by Heather T. | Oct 10, 2023 | Blog, Marketing, Observations
What are rack cards?
Rack cards are tall and narrow, generally measuring 4 inches in width by 9 inches in height. They’re often used to target prospective customers or guests in areas with heavy foot traffic, like tourist kiosks, tradeshows, or conferences.
The point of a rack card is to drive people to your website and to put as much pertinent information about your business in a graphically appealing way for people to pick up and either go directly to your website and/or take it home to investigate further.
What are some of the benefits of rack cards?
The major difference between a rack card and a brochure is that it’s generally cheaper to print a rack card. When people pick up rack cards, they’ll generally keep them around longer, too. Other perks? A rack card professionally designed costs less because it’s one piece of paper, usually double-sided, not three double-sided panels, like a brochure.
The paper they’re printed on is generally heavier (and if you are going with an online or local printer, make sure they use the heaviest paper stock available.) People will pick up a rack card and flip it over, look at both sides for information, and decide if they will keep it. If they pick a brochure or trifold up, they might often put it back, especially at a tradeshow or tourism kiosk when they don’t usually have two hands-free to look through it and open it up.
What are some key things to consider when designing a rack card?
The top half of the rack card is the most important. If you’re thinking of having your rack card displayed through a tourism distribution company to find out where the cards will be distributed, then do a drive-by (if possible) to see what the existing rack cards in those locations look like.
You want to see what kind of rack card holders they have and take some pictures. I’d also pick up other businesses’ rack cards to get ideas and to see what the competition is doing for advertising.
When browsing kiosks, bring a notebook and take photos of the racks. What attracts your attention? What doesn’t work (like the rack cards with names hidden at the bottom behind the rack shelf)?
When designing, keep in mind the top one-third to almost half of the card will only be visible, so make sure your business name and an eye-catching photo or image are at the top; a location for your business helps as well.
Business Branding
I’m a big believer that you should be consistent if you have established colors you’re using for your business. Your business cards, website, or anything you use for advertising. It’s super important to be consistent.
I’ve seen so many rack cards and brochures that don’t even have contact information on them, and that’s completely crazy, but it happens.
New businesses might have a website in development and not have any other branded materials done, they should identify the colors and fonts they like and stick with those. The promotional material should always be an extension of your business. I’d recommend you use two font choices and three colors at most.
If you don’t have a website done yet and you are under the gun to get some print material out, try to leave a bit of white space at the bottom of either the front or back of the rack card where you can print up your website on clear Avery labels and add later to the cards when your website is finished so if you have a ton of printed cards left you can use them up before having to re-print.
Photos
Always try to use photos; line drawings are nice, and they can have their place, but don’t put that line logo, if that’s what you use, in a prominent spot because photos are what drive people and especially what drives people to pick up rack cards.
I suggest businesses use photos that showcase their unique offerings. Try not to use stock images if possible, and if you are going to use them, make sure they are legally bought and not from a free stock photo site.
If using photos of clients or customers, it’s crucial to have permission to use them; a written photo release is highly suggested and imperative if using photos of children.
Before you get your rack cards printed, print out a sample and place it four feet from you, with the bottom half (and maybe a little higher) folded over so you can’t see it. Can you read the text? Are the image and colors eye-catching, or does it have too much detail for text and imagery, and you can’t see clearly what it is or what it represents?
Messaging
Have a headline and a tagline for the front. You really want your rack card to be a driver for people to get online with their smartphones right away or to scan a QR code and go straight to your website.
If using a QR code, make sure it’s static (unless you want to pay a monthly fee) and not dynamic. Static QR codes cannot be edited once created. Dynamic QR codes offer you the flexibility to edit QR code content as many times as you would like but usually require a paid monthly service to use them. Some QR code creator sites offer a free trial to use a static QR code and then charge if you want to edit it, read the fine print.
If you have a nice logo and/or if the logo has your business name clearly visible, go ahead and put it near the top or incorporate it into the photo. In the top part, you can also include a call to action, like “make a reservation” or “call now!“
I’ve seen some great rack cards that say, “Bring in this card and get 10% off”, or “Sign up for our online newsletter and get access to ongoing special offers or discounts.” It’s an incentive for people to take that rack card home too.
It would be best if you honored your promotion whenever that card/code is redeemed, so think through your offer carefully.
Aside from the top messaging, your rack card should include a short paragraph about your business and five to seven bullet points on the back. Make sure there’s plenty of white space. Try not to cram information or use too small a text; you are aiming for easy readability for every age.
Remember to include your business’s name, phone number, address, and website. If you’re active on social media, put a text link to your Facebook page and other social pages. Don’t just say, “Find us on Facebook,” or just put the icon for a social media channel. People want instant gratification, and the way social media channels and handles are, they may find a business with a similar name, not yours and they usually won’t bother searching if it’s not the right one. Put the actual full URL, i.e. facebook.com/janedoeinn or facebook.com/jane-doe-inn.
Try only to put in pricing if you know it’s going to stay the same. It’s OK to include a price range and point readers to your website for more information. However, printing your exact prices may mean you’ll have to incur printing and distribution costs frequently to keep your rack cards up-to-date or have someone insist that your business honor something in print. A price range provides you with more flexibility or putting no pricing at all.
Printing
In terms of printing, make sure you print in a matte finish despite the lure of ‘glossy.’ Tourism centers have exterior light coming in, and the gloss finish causes a reflection. Trade shows are frequently held in very large areas with bright light that can cause reflections.
Once someone picks a rack card, they’ll see your complete design but if it’s in the holder and your card is competing for attention, you’ll get a lot of reflection from natural and fluorescent light that may hamper your chance with that prospective customer.
As mentioned prior, You will also want to invest in a heavy card stock. You will see people in some tourism centers pick up a rack card, and if it flops (because whoever made it wanted it printed on lighter paper to save money) they may put it back. It negatively affects that first impression; if it flops over in the rack card holder itself, people generally won’t pick it up.
Remember to proofread and proofread again and again. If you have staff, ask each person to read it and proof it as well.
Last but not Least
Consider cross-promoting, if there is an associated type business that might send you business or a related business, trade your brochures, rack cards, and business cards with them. Restaurant to Lodging and vice versa. Massage therapists to Body Care stores, Riding and Horse Stables to Tack and Horse supply stores and vice versa, etc.
by Heather T. | Sep 5, 2023 | Blog, Business, Marketing, Observations, Operations
How many of you get stuck on a project when you’ve got too much on your plate? Or more specifically encountered a roadblock and not moving forward.
The next time you’re feeling defeated or overwhelmed, take a step back and resist the urge to look ahead. Instead, take a moment to look back.
If you are familiar with the concept of emotional intelligence, you might be familiar with this term, but I want to elaborate a little for those who are not.
What is Reappraisal?
Reappraisal involves mentally reframing an event to reduce the negative emotions you feel.
This is not the same thing as reconsideration, which is the act of “thinking” about something again, especially to change a decision or opinion.
Reappraisal is the act of “assessing or evaluating something again,” often to determine its current value or worth.
While both involve revisiting a previous decision, reconsideration involves a potential change in opinion or decision, while reappraisal is focused on reassessing value or worth. And to help change your mindset.
For example, let’s say for example that I spilled the soda that I was going to have for lunch, and I now only have water left to drink.
I might tell myself that well, “It’s okay because at least I have water; there are people who have nothing out there to drink in countries with food and water insecurities”.
That can also be self-limiting, though, because if anyone grew up with parents who said things like “eat your peas; there are people starving in other countries.” I did. There was no direct connection to the reasoning. I never knew someone from another country when I was a child who didn’t have enough to eat, and while I have met people over the years with those challenges from other countries and sadly this country as well, I didn’t have a personal connection with them then.
If I reframed that reasoning now as “it’s okay because at least I have water, clean water to drink, there are people who have nothing out there in my town with food and clean water insecurities.” It’s a lot more relatable.
But you can also look at things from a self-improvement standpoint, which is how I prefer to reframe things.
“I dropped my soda, and maybe that’s a good thing because it’s high in sugar and calories, and this can help me stay on my diet.”
There is no wrong way to do this; it’s only about reassessing and reevaluating.
Let’s take a business example.
You are a software engineer, and you just programmed a new AI platform and released it into the wilds of the internet for use.
After just 2 hours, you have reports of the AI giving people bad and inaccurate information, and you have to pull the plug.
You are depressed and unmotivated because you and your team spent thousands of hours programming this AI, AND now you have to reinvigorate and remotivate your team (and yourself) to redo it and fix it.
Instead of dwelling on the issue and bringing your team and yourself down with your failure, reassess and apply the Rule of Reappraisal.
You don’t want reconsideration, which is the act of “thinking” about something again. You want the assessment of the issue AND to identify and practice the core questions around reappraisal.
You don’t have to use all of them, but identifying a couple can help change the mindset.
Questions to ask yourself:
-Were there, or will there be, any positive outcomes that result from this situation?
-Are you grateful for any part of this situation?
-In what ways are you better off than when you started?
-What did you learn? (Maybe the most important one)
An example might be your need to leave a new program in beta longer and get more testers before opening it to the public.
-How did you grow and develop as a result of this situation?
An example might be you learned how to knit your team into a very cohesive working group during this project, and because of that, future projects will be more efficient.
-Why is it important to build reappraisal ability?
When we change the way we think about our experiences, it helps in not letting things get to us that can drag us down.
We are able to see challenges as opportunities and begin to view our lives in terms of strengths instead of weaknesses. It also helps to reduce negative emotions.
Don’t focus on the path ahead. Look back at what you’ve already accomplished.
The next time you feel that your day, your week, or even your year was a failure or the latest project you deep-dived into just didn’t make the cut, resist the urge to look ahead only.
This is especially important as a business owner because you can get mired down in not rethinking and reassessing something that perhaps didn’t work or didn’t go the way you planned, and it can derail your motivation, which can affect how your business operates.
Instead, take a few moments to look back and reappraise. You would be surprised by all that you have already accomplished.
by Heather T. | Apr 12, 2023 | Blog, Business Networking, Marketing, Opinion
In some ways, I’m a bit of a Luddite; I still dislike my cell phone (I had a Tracfone for years until I was dragged literally kicking and screaming into the 21st century a few years ago). I still use a paper calendar for scheduling my week (this is more that my brain can’t process things in a digital format for scheduling and try to find room to breathe occasionally. I like being able to visually lay out my week and schedule meetings and workshops where I can find time to do work in between them). But I digress.
My friends and many business associates chuckle at me because in most ways, I am a massive computer and technology geek. AI fascinates me, for example, down a rabbit hole I go. Ohhhh, new social platform alternative to Twitter…………Ohhh, Canva Design challenge……
But……. Printed physical business cards vs. digital. I suspect until we do away with paper entirely and also in-person meetings completely, physical business cards will be a long time in going away.
In the past few months, I’ve had several interactions with people who did not have physical business cards with them. All three went overboard trying to convince me that they no longer needed physical cards any more or even business cards at all. I’m afraid I have to disagree.
Let’s explore those interactions for a moment.
The first was back in January, where I got into a discussion with the person online in front of me in the grocery store when he commented on my custom business imprinted grocery totes. (it was a long line, not enough cashiers on duty). He asked me about my company, and we chatted for a few minutes, and I gave him my card and asked him for his.
He said, “I don’t carry cards anymore because I use digital cards now, I just converted to all digital last week. I think digital business cards are fantastic, etc. etc. the greatest thing since sliced bread.”
Well…. Ok then. I’m game.
Him: “Here scan this QR code on my phone.”
I scan the code. Me: “Ok, so is this what’s supposed to happen? It’s bringing me to the App Store on my iPhone to download a contact App.”
Him: “Oh, they told me it was supposed to get instantly added to someone’s contacts” (My ask was apparently the first test of the digital card).
Me: “I’m sorry the line is moving along, and I don’t really want to add one more app on my to phone if it’s just for one contact. Let me grab a pen, and I’ll jot down your email/phone number.” Good thing I had a pen……
The second was at a home show in Manchester, NH, my husband and I went to last month and got pigeonholed by a guy at a booth selling garage flooring. It was kind of interesting so we stuck around to chat. The booth was completely paperless.
When I asked for a card, the fellow said, “I don’t do business cards anymore or anything in print, but let me have all your contact information so I can put it into the computer and follow up.”
Sorry mate, if I’m interested, I’ll call you. Not the other way around.
My husband caved and gave him his contact info with the caveat; don’t call me during the day; I can’t take personal calls when I’m working.
Guess when he called?
He didn’t even have a QR code on anything in or on the booth either (or on his phone) or even anywhere where his website was listed on the display so I could take a picture of it, so we walked away with nothing in hand to remember the company by, except for him having my husband’s information which didn’t work out so well for him. Several marketing fails on that one.
Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately?), I don’t recall the name of the company because again, I didn’t have a way to do so easily. And the fellow was very VERY adamant that this was “the Way!” Anyone else watching the Mandalorian? While I suppose I could have snapped a picture of the display with the business name on it, at that point I was a tad aggrevated at both the pushiness to get contact information and the “new tech is the only way to go.” He lost a potentially significant sale because of this (and calling during the time when told not to call didn’t help).
The third interaction was last week at a business event. I asked a new contact for a business card and gave them mine. “I don’t have print cards anymore” was the response I got. Ok. So I scanned the code on his phone into mine, and he is now in my contact list.
Well, just dandy folks, I met 15+ people after I talked to him within a short span of time. I got business cards from pretty much all of those people except for people that forgot them or they were out of them. Note, I also have over a thousand contacts in my contact list.
If I had a little more time in between meeting other people, I would “maybe” have had a moment to try to find the contact and add a note in about who he was and where I met him, but I didn’t get a chance. And I didn’t remember until days later, and by then, I forgot his name.
This is something to keep in mind for how people do in-person networking, you meet, you greet, you chat, you move on to someone else. So normally (and in this case), I probably would forget to follow up with him unless it was a super important contact and it was top of mind.
All of the business cards I received at that event, I’ve either connected with via email or on Linkedin if I was interested. And to whoever it was that I met and got your digital contact info, I’m sorry I don’t remember your name, and I don’t have time (or the inclination) to spend lots of time trying to find you in my contact list, so I hope YOU follow up if you want to connect.
I’m not poo pooing digital business cards, but I’d like people to consider the benefits of using and having BOTH digital and physical cards. I no longer have a Rolodex, but I do like the physical business cards, so I can make notes on them, track where I got them from (date and event), and then scan them in (and then they are digital). I also keep important ones in addition in the paper format as I may refer other people to them as they are easily accesible in a card file vs searching online for information, and I also may pass them along to other contacts.
To reference the last interaction, this is where having both digital and paper cards come in handy. “I got business cards from pretty much all of those people except for people that forgot them or they were out of them.” Have the digital format for people that want it (and as a last resort if you run out (can I just say tsk tsk though?) and use the paper for most.
I know I’m not alone, I do know many people who still keep Rolodexs or similar means of keeping cards, and until all of us old fogies and luddites die out, we might be customers, guests, vendors, or, if nothing else, good contacts. (Sorry, not sorry, if that sounds sarcastic but it’s true.) Until Gen Z completely dominates the workforce, which is coming, but still a decade+ down the round, business people have to remember that customers and business contacts still come in a variety of ages and technology comfort levels.
The other small (or large) thing to remember is if the contact application is in the cloud, is there decent cell service (or service at all in some cases) everywhere? In rural”ish” NH, there is still a ton of dead zones. So if your business card app is cloud-based and you can’t connect, how useful is it to you or the person you are trying to exchange contact information with? It’s just like QR codes (which I love, by the way, as a marketing tool), but if you’re in a subway, (the longer version is well worth the watch as well), as my one of favorite marketing peeps points out from a rather older video now, but still relevant, you don’t have a cell signal………
Also, what happens if your cell phone runs out of juice at that all-day conference you are at…..
(As a side note, mostly because I am so easily amused, Canva’s AI doesn’t seem to know what a Rolodex is, the right hand photos are AI generated in the photo collage at the top, if the odd shaped fingers hadn’t tipped you off already).
by Heather T. | Mar 22, 2023 | Blog
Since AI first started hitting the news, I’ve been completely fascinated. I was expelled from the womb as a science fiction nerd, and my earliest memories of reading anything besides Nancy Drew stories were reading Isaac Asimov and Frank Herbert (who wrote the Dune series).
I was an early 70s baby. My Grandparents mostly raised me. My grandmother (also a sci-fi fan) shared her old Amazing Stories Magazine and Analog Science Fiction and Fact Magazines from the 20s and 30s. She had boxes of them she had saved, and I happily feed my psyche on those and her set of pretty much every book Edgar Rice Burroughs ever wrote. And for those who identify Burroughs with just Tarzan, 3/4s of his works were sci-fi, including a few of the Tarzan novels. As I got older, I still loved the books by Burroughs but despised the author for his beliefs. (But that’s a topic for another time).
I have many happy memories of growing up talking about science and science fiction with her. Not all of you may recognize these shows, so I encourage you to look them up for a laugh for a couple of them. I grew up on shows like the Gong Show, The Odd Couple, Nova (I loved Carl Sagan’s voice and listening to him talk about space, time travel and science fiction, and science fact), and of course, Star Trek reruns, I think that accounts for a lot of my rather wonky personality at times. And, of course, as a kid, I watched the cartoon the Jetsons.
It puts into perspective those old stories written 50 years before I read them in the 1970s; so much of what was pure fiction that authors wrote about that they didn’t see happening for centuries has happened within the last few decades.
Look how much has changed in the last 50 years; the cartoon, the Jetsons in 1962, had a meal replicator, we now have 3D food printing, and Elroy Jetson had a smartwatch, and he could watch TV on his wristwatch. How cool was that, then? How cool is that now?
Star Trek came out in 1966. Star Trek had the first mobile phones. In the show, known as the handheld communicator, aka a cell phone.
But that doesn’t hold a candle to AI. But it’s tied to it. Artificial intelligence is generally tied to computers but also robots.
Not everyone is a Sci-fi fan, but I’m going to throw out a bunch of examples of AI in TV and the movies, and most of you will probably have heard of at least one.
Examples of good artificial intelligence:
Johnny 5, Short Circuit
The Iron Giant
C-3PO, Star Wars
The Robot, Lost in Space
Vision, The Avengers
Lt. Data, Star Trek
Bad or evil artificial intelligence:
HAL 9000, 2001: A Space Odyssey
T-800, The Terminator
The Sentinels, The Matrix
The Gunslinger, West World
Ultron, The Avengers
The Borg, Star Trek
Wait, I said Evil. Can Artificial Intelligence be evil? Good question.
Was the original terminator evil? Well, it wasn’t an AI directly, Skynet was sentient, so that one is debatable. Skynet started a war because it didn’t want to be deactivated. Technically, if it were a human being, it would be the equivalent of not wanting to be killed.
In many cases, the “bad/evil” AI’s motivations were that it didn’t want to be killed/deactivated. From a human perspective, it’s understandable.
And then you take cases of movies like Lawnmower Man’s Jobe or Virtuosity’s SID 6.7, which puts a bit of spin on things. Jobe starts as a human and then basically merges with the machine. Is that AI? It’s an intelligent machine, so technically yes, but technically no, because it started as a human that went bad.
In Virtuosity, SID 6.7 is a digital blend of some of the worst killers out there in digital format that ends up as an actual real-world villain that goes on a killing spree. Sid is also threatened with being shut down. Is this a real AI with true sentience? Fear of being killed as a motivation, or is it a program based on some terrible people which acts out its base programming when given the opportunity? Why does it exhibit rage or glee if it’s just a program? That one never quite gets answered.
Can an AI be good or bad? Also, a good question!
We don’t know. That can be a philosophical, religious, scientific debate, or all three.
In many examples of “evil” AI, it’s a computer deciding the world would be a better place without humans. Well, are they wrong?
And this is not an argument about whether human beings should be around; it’s a rhetorical question meant to make you think.
I want to explore this for a moment and tell you what I think are three things that make people fear Artificial Intelligence and that are stimulating our flight or fight responses.
First, AI currently is not sentient, meaning it “thinks” based on the input it’s given. It can problem solve, but it’s based on the data it has access to. I think people fear this regardless of whether it can pass the Turing test or not. Like news highlighting Bing’s AI, which according to some journalists, has a mind of its own. Many people think AI means it actually “is” intelligent and free thinks.
The Turing test, originally called the imitation game by Alan Turing in 1950, is a test of a machine’s ability to exhibit intelligent behavior equivalent to, or indistinguishable from, that of a human. That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s intelligent and has self-awareness. It just means it’s enough to convince most people. And that’s pretty scary. It’s enough to be disturbing and make people uneasy.
Humans do away with each other, we do away with other species, and we damage the planet we live on. If a AI, regardless of whether it was self-aware or not, evaluated whether we are good for the planet or not, what do you think it would decide? And so we are afraid. It makes me afraid as well.
The second fear is we also run into something called the uncanny valley. We see it on tv shows and movies when a robot looks human, like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator, Arnie plus a ton of makeup to make him look a little “fake”. We see it in recent films like a recent horror movie called M3GAN, about a murderous child robot. In those cases and in most movies where it’s a AI robot on TV or in the movies, it’s also really a person “playing” a robot, which is disturbing enough by itself.
But we actually do see the uncanny valley in CGI in movies where things don’t “quite” look right all the time or in hyper-realistic video games. The news doesn’t help when they spotlight Boston Dynamics Robot Dogs Dancing or interview Sophia from Hanson Robotics on TV or news on the net.
The uncanny valley is an unsettling feeling people experience when robots and audio and/or visual simulations closely resemble humans (or, in the cases of the robot dogs, actual animals) in many respects but are not quite convincingly realistic, but it’s enough to make you feel uncomfortable and raise your hackles.
You may have heard of the news about deep fakes, where a person is basically digitally cloned by AI and other software, and the concern is that news will become even more questionable than it is now because you won’t know what is genuine and what is fake.
Our popular media hasn’t been helping pushing movies and shows highlighting the scare factor. The FTC recently came out with an alert about AI helping clone people’s voices based on finding public videos that out there and scamming people. That is super scary in itself.
The third fear is that AI will supplant people’s jobs, and I want to explore the pros and cons of what AI can do for businesses and the pros and cons of doing it as I see the potential it gives us. As stated in the title, this was part one; stay tuned for part two in my next blog post, where I’ll talk about AI for business, what it can do, what can’t it do and whether we should be scared of it or embrace it.
And in terms of AI taking over the world. AI, according the Oxford Dictionary, states:
Noun: artificial intelligence; noun: AI
The theory and development of computer systems able to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as visual perception, speech recognition, decision-making, and translation between languages.
Key in on “perform tasks that normally require human intelligence” AI does NOT mean it’s actually intelligent and self-aware and is going to take over the world and do away with humanity. That “may” come down the road, but it’s not here “yet”. But we still fear the unknown and again popular media doesn’t help when they feed the fire of our fears.
by Heather T. | Jan 3, 2023 | Blog, Opinion, Toastmasters
This was a Toastmasters speech I recently gave in my club, and I wanted to share it as it got a great response from our club members, who are in business, either working for themselves or others.
I’m not going to talk about personal or relationship boundaries because we would be here all night. I do want to address some professional boundaries that all of us, whether we own a business, run a business, are a manager, or work for someone else and have probably run into at some point in our lives.
What happens when you don’t set boundaries in your business life?
Whether it’s by email, text message, phone call, or in person, What happens?
- You end up resentful of managers, bosses, co-workers or clients, and others who demand your time.
- Your motivation and energy suffers.
- You hit your burnout mark, you might break down, or in modern terms, You have exceeded your bandwidth.
- Other parts of your life are suffering: your health, your sleep habits, your eating habits, and more…
Those 2 AM wide awake stress periods about something, has anyone ever had those?
What happens when you Do set boundaries in your business life?
- You are more productive
- Your mental and physical well-being are generally greater.
- You can enjoy the work you do (if you liked it in the first place).
Boundaries are NOT demands.
They are explicitly setting and communicating clear expectations to others.
A boundary is a particular course of action YOU take when someone pushes it.
It is a statement of cause and effect.
It’s not about what THEY do (or don’t); it’s about what YOU do or, more importantly, Will do if that boundary continues to be pushed.
Some people might feel that setting boundaries is making a threat, i.e. “If you do this, WELL, I’m going to do this back at you.”
Please throw that thinking and that mindset out the window.
If you don’t set boundaries, what usually happens is people will walk all over you, and they will continue to do it for as long as you let it happen.
Here are a few examples of setting professional boundaries:
From an employee to a manager or co-worker, or even a client:
Not a good boundary: “You can’t call me after regular business hours.”
Why is this not even a boundary? There is no qualifier. “Yeah, so what?”
It’s like saying, “You can’t keep coming on to my property without my permission, and (nothing will happen).”
A better boundary: “If you call me after hours, I will not respond until the following business day.”
Why is this a reasonable boundary?
It’s telling someone if they do this, this is what will happen, or in this case, NOT occur.
Not a good boundary: “You need to give me less to do; I’m overloaded.”
A reasonable boundary: “I will only work the number of hours I am contracted for per month.”
Or, more specifically, “I will only work the number of hours per month I am contracted for unless my time is compensated.”
Why is this a reasonable boundary?
It’s setting a standard, being specific, and in the second case stating well, if you want me to do this (?), where is my carrot?
A few examples from a manager to an employee or to a boss or co-manager that is habitually late for meetings and holds everyone else up, including you:
Not a good boundary: You need to attend staff meetings on time.
Why is this not a reasonable boundary or even a boundary at all?
Why should they? Everyone waits for them when they show up late, so they push the envelope and keep doing it for every meeting.
A better boundary: We will start without you if you are not here.
Why is this a better boundary? They snooze they lose. If they are late, they will miss important information, and if they don’t hear information, they will be out of the loop, and bad things could happen.
The best way to think of what is a good response and a reasonable boundary is that the person you are setting boundaries with needs to make a step.
I’ve also heard that telling a boss they won’t wait for them (in the example of always running late for meetings) is a bad idea because they own or run the company. What I have found works well is let them know respectfully that when they are late, it puts projects behind, causes overtime, and takes money out of their own pockets. That usually does the trick.
And you need to give them that step to take.
In the context of Toastmasters, think of evaluations; an evaluation with feedback that is not actionable doesn’t do anything and doesn’t help you become a better speaker.
An evaluation outlining steps to fix, help or correct something in a speech helps you progress as a speaker.
I’d like you to imagine yourself as a tree; around the tree is a small fence, and your boundary is a foot-high fence, but not a 10-foot fence.
The person you are interacting with can’t step over a 10-foot fence, but they can step over the foot-high fence (or maybe one slightly higher if needed), but they have to make an effort to lift up their foot and take the step. Give the person pushing your boundaries the step to take.
Here are a few steps I’ve found helpful when setting up your own professional boundaries and how to respond to others that push yours.
Make a list, of what ticks you off, what gets under your skin at work, what are things that bug you, that cause that insomnia, and 2 AM wakeups where you are stressing out. Make a list.
If you have ever had a conversation with someone and for days and sometimes longer, you think about what better responses you could have given, it’s usually an example of someone pushing your boundaries. Write those down!
What is the thing being pushed on? Be specific!
What do you want that person to do (or not do)? Be specific!
Write down some what-ifs. You are working too many hours; you state to your boss or client you will only work “this number” of hours.
What are some variables as the result of your saying that?
Write them out. Sometimes a stated boundary can be negative.
Think of the potential outcomes when you write out your responses.
If you said, “I won’t work more than my contracted hours per month, or I will quit.” A manager or boss might say, “OK.”
Maybe not go there……
But rephrased with room for negotiation, like, “I will not work more than my contracted hours per month unless my time is compensated,” gives you some space for discussion.
“Well, if you can’t pay me more, what perks can you get me? More vacation time? Other?”
And last but not least, practice in front of a mirror.
Record yourself. The first few times, you may not feel comfortable setting that boundary you are aiming for, but just like giving a speech, practicing helps with your comfort level.
Setting reasonable boundaries in your professional life can help make your workplace a more enjoyable and productive environment in which you work, no matter your position.
One of the biggest things people have trouble doing is saying NO. I used to be horrible at this, and then I started getting overextended and over-committing and then totally stressing out about things. I would always get the commitments done, but the amount of mental and physical stress it would put me under was horrible.
One of the hardest things I found is the ability to say NO and WHY. I still cave occasionally, but it’s after I’ve had that internal conversation with myself that asks, do I “actually” have time for this? Will I enjoy doing it? What do I get from it? Money? Recognition? Self-satisfaction? If I have time, but I’m not going to enjoy it, and there is no carrot, why do it? And if I said Yes (but should have said NO instead), I try to make that decision to change, and I set information down on paper (pros of something and cons of something), so I can review it and reevaluate whether the decision was good for my mental and physical well-being.
No is just a boundary, but putting it and a “I will or I won’t” into context will resonate more with others if there is a qualifier.
by Heather T. | Nov 30, 2021 | Blog, Opinion
I recently did a Toastmasters two-part speech project and thought it would make a good blog post. The project was to give a speech and then give the speech again based on the first speech’s evaluation.
I ended up giving this short speech to three different Toastmasters clubs, one club is the club I am coaching, and the feedback I got from all of them was pretty interesting.
In all three meetings, heads nodded, and the comments afterward were, “Yes, we have ourselves done all of these things, both personally, in business and leadership situations.” I know I have as well in the past and have tried my best to cut them out.
Dan Rockwell has been one of my favorite blog writers for years and most definitely one of my most favorite leadership article writers. His posts don’t always have the answers and the solutions to things, but they make you THINK!
From a leadership perspective, that is invaluable because there are no perfect solutions to leadership issues.
Every situation is unique, and what works for one doesn’t necessarily work for another.
Gaining some insights about how people react and stimulating your brain into thinking about scenarios that may happen or have already happened gives you an awful lot of insight into yourself and how you deal or would deal with things that may come up.
He recently wrote a blog post, 12 Things Smart Leaders Don’t Say, and it really got the wheels turning a bit more than usual.
His blog has 12 questions, but I cut it down to six (technically seven because I combined two) for two reasons, my first speech when I based it on my additional commentary to his questions was too long (almost 12 minutes instead of the target 5-7), and when I started to rewrite it, I found that these questions resonated with me more than the others, mostly because they made me “think” about them more myself.
Question #1.
Dan writes: Don’t say, “You should have. Why didn’t you? and “I should have”
He comments: ‘Should have’ is backward facing. Do your best to speak into the future.
Instead of shoulding-yourself, say, “Next time.”
I’m adding to this, “YOU should have” is very negative, it’s a blame game, and something parents do to guilt their kids and makes people feel small and insignificant. “Next time” is a great starter, but adding, “Let’s try this next time” is even more encouraging.
In leadership, it’s also worth considering that maybe the “you should have” is really on you for not providing enough information or direction to the person that “should” have done something. Is it that person’s “fault” something went sideways, or was it your own?
From a leadership perspective, I think of all of the questions, this should be the biggest takeaway for people in management. Is it “really” an employee’s fault or ?
Question #2. (Dan’s #3)
Dan writes: Don’t say: What can we do about that?
He comments: ‘We’ is a tiny act of cowardice that softens the blow of responsibility.
“What could ‘you’ do next,” is better than, “What could ‘we’ do next?” (Unless you are planning to actively participate.)
It’s insincere to say ‘we’ when you really mean ‘you’.
I’m adding to this, Toastmasters tries to teach us to say “we” because it’s inclusive and that’s what leaders are supposed to say, but too often leaders, both in organizations and in business, say “we” but leave the actions and the follow-up to others, most often the ones that need the help most.
Leaving someone hanging is passing the buck, and it’s saying it’s not that leader’s problem. If you are truly going to say “we,” MEAN it and participate. Please don’t put it on someone else.
If you say “you,” then follow up and give the person or the group some tools and directions to fix the problem or issue and the ability and assistance to solve it, don’t just leave them hanging in the wind.
Question #3. (Dan’s #4 & #5)
Dan writes: Don’t say: It’s simple AND It’s easy.
He comments: What’s simple to you is often difficult for others. Judge people through the lens of their experience and strength, not yours.
I run into this all the time. In Toastmasters, Pathways is a good example. I think it’s easy, I’ve also been using it since it literally first rolled out, and I’m in the interface several times per week. For many others, it’s not easy, and when you don’t use something all the time, it’s not “simple.”
I hear marketing people say this all the time about using social media, and it drives me bonkers. “It’s so simple, and it’s SOOOOO easy to do.”
Well that’s because they swim in it all day long, for business people who actually have other things to do, like run their businesses, it’s not easy, it’s not intuitive, there are no big red buttons and guides that say do this, do that to proceed to the next step.
It’s also a belittling comment because it makes people think they are not smart enough for not “getting” something that is according to someone else “easy” or “simple.”
When I do SCORE mentoring, I also run into this quite a bit with clients who are frustrated that they don’t “get” social media, website development, or SEO and have been told by someone else that it should be easy.
Why should they get it? It’s not their fields, yet some marketers out there make people feel small by saying things like, “oh, that’s easy, you shouldn’t have any problem with it.”
I don’t know how many times I’ve caught myself starting to say that and then booted myself into a reality check. And I freely admit, I used to be guilty of saying this to people myself and had a massive wakeup call a couple of years ago.
Question #4. Dan’s #8
Dan writes: Don’t say: Don’t you agree?
He comments: Questions that begin with ‘don’t’ insult people’s intelligence and pressure them to agree. Who’s going to say, “No,” when you ask, “Don’t you agree?”
Don’t you agree is also pressure on people to “make” them agree, so they feel like they are a part of the group, it goes back to the comment “You should have” it’s not just insulting to people and pressuring them, it’s also giving a guilt trip (funny how guilt trips come up twice in things we shouldn’t be saying, and how learned mannerisms as well as phrases creep into our speech as adults). A good alternative is “what do you think? I value your opinion and your experience or expertise.”
Don’t you agree it is a lot like “With all due respect”….. Every time I hear someone say that I cringe, because I have rarely heard anyone say that and then not completely tear apart or disregard the other person’s opinion. I’d add that to the list of things that Leaders should probably stay away from saying.
Question #5. Dan’s #10
Dan writes: Don’t say: But
He comments: Never say ‘but’ after saying something good. Try using ‘and’ when you’re tempted to use ‘but’.
‘But’ is an eraser.
But is not only an eraser but also a contradictor, You did a great job with your speech, and I really like the examples BUT>>>>>>>>>>>> Terrific job with that presentation and you really impressed the client BUT>>>>>>>>>>>>
In Toastmasters But is a filler word, as is And, but the grammarian and ah counter are more likely to flag you on But as a filler word because it doesn’t lead into anything else, it contradicts and it fills space where it doesn’t have to.
I agree that AND is a good substitute. Think of it in the context of doing an evaluation, or giving feedback to an employee, “Here are some great things about your speech AND here is a little bit of room for improvement. Fantastic job with that report, I particularly appreciated you including next year’s financials AND maybe next time can we add an additional 6 months worth?
Question #6. Dan’s #12
Dan writes: Don’t say: Nice job.
He comments: Be specific, not vague, when giving compliments. What was ‘nice’ about it?
That was a really “nice” speech, Eh? What does that mean? Was it sugar and spice and everything nice? Was it nicely wrapped in a box with a pretty bow? It was nice, because………………… ?
I used to work with a fellow chef at a resort with multiple restaurants that was always saying to his staff, “Nice Job, Nice Job.” His employees used to mock him for it because he would never give specifics, and it came across as insincere. He thought from a leadership perspective it sounded good to say that to staff, and it became like an automatic reflex, but his employees hated it.
Give some specifics, “Nice job with that catering order today, the clients were really happy with everything, and the bride especially liked the vegetable canapes.”
What we say as leaders defines us, and we can either help lift people up or drag people down, and being cognizant of what we say and how we say it makes us a good leader or someone who has some work to do.
Sometimes little things like wording both verbally and written can make a huge difference especially when giving feedback to someone.
Original post here and CC License for Mr. Rockwell’s post attribution.
