SPEAKING
Drawing from her background in business, journalism, and the nonprofit sector, Janet helps audiences communicate clearly and persuasively and manage the demands of their busy lives. Participants praise her ability to deliver solid content with warmth and humor, encouraging high participation and retention of material.
Programs will be tailored to the needs of your organization and are available as keynotes, breakouts, and half-day or full-day seminars.
Key topics:
Business Writing that Gets Results
Precision Questioning and Answering
Problem Solving and Conflict Resolution
Mindful Time Management
Your Vacation Starts Now: Easing Into Life Balance
Business Writing that Gets Results
Good writing increases credibility and cooperation, while less-than-good writing can lead to confusion and delay. Get better results from your emails, reports, and other business documents by saying what you mean clearly and concisely. Improve your productivity by giving readers the information they need, the way they need it–so the message gets through the first time.
Participants will learn to:
- Plan and draft documents with more focus and less stress.
- Analyze a reader’s point of view to gain greater cooperation.
- Write clear subject lines that prompt efficient responses.
- Choose the right formatting to enhance the message.
- Organize information logically for quick reader comprehension.
- Use appropriate tone.
- Recognize and avoid common, credibility-damaging errors in grammar and punctuation.
- Spot and eliminate unnecessary words and phrases, without sounding brusque.
- Proofread for accuracy.
Precision Questioning and Answering
Precision Questioning and Answering (PQ+A) fixes inefficient meetings, tightens unfocused presentations, clarifies thinking, and leads to smarter decisions. In this one-day workshop, you will apply PQ+A techniques to scenarios from your own work. Using Precision Questioning, you will learn to uncover risky assumptions, attack complex problems from new angles, and raise the level of critical thinking within your team. Using Precision Answering, you will be able to communicate crisply and concisely when presenting ideas up the hierarchy.
Developed by Dr. Dennis Matthies from his research at Stanford University, PQ+A has been embraced by companies such as Cypress Semiconductor and Microsoft and taught to thousands worldwide. Janet is a certified PQ+A trainer.
Participants will learn:
- The seven categories of Precise Questions.
- The nine types of assumptions and how to recognize them.
- The Four-Column Technique for deepening your thinking about your work.
- The three rules of Precision Answering that keep a discussion on-point.
- How Precision Answering improves credibility.
- What to do when the answer is “I don’t know.”
- How to test and trouble-shoot a recommendation by using PQ+A with a partner.
- Types of situations that benefit from Precision Questioning + Answering, and times when PQ+A is not appropriate.
- Guidelines for using PQ+A skillfully and intelligently with people who are not familiar with the tools.
Problem Solving and Conflict Resolution
When faced with conflict, do you get defensive…go on the attack…clam up? Conflict is inevitable because differences between people are inevitable, so managing it constructively is a crucial strength. By handling conflict capably, you can improve communication, understanding, team cohesion, and confidence. In this course, using case studies, assessment tools, and skill practice, you will improve your ability to deal with conflict by recognizing and addressing your habitual reactions to disagreement; analyzing and choosing alternative responses; making requests and saying “no” assertively and graciously; avoiding communication traps; and collaborating–even with resistant stakeholders–to arrive at resolutions that both parties can support.
Participants will learn to:
- Use an assessment tool to identify default styles for dealing with conflict.
- Actively adapt one’s style to the requirements of a specific conflict.
- Use practical techniques for navigating divergent perspectives.
- Apply problem-solving techniques to interpersonal situations.
- De-escalate challenging discussions.
- Follow a simple structure for making assertive requests.
- Employ strategies to move from polarization to collaboration.
Mindful Time Management
Overload is a fact of professional life. Confronted with too many opportunities and demands, we react to the loudest stimulus, or keep doing what’s comfortable, even if it isn’t what matters most. One-size-fits-all time management “solutions” don’t make sense in today’s constantly shifting environment. Instead, this interactive workshop will help you to be more conscious about the decisions you are making moment to moment and incisively aware of default habits that are getting in your way. Discover how be more deliberate about priority setting, scheduling, and responding to interruptions and unexpected events. Gain personalized tools for reducing overwhelm so that you make more powerful choices about how you use your time.
Participants will learn:
- A quick way to recover composure in the midst of chaos.
- Three questions that reduce overwhelm.
- The power of single-tasking and how to get better at it.
- Methods for observing and adjusting your behavior (that don’t take a lot of time).
- A tuning-in technique that gets you out of autopilot.
- Two practical techniques for dealing with procrastination at the source.
- Easy-to-implement structures that improve your focus
- Strategies for incorporating self-care and avoiding burnout.
Your Vacation Starts Now: Easing Into Life Balance
Don’t wait for your official vacation to get the self-nourishment you crave. Instead, avoid burnout by working renewal into your daily life. Janet shares inspiring ways to make relaxation, adventure, and shifts in perspective part of each day, so that you replenish your energy and motivation even in the busiest environments. Learn do-able techniques for getting that balance we all seek when we say, “I want my life back!”
