it easier to stand out in job interviews. And they need to find ways to stand apart. In a recent Wall Street...
The Storytelling Surgeon Chosen To Head The Dimon-Bezos-Buffett Healthcare Firm Is An Inspired Choice
Three of the most influential business leaders of our time—Jamie Dimon, Jeff Bezos, and Warren Buffett—have chosen Dr. Atul Gawande to lead their new healthcare firm. Gawande’s credentials as a surgeon and Harvard Medical School professor give them...
Every Communicator Should Follow The Lead From The Fed’s Plain-English Campaign
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has a bachelor’s degree from Princeton and a law degree from Georgetown, but his first statement after the June FOMC meeting was written in ninth-grade language. It began, “The main takeaway is that the economy is...
The Key Driver Of Success In The Modern Age
A new McKinsey study of 800 occupations finds that automation and artificial intelligence will transform the workplace over the next decade. In order to compete, our skills have to change. The study finds that communication skills will be valued above all...
How Expert Presenters Mind-Boggling Supercomputer Specs Into Human Terms
The $200 million supercomputer, Summit, can perform mathematical equations at speeds that “boggle the mind,” according to a report in the New York Times. How fast is mind-boggling? Try 200 quadrillion calculations per second. That’s not a typo. But if it...
Hook Your Audience In Less Than 10 Minutes – Here’s How In 3 Steps
In a presentation of medium interest--not too boring and not too exciting--how long will it take for your audience tune out? The human brain has an onboard clock that times out after exactly--ten minutes. Neuroscience proves it. According to John Medina, a...
Use Director Ron Howard’s Checklist To Improve Your Next Presentation
If you want to create an exciting business presentation that keeps your audience on the edge of their seats, steal a page from one of Hollywood's best storytellers, Ron Howard. Howard is the legendary director of such modern classics...
How Software Giant SAP Looks Back To Drive Forward
NBA fans who spent more than one million hours pouring over basketball stats can thank enterprise software company SAP. As the 2018 NBA Finals get underway between the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Golden State Warriors, fans will once again be checking...
Howard Schultz’ Letter To Starbucks Customers Reflects A Longtime Mission
The Starbucks announcement to temporarily close 8,000 stores this afternoon for racial bias sensitivity training has been met with a range of opinions on social media—snark, skepticism and support. I see the action as consistency of message—a valuable...
5 Ways to Project Confidence in Front of an Audience
Harvard Business Review 5 Ways to Project Confidence in Front of an Audience Employees, investors, and partners don’t just follow anyone — they follow leaders who have command of the business and command of the stage. Whether you’re presenting on an analyst call or...
Profits Soared At Carnival After Its CEO Discovered This Communication Tool
Carnival Cruise Line’s newest ship—Horizon—departs from New York City this week with about 4,000 guests. Also on board are 1,450 crew members who are responsible for keeping those passengers safe, happy, and eager to take another cruise. Across all of...
The Crucial Leadership Lesson Steve Jobs Taught Tim Cook
Speaking to more than 5,500 graduates at the 2018 Duke University commencement on Sunday, Apple CEO Tim Cook reminded them that, despite the problems facing society, "this is the best time in history to be alive." The data backs up Cook's observation....
Oprah’s Powerful Words Brought Tears In Her USC Commencement Speech – Here’s How
It was fitting that the USC Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism chose a master communicator--Oprah Winfrey--to deliver the 2018 Annenberg commencement speech. Oprah's speech on Friday to 960 students and their families had the hallmarks of...
Philadelphia’s Bid To Be Amazon’s HQ2 Will Help You Improve Your Communication Skills
According to a recent Wall Street Journal article, some the 20 cities on Amazon’s shortlist of potential sites for its second headquarters are seeing an unintended benefit from the presentations they created to pitch themselves to Amazon. The pitches are...
LinkedIn Survey Shows This One Skill Will Keep You Relevant
Robots don't have a heart; humans do. The line sounds trite, but it's the key to standing out and getting ahead at a time when automation and artificial intelligence threaten to eliminate millions of jobs. This is the conclusion of the recently...
5 Tips For Success From Warren Buffett
The billionaire Warren Buffett and his Berkshire Hathaway investing partner Charlie Munger have been dispensing financial wisdom and life lessons for 24 years at their annual shareholders meetings. CNBC has recently archived about 120 hours of videos from...
The Nine Words That Took This CEO From Poverty To The Pinnacle Of Success
Words matter. Words can shape a person’s life and career. They did for Arnold Donald. Nine words took Carnival Corp’s CEO from poverty to the top of a $48 billion company. This summer, Donald celebrates his fifth year as CEO of the world’s largest leisure...
The 3 Presentation Tips I Learned While Preparing CEOs For IPOs
I recently heard from the marketing director at a pre-IPO company. "The CEO can't tell our company story," she said. The CEO is visionary, passionate and competent, but he's not skilled in the art of communication and public speaking. Fortunately, there...
Use These Presentation Hacks To Captivate Your Audience
Molecular biologist John Medina once told me, "The brain does not pay attention to boring things." The statement profoundly shaped my approach to communication skills. My mission is to give readers the tools they need to keep their audience from getting...
When Presenting, Simple Is Always Best… Always
Steve Jobs once said, "Simple can be harder than complex." It's true, which is why it's hard to express your ideas simply. Anyone can write long, confusing sentences. Anyone can speak in esoteric jargon. But simplicity is worth pursuing because it "can...
Jeff Bezos Replaces PowerPoint With Narratives In All Amazon Presentations – Here’s Why
In his 2018 annual letter, Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos repeated his rule that PowerPoint is banned in executive meetings. What Bezos replaces it with provides even more valuable insight for entrepreneurs and leaders. In his letter, and in a recent...
Software Giant SAP Looks Back To Its Roots To Drive The Future
NBA fans who spent more than one million hours pouring over basketball stats can thank enterprise software company SAP. As the 2018 NBA Finals get underway between the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Golden State Warriors, fans will once again be checking...
Avoid 3 Mental Hurdles That Get In The Way Of Success
Hans Rosling was a famed Swedish statistician and widely admired TED speaker. Rosling passed away before he could see his new book, Factfullness, climb to the top of the New York Times bestseller lists. Bill Gates calls the book one of the most important...