You need to maintain eye contact with a reporter or interviewer during an on-camera appearance. And yet, you need to cover your main talking points. And stick to an agenda and stay on time. And you don’t want to have wandering or shifty eyes while you’re talking on-camera! What to do, what to do? How …

Color choices on your slides are important. People react to color on both a physical and emotional level. Often, we see color on PowerPoint slides that don’t seem to have a purpose. Or worse, the color undermines the emotional intent of the message. Sometimes, setting constraints or following basic rules on colors can help you …

Let’s explore 5 common crisis communication response mistakes… and what to do instead. I’ve seen all five of these mistakes play out in the media recently. How about you? 1. Don’t ignore warning signs: conduct routine threat assessments. 2. Don’t cover up: take responsibility. 3. Don’t speculate: verify and confirm facts. 4. Don’t say “No …

Let’s UNMASK four near enemies. A near enemy is a WICKED emotion that comes disguised as a NOBLE emotion. Near enemies can be more dangerous than far enemies. That’s because far enemies are easy to spot. For example, hate is the far enemy of love. Or sadness can be a far enemy of joy. Since …

In an attempt to make live presentations more accessible, I first used Closed Captioning in Google Slides for a presentation I gave around a year ago. Closed Captioning in Google Slides is easy to use and does a terrific job. All you need is Google Slides, Google Chrome, a live internet connection, and a microphone. …

Do you do “walk & talk” meetings at your organization? One of my favorite times for a “walk & talk” is when I’m presenting research findings. If it all possible — due to the weather and other constraints — I want to get my clients out of the office and into nature. My reasoning? Clients …

How do you get a QR code of your LinkedIn profile? You can do it directly from within LinkedIn! I often put a QR code that leads to my LinkedIn profile on or near the last slide of my presentation. I sometimes will put one in a video. With a QR code that leads to …

Here’s a question about presentations and videos I started to get a lot last month. I’ll paraphrase it: Hey Laura. How do you do those square, short, silent little videos that you share on LinkedIn and Twitter? The answer is: really easily! I use a tool called Canva. As a stand & deliver trainer, I …

“We don’t pay attention to boring things.” John Medina, Brain Rules Sounds basic, right? But how do you NOT be boring when you’re speaking or presenting? Medina tells us to be sure to introduce something emotionally relevant every 10 minutes. At least every 10 minutes! If we don’t, we risk losing the attention and interest …

I own a car. When it dies, I may not buy another. In fact, I may never own another car again in my lifetime. I don’t want to be careless. I’d rather be carless. This is a shocking statement for a middle-aged Michigan suburbanite to make. For a time, I worked in the auto industry. …