Even if you don’t know the original source for a fact or a quotation, you need to indicate that it’s not your idea.
Otherwise, your audience will assume you are either too dim to know that you’re borrowing from someone else, or that you are too unethical to acknowledge the debt.
Either way, you have everything to gain and nothing to lose.
If you have time, track the information back to its first author. And for facts and statistics, it’s worth doing a quick check about the validity of the statement.
Commonly-accepted pseudo facts like “You should drink eight glasses of water a day,” …read more

I’ve been to a lot of funerals this year.  Too many of them have included a sales pitch for the religious choice of the deceased.
This strikes me as an odd choice. The religious affiliation (or lack thereof) of the people attending could be all over the map.
Yet, like clockwork, the kindly person running the memorial service starts explaining that we can all breathe easier because the person who died backed the right horse in the religion sweepstakes. They have gone to heaven because they chose (insert name of deity or prophet here).
It goes without saying that anyone in attendance who …read more

The average person in business receives too many memos, e-mails and news alerts in a given day to pay close attention to all of them.
Unless you can communicate quickly  what value will come from reading your information, they may not even get past the heading.

Assuming you are distributing something that has value to people, it’s your responsibility to signal that value in the first few words.
And if you can’t think of a reason people would find the information valuable, maybe you shouldn’t be wasting their time with it.
Technorati Tags: influence,business,communications,values,teasers,stickiness,answers,information,words

A decade ago, the Canadian government made a statement of regret about the country’s long-time policy of forcibly removing aboriginal children from their home communities and subjecting them to cultural cleansing in “residential schools.”
That half measure laid the groundwork for a full-fledged apology to be delivered today in Parliament by prime minister Stephen Harper.
The formal apology will detail the verbal, sexual and physical abuse many children suffered in the government-funded schools that were run by churches.
The government is keenly aware that its words will be closely scrutinized for weasel words that fall short of a complete expression of remorse, …read more

There was a time when a public speaker could count on the attention of their audience.
Blackberries, wireless laptops, and other tools mean that you’re no longer in control of the environment you’re speaking in. Are you talking to a room full of conference-goers, or to all the readers of live bloggers and folks Twittering your comments to their colleagues?
You don’t know.
The implications for speechwriters and their clients?
Speechwriter Glynn Young says speakers need to be more conversational, engaging the audience in the talk. Speechwriters need to “think of people not as an audience, but … as a community, a community …read more

You think you know the facts about something that’s common knowledge. Not so, unless you check the facts.
Techdirt’s Mike Masnick points to a copyright blogger who notes a paper that details the incorrect assumptions about the popular song that pulls in millions of dollars each year on a copyright that may not be valid. (background on Masnick)
And did you know Paul McCartney doesn’t get the royalties?
Never forget that Snopes.com is available to keep you from passing on an urban legend as fact.
Photo copyright Eric Eggertson.
Technorati Tags: business, communications, public relations, copyright, royalties, assumptions, urban legends, fact checking, paul …read more

Outward-facing communication shouldn’t use jargon and inside jokes, but internally, the sky’s the limit.
 
For communication with and among employees, the use of nicknames, jargon and inside jokes is part of what bonds people together. Forcing the language to fit a preconceived notion of Strunk & White clarity can make work seem too much like work.
Relax a bit. Yes, some of your videos of the executive doing a skit may leak outside the organization. So don’t be stupid. But letting down your hair and relaxing some of the rules of formal communication is part of employee engagement.
You may want to correct …read more

Template for candidate messages in a primary:
“(Insert any old accomplishment) is a sign we are on the course to victory.  Any candidate who (repeat any old accomplishment) is certain to be the next president.”
Let’s all forget about those other states that would have been really good to win for the Clinton campaign. As of Tuesday night, Ohio is the bellwether state of all bellwether states, a must-win state for any serious Democratic contender.
That’s the spin from Hillary Clinton, and she’s standing by that story.
Of course, if the votes from Texas had come in sooner, and the Ohio votes …read more

I dragged the family out to see the lunar eclipse Wednesday night. One kid was home sick all day, the other didn’t have pants on. Spouse is just getting over a nasty cold.
Still, there we were, standing at the end of our yard staring at an ochre orb thousands of miles away, marvelling at the transformation it undergoes when the lights go out.
Yes, it’s one of the colder nights of the year. No, I wouldn’t take no for an answer.

I grabbed the uber Nikon Action BJ binoculars that zoom to 22X magnification. Spent about 5 minutes trying to get …read more

As hired pens, speech writers are always faced with the dilemma of how hard to push back when we think a client is being unreasonable.
by Colin Moorhouse
I am talking about the CEOs who have given no thought at all to what they want talk about at the one and only meeting you are going to have with them.
Or the ones who won’t read their drafts out loud at least once before they face their audience. Or those who want to review the draft with you before they have even glanced at it – resulting in a lot of …read more