If you were among the 100 million people who watched the first Presidential debate last night, then you saw in real time the power of preparation. Republican or Democrat, it was universally recognized that Clinton was far better prepared than Trump was for a sustained issue-based debate. The parallels to presenting are obvious. The question …
A James Joyce sentence can run the length of a page. Ernest Hemingway wrote short simple sentences. When it comes to literature, both are revered for their genius and dramatically different styles. However, when it comes to presenting or speaking, a Hemingway style is the safer bet for success. I was reminded of that this …
Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers studied many successful people from the Beatles and Bill Gates to concert violinists and concluded that it takes roughly ten thousand hours of practice to achieve mastery in a field. Whether that number is correct or not, the larger point is that there is definitely a correlation between practice and success. Yet I find …
As the summer winds down (all too short), I would like to recommend “Making Modern Toughness” to you, a short article by David Brooks in this week’s New York Times. Its serious intention is to provoke thoughts on what makes people resilient in life (it is not what you think). But, as I read it, …