The Heart of the Matter: Seminars

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Uniquely fun
Never boring
Challenging without remedial overtones
No dumbing down
Eliminating all exceptions in the language
Applying to speaking, writing, thinking, planning, reading
Sophisticated yet simple
"Ah Ha!" discoveries
Beneficial in every environment
Remarkably appropriate
Life-changing
Immediately useful

Why Should I Bother?

If you have taken seemingly endless communications courses, or been sent, the idea of attending another one may have as much attraction to you as a trip to the dentist.

As we have taught seminars, we have heard exactly that sentiment. And often!!

This technology will change your life. Really. Or, you will change your life with this technology. You will find that you do not learn a set of "shoulds" as rules which you must follow to communicate well. You will find a set of "magic keys" to help you fit communication to your needs.

What Magic Keys?

Language has "keys" for meaning in its patterns. English only has four thought patterns in "chunks" of thought; the "keys" to these four patterns number under 100!! Once you know them, you have the insight into how you and others think. To communicate with others, we often have to either shift our points-of-view or shift to another person’s point-of-view to understand what on earth that person is thinking.

These "keys" reveal the underlying "architecture" of English, how English operates, how it is put together. Once you use that "architecture," you build your ideas as they will most effectively meet your goals.

Nor, do the "context keys" only serve those who have not mastered English grammar or composition. The better we have learned to communicate, the better we can put that "architecture" to work.

C What Good Can theExact Word's^Ž Seminars Do Me?

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We all know the feeling when we have communicated something beautifully. Yet, mysteriously, sometimes the listener or reader responds with complete confusion. Or partially questions what we have said.

At the very moment that we have been the most clear, a supervisor, friend, or teacher may gently approach us to "suggest" a few changes here and there. Or a vicious, unfeeling "slasher" may cut what we say or write to ribbons.

In a meeting, someone may send a withering glance at us to clearly label that last comment as the ultimate in stupidity. In fact, of course, it may be the "glancer," or the "slasher," or the "grammar police" who operate from behind a dense cloud and misunderstand everything. But, how do we even begin to get the attention of those who judge or condemn us? How do we use communication skills as a solution and not more of the problem?

"What good the seminars will do for you" is to create a new, immediately useful, life-changing, masterful hold on the communications process that will, in turn, give you a new set of keys to communicating.

What Happens When It’s Their Problem, Not Mine?

Every one of us is a "they." I am "they" to you and you are to me. Communication is always both a "they" and an "us" problem.

Steven Covey says in Chapter 11, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People "Even if (and especially when) the other person is not coming from that (your) paradigm, seek first to understand...it gives you accurate data to work with" once you understand why people think the ways that "they" do.

If we only talked to ourselves, then we would never need to change what we say or how we say it. It is almost always "their" problem because it is "their" point-of-view that we need to understand in order to communicate in the first place.

And often, our listeners need to understand our points-of-view very differently from their own. Once we can listen to, hear, and address "their" points-of-view, we save time, speak to others’ needs, look great, and provide real communication. Expecting someone else to always shift positions makes us look like manipulators.

Executive Leadership and Communications^Š