Bring on the holidays !

Flags at Honfleur Acrylic on canvas 20x20cm

Umbrellas
Acrylic on Canvas
60x60cm

Last week I took a week off and went to the Blue Mountains, just outside of Sydney for 5 days of hanging out with my husband, and painting and watching the rain over the valley. It was so good, I'm really eager to have more holidays!

Some of the works I completed last week are in this newsletter: They are part of an exhibition I'm preparing which will open on Sat Feb 9th 2008 (4 - 7pm). Please put the date of the opening in your diary, and come along for a drink!

Back at work, I've often been frustrated by the fact that most public programs have no entrance criteria (i.e. marketers would rather have 40 people with no idea in a training room than 10 with great ideas).

So I've created a program for participants who already have a clue, are already influencing and persuading well, but would like to be more consistent in how they do it.

If you too have longed for some interesting ideas, clear practical applications, and an environment where you learn as much from the participants as you do from the course itself, please consider my exclusive, influencers-only January 08 public NLP workshop (subtitled Mind reading, influencing and questioning).

This will be the last ezine for this year, so merry everything, and may your business prosper!

Cindy

In this month's ezine we have:

• Improving your consultancy: Saying yes more often, giving thanks, new type of medical practice
• Managing better: Tips on marketing to Generation X; Pecha Kucha to cut out the waffle
• Fascinating: Buy your own band, what stagehands do
• Fun: Use your word power to feed millions, Name that tune on the web, and impro

Your Consulting
business

Manuschka
acrylic on canvas
20x20cm

Resort
acrylic on canvas
30x30cm

They'll say yes more often than you think

Getting people to say Yes is easier than you think. Research from the Influence at Work camp: People overestimate how often others will say no to simple requests. We think we'll have to ask 20 people before someone will say yes to us about an idea, about whether they can help us in some way, when it takes only 10.

This has a direct application to our fears about calling clients, asking for sales or for leads. How many clients do you think you need to ask to get a sale?

Giving thanks

Tom Peters (Mr In-Search-0f-Excellence) suggested years ago that thanking people is an integral part of getting more business. David Maister says treating clients like you would a love relationship builds trusted advisors. Check out this Fast Company bit on giving thanks (and consider it as an option for your end of year ritual)

Cyber Medical

Is this the future of medicine (at least in the US)? Jay Parkinson MD mixes the old-time doctor with cyber-tools. He specialises in 18 - 40 year olds, he can be contacted by phone, text, internet messaging, text or video chat, and only makes house calls. He services a narrow geographic range (Brooklyn and Manhattan). All of the paperwork and even the symptoms he gets from you online, so when you meet it's the hands on stuff. His fees are on a database, and he'll help his patients find the cheapest medications and best-value services where he refers them on. It costs $200 per visit (wow!).

It's certainly a different medical experience than I've had (in Australia, UK or France), and I wonder what consultancy experiences we could change so that we use much more of the cyber-capabilities?

Consulting products

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Managing better

Dock
acrylic on canvas
30x30cm

Tips on marketing to Gen X

If you're trying to get customers in the Gen X demographic (or managing them), try this article on marketing to Generation X. In short, the key points are: Respect them as consumers, Get to know them, Look cool and hip, Be socially responsible, Be real, Join their networks, Take it to the streets, Give them a chance to win, Go viral, Text them.

Cut out the waffle

And perhaps you are over Powerpoint presentations (or not over them, but keen to make them more engaging for people). Pecha kucha is a presentation style which restricts presenters to 20 slides, each shown for 20 seconds, and so their speech goes for 6:40. It was originally created for architects and designers to show off their work in Tokyo (hence the name). To see a corporate application, heck out Dan Pink's video on emotionally intelligent signs in Pecha kucha (pronounced: "pechAHchka").

Mind read, influence, question better...

Enrol in my
Corporate NLP program

Please
contact me with any questions now and
we'll see how
you can
be part of it!

Fascinating

Gulls
acrylic on canvas
20x20cm

Buy your own band?

Fancy buying your own band? At SellaBand you can invest in a band you believe in. If an artist can find 5000 people who believe in them (@ $10 per person), SellaBand will produce and album for them. Then the people who supported the band get a copy of the album, and SellaBand gives away 3 of the tracks for free (with the other tracks available to download for a fee).

If the band sell loads of copies, the Believers get remunerated... What a cool system!

What do stagehands do?

How about this detailed description of what stagehands do, including the technical crew hierarchy, safety information, different types of spaces, stage carpentry, scene shop, electrics, sound, video properties, and wardrobe.

And Fun, fun, fun

Pool
acrylic on canvas
30x30cm

Harbour Bridge
acrylic on canvas
30x30cm

Use your word power to feed the millions!

Check out Free Rice. You play the game, test and increase your word power, and advertisers donate 20 grains of rice for every correct word! I donated 620 grains before I had to tell you about it!

Name that tune - on the web

You know those days when a tune goes round and round in your head, and you don't know what it is? Well, now you can go to Midomi.com, sing it into the microphone on your PC and if it's on the database, midomi finds it!! The longer the piece you give the mic, the better it is (with 4 - 5 notes, it's a lot of possibilities, but with 20 it gets narrowed down). Really cool!!

And impro, of course

Scared Scriptless' Theatresports®, has only 2 more shows this year - Fri 14th 2007 is the Christmas show, and then 21 Dec is a special, experimental impro show, so secret noone knows what's going to happen! It's at the Clarence Hotel, Petersham (in Sydney). Doors open 7:30, show starts at 8. Drinks at pub prices, food available. There's a second show (The Late Show) at 10:30, so catch them both for an unheard of $5 whenever you're near Petersham in Sydney. We'll be back with the show late January 2008.

Let me know what you like about this ezine - or anything you'd like to see more of!

C

Cindy Tonkin The Consultants’ Consultant
Certified Management Consultant

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This month's images are original works ©2007 Cindy Tonkin. See more here.

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