Miss Communication: It’s All About the Story

I have said it before, and I’m more than happy to say it again. Communication is all about telling stories. The better we tell the story the easier it is to get a message across. Yes, there are people who are “numbers and facts” people. But they see the story in the numbers and facts. They’re still looking for the story, they’re just putting it together a different way.

Not everyone believes that, I’ve had it said to my face, but it’s true. Training, you’re telling the story of how to do something. Proposals, you’re tell the story of how your company can fulfill a need (or in the case of non-profit grant writing, how the money requested can make change happen). Social media is the story your trying to tell through pictures and posts. Marketing is telling the story of an organization or product you want someone to buy or get involved in. It’s all story telling.

person holding red iphone x and macbook pro

Photo by Oleg Magni on Pexels.com

Your right, it isn’t the traditional “once upon a time” kind of storytelling (though it would be fun to see that in some cases). But you take your audience from point A, to point B and on through the end of what you’re trying to tell them. There is (hopefully) logical progression through the message, and if done correctly people will remember it. The happily ever after if you will. A simple list of facts, or steps, or activities, may grab the audience’s attention, but it’s how you weave that information together that keeps their attention.

Communicating information, and doing it well, is an art. Like storytelling. Don’t dismiss the concept without taking the time to think about the application. Make your message memorable. Tell the story.

The World Turned Upside Down

confident businessman using smartphone on street

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

First, this is not another reference to Lynn-Manuel Miranda’s amazing musical. It’s a reference to something he referenced which I knew about before he referenced it. The World Turned Upside Down was the song the British sang as they marched out after their loss in the Revolutionary War. I used it in 2001 in recognition to the way the world was different after September 11th. The thought fits now as much as it did then.

Now, I’m not looking to talk about the state of the world, the craziness of the pandemic, or what is passing for political discussion in my country at the moment. I want to talk about the little individual worlds we all live and work in, and more specifically, how they’re all going to change once we’re allowed out of the house.

I have spent many years working as a government contractor, er I mean consultant, er that is…what ever you want to call it, it is all the same thing. People who work for a company that does work for the government. For the most part dress code is dark suit, maybe a flashy tie or socks if you’re a real rebel. We are conservative, respectable, and frankly boring.

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Peter Olexa from Pexels

Now that the world has turned upside down, how many people who have gone from wearing a suit five days a week to wearing business casual (heavy on the casual), and in a lot of cases no pants (I’m a pants person, but this is a judgement free zone). How many of us really want to go back to wearing a suit every day. Or going into work everyday for that matter.

Working from home is nice. How many of us are prepared to go back to our open-work-space with maybe a window that overlooks the alley? Personally, I like a more hybrid approach where there are periodic days in the office, if for no other reason than for people to meet face-to-face and remember that there really are people on the other side of the screen.

Are you ready to go back to the office? No, it’s not going to happen today, or tomorrow. Depending on who you talk to it could be a while. But will you be ready to just go back to that world that you came from? Can you look me in the keyboard and tell me that after the newness of being back rubs off that you’re really going to want to be in an office wearing a suit and high heels?

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Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels

The business as usual world has been turned upside down. We’re home. We’ve got both human and animal support in the background when the video calls that could have been an email (because face it, that’s never going to change) are over. We’re not traveling around the country to meet people because we are finding new ways to interact. We’ve found new ways to get the job done. Ways that may be more efficient, less stressful and more fulfilling.

So, let’s start the discussion now about what work is going to look like when we go back. What do you want it to look like, to feel like. I mean, I think pants will still be mandatory, but do you want to go back to your ties or heels (or both, again no judgement here)? Business owners and HR folks, are you going to be willing to bend to the new, and potentially better, normal that your employees found?

I think we’re on the brink of new work place “normal,” but what do you think? Please share your thoughts below!

And So It Goes…

I promised my kids, and myself, that I wasn’t going to go back into government contracting because it is way too unpredictable. Contracts come and go and change and the person sitting at the desk doing the work has no control over who stays, who goes, who tells the story (all respect due to Lin-Manuel Miranda, but I couldn’t resist). But, after being out of a full-time job for over three and-a-half years, I folded.

I took a job as a contractor for the United States Department of Agriculture on a contract that was up for renewal, but everything looked good for long-term renewal. I started the 2nd of January full-time in DC, staying at hotels and going home as often as I could. The plan was to move down after school was out for the summer. I was looking for places to live and everything seemed good. I was wrong.

Just under two weeks from the end of the contract major changes were made. It wasn’t just me. About 66% of the people on the contract were scoped out of the next phase of work. It wasn’t me. It wasn’t them. It just was.

If any of my former team members find their way across this, please know that it was an honor and a pleasure to work with each of you. I have rarely worked with a team that gelled so quickly and performed to such a high standard straight out of the gate. I am impressed with you, I am awed by you and I am inspired by you. I will miss the Breakfast Club like nobody’s business.

Now I find myself looking for the next new chapter just a few months after I thought I started the next book in the series. Frankly my friends, this story sucks. But it is what it is. This isn’t a great time to be looking for work. So many people are out of work that the market is flooded with people applying for anything that they are remotely qualified for (and yes, I fall into that category too).

It isn’t easy. It isn’t fair. And, it’s scary as hell. It is the life of contractor.

And so it goes

Miss Communication: Listening

Today’s political climate is…volatile (to put it nicely). It seems to me that everyone is yelling at the top of their lungs to be heard, but no one is listening.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a good debate and thoughtful discussion. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of discussion taking place. I respect everyone’s right to have an opinion, and to share that opinion. But there is no hope of an actual discussion or change taking place if everyone is talking and no one is listening.

So, to resurrect something I used to do here often, a little Miss Communication advice – LISTEN.

Be quiet and listen. Listen to the birds singing, the wind blowing, the kid

s laughing, and to the thoughts of those whose opinions are geometrically opposed to yours. Don’t just hear the words they’re saying so you can tell them why they’re wrong. Listen to what they’re saying, think about it. Chances are you’re still going to hate every word, but you have no hope of changing someone else’s mind if you can’t counter their argument and formulate one of your own that they might listen to.

Communication is as much about what you want people to hear as it is what you have to say. Listen to what people are saying, then you’ll have a pretty good idea of what you really need to say.

New Year, New Look, New Outlook

As my intelligent and beautiful ones of readers have already noticed, I’ve not only changed the look and feel of my blog, I’ve changed the title too. A Look Through Lorie’s Lens was created when I was working in video, and while video production will always be my first love, it doesn’t reflect me or what I want to do any more.

laptop-820274_960_720 I want to tell stories, my own and other people’s. So, We’re All Just Stories in the End was born from what was on editing room floor. (Bonus points to anyone WHO knows where I got the title from.) With the change in title comes a change in perspective.

We’re All Just Stories in the End is going to focus on telling stories. I’m going to look at how business and individuals can use stories in their marketing to grow their reach and their profit. I’ll be talking about how different mediums can help tell stories. Of course, I’m also going to talk about telling my stories.

Regulars readers will also notice that I’ve added a page with samples of some of my writing. This is all part of my plan to continue to work as a freelancer to help people tell their stories. If you’d like to talk to me about your story, and what I can do to assist, just drop me a message here.

I’m really excited about the opportunities that lay ahead in 2017. I hope you’ll join me.

Recommending Recommended

I told you about the website Recommended a short time ago. In this time of shopping and searching for great service, I thought it was to talk about it again. This free site is a cross between LinkedIn and Facebook for businesses and freelancers. Like other sites, Recommended lets people set up a page with information about their business or services and then get recommended by their customers. But it goes a little deeper than that, they’re working to fill a gap between social media and business in a way that no one else is.

Full disclosure, I first learned about Recommended, and its founder Aaron Lee, when I did a little freelance user experience testing for them. I was very impressed with what I learned about the site during the testing, so much so that I joined the site and have been sharing it with friends and business contacts. Let me tell you why.

Websites like LinkedIn and Facebook are great and have their place in marketing, public relations, recruiting and brand awareness. LinkedIn is a great place to find contacts, that is what it was made to do, but it doesn’t do much to really give small business and freelancers to show off their skills. Facebook is a great way to market, but it doesn’t necessarily give people a full picture of the services someone offers, and how their clients feel about them. It’s these things that Recommended does best.

Recommended allows users to market and make connections, but it’s more about what the business does. It also does recommendations better than I’ve seen anywhere else. As a consumer looking for a business or service, you get a user friendly website that allows you to dive past the hype and glitter of marketing and look more closely at what the business or freelancer does. You get the opportunity to read recommendations and leave them in a way that feels more honest and real than other sites. As a freelancer or business owner you get a site that looks clean and professional and lets you get your message out without the clutter and advertising that are all over other sites.

Since I first mentioned the site, they’ve added new functionality, and have even more in the works. One of the new additions to the site is “Work” – a portfolio like option that allows the business or freelancer to showcase some of their best work. For example, a software developer could provide information for the kind of work they specialize in and pictures of what they’ve done. They haven’t finished perfecting the Work pages yes, they’ll be expanding it to accept different file types to allow someone (like a freelance writer) to add different kinds of examples. You can check out examples of Work at work

These are still early days for Recommended. They’re adding new functionality all the time. As I’ve told everyone I’ve discussed Recommended with, I think that this has the potential to be huge. It could be a real game changer for small businesses and freelancers by giving them more freedom and options than are currently available.

I recommend Recommended wholeheartedly. I encourage you to get in on the ground floor and be part of this effort before it explodes. Take a look around, I think you’ll be impressed.

Lorie’s List – 9/9/2016

And I’m back with another addition of Lorie’s List! This one is pretty short and sweet because I wanted to tell you about two new websites I came across this week that you’ve got to know about. One is business related and the other is writing related. If your business is writing then I suppose they’re both business, so I stand corrected. Regardless – on to the websites. Person on computer with smart phone and notebook

getrecommended.com – I learned about this site during a freelance usability project I did earlier this week, and I’ll tell you I found something I was really excited about. The site is built to be an virtual word of mouth – a cross between LinkedIn and Facebook – where you talk about the business your do and recommendations from people that have used your products or services. It’s still somewhat early days for Aaron and the team at getrecommended.com, but I see a lot of potential here! After talking to Aaron and hearing about some of the things they’re working on I think this could be huge!
Inkitt.com – I stumbled across this a few days ago when I heard they were sponsoring a writing contest. They company helps get authors published, I won’t go into the details, but it’s based on algorithms to determine what’s getting the most hits and what is most likely to sell. Right now they’re sponsoring a novel writing contest that will see three finalists get their books published, a professional cover, and money for marketing. The books will also be presented to bigger companies for additional distribution – which could be huge if one of the companies pick up the book!

I would love to know what you think about both of these sites. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below!

4 Ideas to Make Storytelling Easier

I’ve gotten some questions recently about storytelling, and I thought I wold share some of the discussion with everyone. First, let me clarify what I mean about storytelling.

Tips for telling your story

To me, storytelling can be anytime you’re telling people something. That could be in the traditional sense like a novel or autobiography, or in a marketing sense like a marketing or social media campaign. Instructional design, script writing and video production as well as content development can all fall under storytelling – you’re trying to share information or persuade someone by telling someone something. I look at all these things as storytelling because it puts you more in the mind of getting your information out in a creative and/or interesting way that is more likely to hold interest and make an impact.

With that out of the way, let’s look at 4 ideas (and a bonus tip) that will hopefully make storytelling easier for you.

Who cares? I know, everyone should care about what you have to say. Unfortunately, that’s not actually true. So ask yourself, who am I telling this story to? Who is going to care from the first word, and who do I want to make care? Spend a few minutes thinking about the audience the piece is for and what you want them to take away from the story your telling.
These guys might care….

I know that’s the first step in any kind of writing, but too often I see people trying to tell a story, market something or teach something taking a shotgun approach – spreading the information as thin as you can to try to reach as many people as possible. The majority of the time that only makes the story boring and too diluted to have the impact you want.
Watch your language. It’s no secret that when people write for business they write more formally, it’s what we’ve all been taught. But, that’s not always the best option. You need to look at the audience and the story you’re telling. If you’re talking about profit and loss margins something more formal is probably the best choice. If you’re talking about a client’s theme park or telling people about the time you were having such a run of bad luck that your left shoe fell down a sewer grate and you never saw it again, you probably want to be a little more informal.
What do I mean by informal? Using contractions for one. A lot of people seem to have issues using contractions in their writing, and that quickly makes everything more formal. Word choice is important too! Using slang can also be a big help in making what you’re writing more approachable. If your writing a young adult (YA) romance novel and say, “Would you like to go spend time at the local shopping complex?” versus, “Do you want to go hang out at the mall?” your reader is going to feel like they’re reading a text book – and chances are if they’re reading a YA romance novel they probably get enough of text books in their daily lives and won’t give your novel the time of day.
Let your Medium guide you. I’m not talking about Madam Elaine, Psychic to the
Let your medium Guide you!

Masses, I’m talking about the medium you’re using to tell the story. Are you telling your story verbally or in writing? Are you doing a slide show presentation or blog post? Consider the length of time or space you have to tell the story. Shorten or expand as necessary.
Say it out loud! One of the easiest and fastest ways to check on how your story sounds is to read it out loud to yourself. Listen to how it sounds. Does it sound too formal? Not formal enough? Is there a sentence that’s hard to understand when you hear it? Is it something that is easy to understand and hit the notes you’re looking to hit? The answers to questions like these will tell you a lot about the writing style you used for the piece (or your writing style in general) and the how others will hear it – even when they read to themselves most of your audience will be hearing their voice saying the words so in a way they are hearing it out loud.
Bonus TIP! Reverse it! If you’re worried that your writing style or speaking style is too formal and you want to work on that, start verbally rather than in writing. This especially works well if you’re telling your life stories. Record yourself telling the story verbally before you start to write. Listen to it carefully. What do you notice about how you tell the story? Is your word choice different than when you write? Are your sentences shorter? Do you use a storytelling voice that is warm and approachable? Keep these things in mind when you start to write and see the difference it can make in the final product!

I would love to hear from you! Drop me a note and let me know what you think of the post and what tips or ideas you have to make storytelling easier!

Miss Communication: Selling is a Two Way Street

I was catching up with a friend recently and heard a story about a painful proposal meeting with a client. Her team was on top of their game — they were prepared, practiced and professional. Too bad the same couldn’t be said about the client — they were late because someone on their team sent out the wrong room number, people took calls during the presentation and two of the people came to the meeting knew nothing about changes the technical supervisor requested and spent the first part of the meeting getting them up to speed. My friend was proud of how her team handled the situation, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted the client to accept the proposal. If this is how they handled a meeting they asked for, how are they going to handle requests for information and deadlines?

Is this the right time to be on the phone? Image courtesy of Ambro / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Whether you’re in a proposal meeting, a job interview or sales call it’s important to remember that communication is a two-way street. Obviously the one doing the selling, proposing or being interviewed is the person in the hot seat, but it doesn’t mean that everyone else is off the hook.

Put yourself in my friend’s place. Getting more business is a high priority, but so is being able to successfully deliver on what they promise on time and within budget. In the interactions she had with the potential client, she could already see where there was a high likelihood for problems and a low likelihood for success. After some discussion with senior staff, they were considering withdrawing their proposal.

Think about job interviews where you’re grilled about your background and qualifications, but aren’t offered much information about the mission, team or work environment of the potential employer. You may spend an hour or two selling yourself but may not be sold that this is the organization where you belong.

Even when you’re selling a website redesign, you can go into the meeting with a great design and an awesome pitch but if the client is rude and seems difficult to work with you may just walk away.

Just like how you are communicating when you aren’t speaking, you’re selling yourself even when you’re the client. All the verbal and non-verbal communication cues you give off do as much to sell you and your business or product as any presentation or product. And if you aren’t careful about what you’re communicating (or not communicating) you could be the one loosing out on important business opportunities.

It’s good to remember that just because you’re in a “Power Position” it doesn’t mean that you’re the only one with any power. Sales, job interviews and proposals are two-way streets. You need to give people a reason to want to work with you. Communicating clearly and professionally will go a long way in making sure that happens.

We're All Just Stories in the End

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