AnywhereMan

Quick rant: If you have an email address or email contact form posted on your website, USE IT.

If I contact you online, don’t email me back with an automated message that says “Call us.” The reason I emailed you instead of calling in the first place was because I don’t want to navigate through all of the “Push 1 for…” options, account verifications (even though the live operator will just ask me for my account number again), and then just sit on hold for ten minutes.

True story: I contacted my bank a few months back through their website (a national chain – leaving the name off because this phenomenon is not exclusive to them). I had a simple question about submitting documentation electronically.

The next day I received an email from them informing me that I had a secure response awaiting me in my online banking inbox. I then logged in to their website, opened the message…

…And it gave me a phone number to call them.

Seriously, take advantage of the convenience of simply emailing me back. Even if it takes a day or two, you can get back to me on you own schedule and I won’t mind at all. You don’t have to worry about me sitting on hold for too long. It’s kind of a perfect option.

People skills are important, especially if you work on your own. Because much of our time can be spent working in isolation away from cubicles and water coolers, keeping your conversation skills sharp should be a high priority. You don’t want to open the floodgates of talking about yourself too much when you interact with someone in person.

I’ve run into this a few times in the past few weeks – ironically with stay-at-home moms who, when you think about it, are kind of in the same situation as a work-from-home freelancer. At the end of the conversations, I kind of felt yucky. The bottom line in a conversation is that you NEVER want to make the other person feel yucky.

Why did I feel yucky? I took note of a few key do-and-don’ts to keep in the back of my mind for future interactions:

Ask Questions

To me, this is maybe the most important piece of a conversation. In order to make it not about YOU, you need to ask the other person about THEM. And try to be more specific than just “How are you?” If you ask something like “How are things going with your new project?” it shows the other person that the things they share with you don’t just go in one ear and out the other.

Keep An Eye On The Clock

In Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith, they talk about the 30-60-90 rule. It’s definitely okay to talk about yourself in a conversation (typically when asked), but don’t make your answers too long or go off on tangets. A 30-second response is about perfect. At 60 seconds you’re starting to lose the other person. And you can chalk them up as “bored” at 90 seconds.

Be Positive

Bottom line on this one is don’t dump your dirty laundry on the other person. Tell me about what’s going well in your life (again, when asked). What are you excited about? It’s not that you shouldn’t be real but if you really want a guaranteed way to make the other person to feel yucky, just dump some yucky stuff on them. Be optimistic about the negative things in your life. It’ll actually make the other person feel inspired.

Act Like You’re Interested

When you’re having a short conversation with someone, try to give them your full attention. Don’t act like you’re stuck talking with them or you have nothing better to do. Act like it’s one of the highlights of your day. It’s pretty much a guaranteed way to make them look forward to your next interaction. And in order to keep it from seeming fake, practice the art of smiling with your eyes. Seriously – go look into the mirror and practice this.

Be Encouraging

When you ask someone a question, respond to their response. Positively. When you wrap up the conversation, tell them how good it was to see them. Offer them encouragement about things going on in their life that they may have shared.

Post-Conversation: Store It All In The Archive

Make a mental note of the conversation you just had – or even write down some of what they other person shared. Remember what is going on in that person’s life and use it as conversation material the next time you see them. That’s what’ll really kill any hint of the yucky-factor: it shows the other person that they matter to you.

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If you’ve been following AnywhereMan, you know that I’ve debated this smartphone thing for quite some time. I’ve considered ditching trusty Verizon for AT&T and their lovely iPhone. When Verizon released their Android phones, I considered renewing my contract and going with one of those.

But each time I thought about making a change I just couldn’t justify why I would actually need the extra features that a smartphone offers. I also couldn’t justify the cost. I’m currently on an old Unicel plan that got grandfathered onto Verizon when Verizon purchased Unicel in our region. My wife and I spend a grand total of $60 for two lines, 600 nationwide minutes, unlimited incoming texts, and unlimited incoming calls. If you are familiar with Google Voice, you know that free incoming minutes means you can essentially have unlimited calling.

Well, in the past few weeks a few situations have come up that really helped me make my mind up to go with a Palm Pre Plus on Verizon (it helped that I was able to keep my current voice plan thanks to ordering the phone through Verizon’s website instead of in a store). I discuss the specific features I’ve been looking for in today’s video.

I still like the iPhone. I like the Verizon network but was a bit surprised by some of their misinformed salespeople and their general bias towards Android devices. I still like the Android platform in general. But at the end of the day the Pre Plus had the features, reliability, price, and ease of use that I needed.

One of the things I dislike about the use of blocks of time when scheduling is the tendency to use that entire block of time. When a speaker has an hour for a presentation, they’re going to use that full hour. When a pastor has 45 minutes, they’re going to use that 45 minutes. When we schedule a half-hour for a meeting, we tend to use that half-hour.

Don’t be afraid to keep things as short as possible!

Can what you said in that 30,45,or 60 minutes be shortened down to just 20 minutes of the good stuff? People will love you for the good stuff, and everything else might just be getting in the way.

Earlier this week I published a new article to MakeUseOf.com about TokBox, a video chatting and messaging app. In the past, I’ve encouraged all of you to do as much video as possible. Since we don’t get a ton of in-person “face time” with clients and co-workers, using an app like Skype or TokBox to have real-time video conversations really help strengthen trust in a relationship where we might otherwise be more heard than seen.

TokBox gives you an additional feature that is SUPER convenient for Work Anywhere folks like me: video messaging. You can record a video using your webcam and instantly send it to a client, prospect, vendor, or anybody else. I’ve taken to sending video messages over emails on many occasions. For me it’s almost quicker than typing out an email.

I go into all the details in my article, but just wanted to let you folks know that it might be an app that really adds a nice benefit to how you communicate from wherever you might be.

Check out TokBox. What video chatting/messaging services do you currently use?

Take a walk with me through the woods while I debate whether having a smartphone and data plan are worth it for me. While trying to simplify, cut down distractions, and lessen the noise in my daily life, I am unsure if having a web-enabled device in my pocket at all times is necessarily a good thing.

For some, it’s a requirement. But I work from home or wifi-enabled public locations. If I’m neither of those places, I don’t want to be working or tempted to work. I want to be catching fish, focusing on my family, or just enjoying whatever moment is presented to me.

There are three main areas where I question whether having the web available at all times is good for me:

1. I want to spend less time on the internet, not more. By subscribing to a monthly data plan, I’d feel like I was wasting my money if I wasn’t using it.
2. I’m trying to reduce the number of “in-boxes” in my life and the number of times I check my email daily. Mobile web/email would add at least one more.
3. When I’m not working, I want to focus on not working. If I’m in my canoe, going for a hike, or out on a date with my wife, I want to enjoy those things for what they are at that moment, not how they’ll sound in a Twitter update.

What do you think? If you use a web-enabled smartphone, does it simplify your life?

We’re all different and what works for one person might not work for another. I’m just debating what makes sense for my lifestyle today. Smartphones are everywhere and I even had one for a short while a few years ago. I realized it didn’t make sense for me then and I’m still not sure if I really need one. I’m the AnywhereMan, not the EverywhereMan.

And yes, I will probably change my mind on all of this next week.

Working from wherever we want means we spend a lot of time on the phone. In fact, I personally have very few in-person meetings since so few of my clients are local. Most of them live in places much much warmer than the northern regions of Minnesota. But that’s another story…

Phone skills are essential for maintaining a level of confidence with the person on the other end of the line. They might be a prospective client, co-worker, boss, or current customer, but whoever they are it’s going to help your career to carry a phone conversation with the right amount of command.

Essentially you need to communicate not only what you are saying clearly, but also that you understand what the other person is saying. In person, this is a lot easier. A head nod or simple grin can do the trick. However, on the phone you are invisible to the other person.

Here are six little tricks I’ve learned for having effective command of phone communication.

Delay your excitement

It’s important to start the conversation off right. When you pick up the phone and answer, use a friendly tone but save your most excited tone of voice until after the person states their name. Make the person feel like you were happy before they called, but hearing their voice was a nice surprise. Don’t overdo it, though.

Make sure the other person is receptive

If you are the party placing the call, make sure you ask the other person if it’s a good time to talk. I am notorious for diving right in and forgetting to check with them first. Getting permission at the very start of the call lets the other person know that their time is important to you, and as a result they’ll likely be more engaged in the call. Some have referred to this concept as the Golden Rule of phone communication.

Another tip with this one: if you something in the caller’s background such as a phone ringing, baby crying, etc., make sure you ask them if they need to tend to that. Again, this communicates that their time is important to you.

Make sure you are receptive

You should also make sure that YOU have time for the call. If you’re trying to get something else done while talking on the phone, it will be obvious to the caller. If someone calls you in a whirlwind moment just let them know that you’d like to call them back when you can give them full attention.

Wait for the pause

This is a tough one for me because I like to give verbal feedback to people as they are talking. If they are describing something to me, I’ll nod along with an “okay” here and a “yeah” there. Sometimes this works on the phone, but I’ve noticed that a lot of phone systems, especially mobile phones and Skype, will delay your words just a little bit and actually cut the caller’s signal to your phone for a split second. The caller will then stop talking a lot of times and wait for you to finish, but you have nothing to finish because you were simply giving quick verbal confirmation.

Instead, wait for the other person to finish what they are saying before you try to give any sort of confirmation. Imagine you’ve got duct tape over your mouth and the other person has to tear it off once they’re finished with what they are saying.

Use their name

Sprinkling the other person’s name throughout the conversation gives confirmation that you are focused on them. Don’t overdo it, but doing this will make the caller feel like you are much more “connected” to the conversation. Really.  Think of conversations you’ve had where people say your name once in a while versus not saying it at all. Which one made you feel more connected? It’s a simple, easy method that makes a huge difference.

Imagine you are on the radio

The big wall of phone conversations is the fact that you cannot see each other. I use a lot of hand gestures, but those do no good on the phone.  One thing I’ve learned is to imagine that you are the host of your own radio show. The person you are talking to is your guest and (this one will really inspire you to be interesting) there are people listening in on your call.

This will totally change the way you approach a conversation. You’ll ask better questions, you’ll ramble less, and you’ll use a tone of voice that is much more interesting. You’ll sound much more professional.

If you’re a user of a phone app such as Google Voice, you might even try using the in-call recording option to record a few of your phone conversations. Go back and determine the things that would or wouldn’t work for a radio conversation.

Getting better at communication in general

Many of the tips I post here are the result of reading “How To Talk To Anyone” by Leil Lowndes a few years ago. It’s an excellent resource for brushing up on the ways that you communicate. The book is mainly focused on communicating in person, but there are a few chapters on phone communication as well.

It’s good to look back and see how we’ve improved in certain areas, both on a personal and professional level. Sometimes we get a better feel for the direction we want to go with our career just by looking at the areas in which we’ve developed.

I run my own home-based company, and I don’t have the luxury (or annoyance, depending on your point of view) of an annual performance review. Nobody is taking notes and holding me accountable on the things I’ve done well or the things I’m improving upon in my career. It’s all up to me.

Today I want each of us to list one thing we’ve gotten better at on a personal level and one thing on a professional level. Don’t worry if the things you list aren’t areas where you’re an “expert” by any means – just areas where you’ve seen growth and development in your abilities.

Next, I want you to list one skill, either professional or personal, where you would like to improve in 2010.

I’ll get this started…

Personal: Playing acoustic guitar. I’m still super far from being a virtuoso, but I’ve always been more of an electric guitarist. This past year I’ve transitioned into playing a lot more acoustic, and trading my main electric guitar for a gorgeous Taylor K-10 really helped.

Professional: Video. I was looking back, and last January was really the first time I put a fully-produced video together for a client. Since then I’ve immersed myself in video through AnywhereMan and a lot of little projects. I have really enjoyed it and have learned a lot.

Skill to Improve: Verbal communication. This year my goal is to rid “um”, “ah”, “so”, and “you know” (Totally a MN thing) from my vocabulary. These words show up constantly in my videos here on AnywhereMan, and I want to see improvement in that. I’d also like to learn to keep my speaking more focused and concise.

Okay, now I’d like you to list the same three things. What have you gotten better at both personally and professionally, and what skill or area would you like to improve in 2010?

Have a Happy New Year everyone!

The Twitter phenomenon has been absorbed into the daily lives of most of us, and as someone who works from home, it has become my “water-cooler” outlet (as I’ve mentioned before). The idea of keeping followers updated on “what’s on your mind” has become a staple of the web today.

Apply this idea to a team of telework professionals all working for the same company but in different locations.  Imagine being able to constantly keep each other updated on what everyone is working on at any point in time.  The public (and spammy) nature of Twitter wouldn’t work well for this.  

Enter Yammer,  the “internal communication platform” (and a great social network for virtual teams).  Here’s a quick description from the Yammer website:

Yammer is a tool for making companies and organizations more productive through the exchange of short frequent answers to one simple question: ‘What are you working on?’

As employees answer that question, a feed is created in one central location enabling co-workers to discuss ideas, post news, ask questions, and share links and other information. Yammer also serves as a company directory in which every employee has a profile and as a knowledge base where past conversations can be easily accessed and referenced.

Anyone in a company can start their Yammer network and begin inviting colleagues. The privacy of each network is ensured by limiting access to those with a valid company email address. Information is never shared with third parties.

In a way, Yammer behaves much like Twitter, but instead takes place within the safety of an organization. In fact, Yammer offers a way to create an org chart for those involved with a particular account.  How does it know who should be in an account? It uses the domain on the member email addresses.

For example, I signed myself up to try out the service. The domain on my email account is liftdevelopment.com.  It then created a central “Liftdevelopment” account, and any other users who sign up with a liftdevelopment.com domain will get added to that group.  

Those that are signed up can then publish their status throughout the day and view statuses of others.  Files can be attached to statuses, messages can be bookmarked, and RSS feeds can be added.  Within a specific account, groups can be created.  Plus, there are desktop, iPhone, and Blackberry versions of Yammer available to take the tools just about anywhere.

Yammer is free, but there are premium paid accounts available that allow you to set up a central admin profile.  Companies with one of these premium accounts can manage users, delete messages and files, export data, remove former employees, etc.

For a one-person company like mine, the functionality of Yammer isn’t something I need. However, for a scattered team of individuals, I can see the collaboration features bringing value to communication and collaboration.  If you fall into this category, be sure to at least check it out as Yammer is getting a growing amount of buzz.

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