Hate networking? Stop trying to "get"

I’ve always cringed at the thought of networking events. I rarely carry business cards, I dislike getting business cards thrust at me and I’m kind of (despite what you might think if you met my business persona) shy and would prefer to be home in my pjs and ugg boots.

This week I was watching a seminar by photographer of women extraordinaire Sue Bryce (www.inbedwithsue.com) and she said the best thing I’ve ever heard on the concept of networking.

Stop trying to “get”.

Don’t go into a networking event – or any form of networking for that matter looking to get something. Instead – look to give.

In Sue’s words, think “how can I help you?”

She’s a photographer, so in her earlier days, she would look to offer her help –in photographing and in turn, because reciprocity just works that way, those people she photographed in PR or other local businesses would then, after loving their shots, want to refer her to their clients.

How can you help? Never, what can you get.  

By Anonymous with No comments

But I don’t know where to start!

We’ve all been there – the work has slowly but surely piled up, the emails have gone unanswered, and every time you turn your head it seems you’re just being bombarded with more to add to the “not-done” pile – in short, life is out of control.

I recently worked with a friend who was in just this situation and even though she knew she was rapidly falling further down the rabbit hole her issue was, she didn’t know where to start.

So – where did we start?

Well – I wanted to have a one day action plan to get her back on track. Not everything could be accomplished in one day, but everything could be organised and planned in one day.

Only – so we could get off to the right track we started our one day – at about 7.00pm. Now I’m not advocating working at 7pm every night – but when things have gotten to panic stations, being in the office or your workspace at a time when no-one else is might be just what you need.

Step 1. Find and organise the clues

It took about 2 hours, but the very first step was to categorise every “clue” in her office. They went into various “piles” of clues (in no order within the piles). The names of some of these piles were:

·           - Leads for new clients

·           - Random pieces of paper / post its / messages

·           - Personal stuff

·           - Files / checklists

·           - Current clients

Remember, you don’t need 30 post it note squares and 25 pens, minimise the amount of crap on your desk and you’ll minimise the amount of clutter in your brain. Keep what you need immediately within reach, logically store anything else, throw out everything you can that is junk and donate to your office stationery cupboard anything else.

Step 2. Use the clues to generate a plan

So then I took each of these categories and roughed out a plan for the next day allowing spots within the to do list for checking email, confirming that day’s appointments etc.

Step 3. Get an early win

By the time we met first up the next morning there was already a sense of order to the office.  But the list was still terrifying with it’s 9 scary dot points. What we needed was an early first win. The first item on the list was small, it took less than 10 minutes. As lame as it sounds, I invoked a rule whereby we would high five every time we had a “win” (ie: every time we took an item off that list). In the first hour the first three items had all been high fived and we were working on item 4.

Step 4. Throw multi-tasking on it’s ass

Part of the problem, I’ve found, for when everything is getting on top of people is that they’re trying to do everything at once. Multi-tasking is a farse – try and do everything and you’ll get nothing finished and more importantly nothing finished well.

With our little 9 point list – it was clear what we were working on at any time. When we were working on following up every client lead (that’s right, every one) – we weren’t checking email and we weren’t focussing on any of the other 8 points.

Step 5. Rinse and repeat

Pick one thing, do it, complete it, high five, move on to the next.

Systematically work through your list.

Step 6. Remove the memory

As you work through your list – be smart about it. For us in this instance, ever time we followed up a new client lead we put it into a categorised folder and diarised the next follow up. No need to have to “remember” to do anything.  Life is stressful enough without having to wake up at 2.00am because you forgot to do something you were relying on your memory for.

Step 7. Stick-to-it

And finally - being organised, especially if you’re the type of person (read: me) who gets disorganised, isn’t something that will naturally happen if you get organised. You’ll need to keep check of it. Maybe you diarise to clean your desk and remove the clutter once a week, maybe you set aside a time each month to meet with an organisational mentor within your organisation and get 100% on track. 

By Anonymous with No comments

New project launching tomorrow - tune in for nix!

Hi All,

Just a quick one to let you know my new little project http://somewherelive.com/ is launching tomorrow at 9.00am (on the East Coast of Australia) with a free live stream of customer service guru Glen Coutinho.

It's going to be nice and interactive - anyone watching can tweet questions, comments, thoughts with the hashtag #somewherelive and I'll be your voice in the session (along with a live audience).

If you're in real estate - it's got to be a must, if you're in business for yourself - I'd strongly recommend it if you want to enhance your customer service and if you're in sales in any form - WATCH!

I'm very excited, a little nervous and keen to have your thoughts and feedback!

So - to watch, just register at http://somewherelive.com/ and click "watch live"tomorrow!

Kirsty

By Anonymous with No comments

Red licorice

My husband and I were reminiscing about the sorts of presents we used to get our parents when we were younger. He fondly recalled one year when he got his dad red licorice as a birthday present. He told me he couldn’t have been more excited to get this awesome gift for his dad and that he was so positive that his dad would love it. Now, knowing my father in law, I’m sure he gave every impression to his young son that he couldn’t have been more excited at the gift – but my husband realizes now that it probably wasn’t the ideal present for him. You see, my husband made the classic mistake of giving what he would have liked to have received.  As a child, the idea of a big present of red licorice was the stuff of dreams, and that’s why he chose it for his (much loved) dad.

Simple childhood mistake right? Not so much. I bet you, like me, make this same mistake in your adult life all the time. I bet your sales pitch is heavily skewed to how you would like to be pitched to. I bet your staff management and reward techniques are those that would work beautifully if you were managing yourself. And if any of you have read the book “The 5 Love Languages” you’ll know how easy it is to show love and appreciation for your partner in the way that you’d like to receive it.

So – my homework for you today:

   - Grab a copy of The 5 Love Languages if you haven’t read it. It’ll change your life.

   - Analyze one area of your life in which you think you might have a red licorice skew and try and enact some changes. For me –it might be the way I reward my staff at work. I’d love to be offered extra opportunity for travel, training and money – but I’ve got to remember the staff that would respond equally well to more time off work to pursue personal interests, or having the company get involved in a charity that is important to them or public praise of their work. 

By Anonymous with No comments

Testing the Tagline

I’ve been emailing back and forth with a girlfriend in real estate who is about to get her car branded up. She’s a clever cookie – so she got her branding mock up done and then sent it out to a bunch of people to get their opinions and thoughts on what she’d missed or could change.

One of my suggestions was that she needed a tag line on the rear window. Since then every car with tag lines on their rear windows have been jumping out at me and I’ve been busily snapping photos and sending them to her.

She’d brainstormed some ideas – but when we sat down today we mulled them all over. I wanted my friend to leave with something concrete - so I said she wasn’t leaving until we had 3 taglines to test.   Effectively trapped in my kitchen we both just started rambling to get our 3 taglines to test.

Why would someone want to use Jane as their real estate agent? What were her best features we wanted to emphasize? What did we want to avoid? How were we going to get something that didn’t sound super cheesy, but that was something that you’d remember and would make you pick up a smart phone and make contact with Jane.

We also googled for our inspiration –steering clear of other real estate agent’s taglines. We got started with #2 below on a list of websites with taglines for charitable organizations.

In the end we came up with 6 taglines to test – knowing which one we were both super pumped up about, but wanting to see what other’s opinions were.

1. The go to girl for real estate

2. The agent for the home you cherish

3. Not your typical real estate agent

4. Jane Crawford - A fresh approach

5. I can put a value on your home - but never on our relationship

6. Jane Crawford - exceptional agent, mediocre runner (and a whole series of these cook, gardener changing them often)

So how could we test them? Sending them out to Jane’s friends was a good start – but we also wanted unbiased opinions from people who don’t already adore her. Thank you facebook. We posted the taglines asking for feedback on a real estate group and also on my facebook page  (https://www.facebook.com/KirstyDunpheyEmail/) - a couple of hours later and 50+ comments were received. Voila instant feedback.

Overwhelmingly we had our suspicions on what we thought was the best one confirmed and Jane’s car is now going to be branded on it’s behind with “exceptional agent, mediocre...” and then the last word is going to change every few weeks and tie in with her other marketing (letterbox drops, facebook page, newsletter etc).

A fun hours spent with a fun result. So next time you brainstorm – maybe lock yourself in the kitchen (or wherever you need to) til you’ve got at least 3 ideas – and test the immediately. 

By Anonymous with No comments

How I got out of a funk

“I’m in a funk” I said morosely to my husband. He’d heard it before from me. Sometimes I just fall into “funks”. Nothing’s wrong. In fact, I’m rarely in a funk when something’s wrong (I kind of thrive on fixing problems). I’m usually just bored and lacking motivation. Hey – I’m sure it happens to everyone, and you probably have your own definition of a funk.

Contributing more to my, for want of a better word, funky-ness, lately is the fact that I’ve been more house bound that I’m used to with the birth of my gorgeous new daughter. I adore her, but I do get a little stir crazy when trapped in the house for too long. (Don’t even get me started on how insane I went trying to work from home full time after doing/writing this: urlm.in/rzaz)

So – I was in a funk. And like I said earlier, I’m a bit of a problem solver, so I decided to try a new way of dealing with my “funk”.

Every day I work through a to do list on my calendar. At present, there are 25 different things on my “every day” list from taking certain vitamins, doing certain exercises for my constantly misbehaving back, reading a certain amount for myself and to my kids, taking a photo etc etc – as well as the other tasks that are specific to that day. What can I say – I work well with a list.

But – back the funk. To try and resolve the issue I added one extra task to the list. I don’t do it every day, just days that aren’t as “full”, days that I know I’d be more prone to falling into a funk. It is my audacious daily goal. I think I have Eric Wahl’s Unthink to thank for the idea (http://theartofvision.com/unthink - it’s a great read, check it out and also check out his cool online tool to help you uncover what kind of artist you are in the workplace http://theartworkrevolution.com/ - I’m an inventor/sculptor).

So my first audacious daily goal was to do 1000 mountain climbers (http://youtu.be/KI8u58hPam4). I had all day to do them and every time I felt a little bored or stagnant, I just hopped on the ground and did another 50 keeping track of the tally as I went. My 2.5 year old daughter thought I was insane at first and I was told sternly (as only a toddler can) to “stop doing that right now”. But by the end of the day, whenever she’d see me pop my hands down on the floor to crank out another 50, she’d join in with her own adorable toddler version which most amounted to her doing almost headstands.

Next daily goal – 2000 crunches, then 1000 calf raises then 500 tricep dips. Then I veered a little and my goal was to cook three meals from scratch in a day (I’m very undomesticated, this was a stretch for me). Then back to the more physical stuff, 200 push ups off my toes. And today’s goal – write 10 blogs (this is number 4 of 10 and I usually write just one a week).

The cool thing I’ve found? When I’ve got a goal to focus on and work on and a fixed deadline - I’m far less likely to get into a funk (so far, zero funks on audacious goal days). Second side benefit – proof positive what we as parents do in role modeling for our kids.  If my girls see me being fit, they’re going to be far more likely to do the same – likewise, when they seem me going nuts for chocolate, I think I can make the connection. Third – I’ve always known I’m the kind of person who thrives on challenge and goals. If I set myself a goal – I’m going to achieve it, even if at 11pm I’m still cranking out sit ups (hasn’t happened yet). And finally, if my goal isn’t quite enough of a stretch (my original tricep dip goal was 300) – I can simply reassess the goal and make sure it is.


Want to help me? Send me an idea for something I can use on my next audacious goal day by commenting on my blog - http://blog.kirstydunphey.com/ or emailing me Kirsty (at) kirstydunphey.com

PS - I reached my goal of 10 blogs, and, the very next day wrote two more - easily, they just came to me, and then the next day another one popped out. It seems that my rubber band of writing was stretched and found it that bit harder to go back to normal!

By Anonymous with No comments