Category: Business Communication

To email or not to email: Michael Dell

In a memo to Dell Inc. employees days after returning as chief executive officer, Michael Dell said the beleaguered computer maker is quashing bonuses for 2006 and reducing managers to help cut costs and steer the company back toward dominance.The e-mail sent Friday also revealed that Dell will not hire a chief operating officer, will push faster product development and will expand into new business to drive revenue growth.

In the e-mail, Dell wrote that the company ended its fiscal year Friday with “great efforts, but not great results.”

“This is disappointing, and it is unacceptable,” wrote Dell, who went on to say that he plans to remain CEO for the next several years. (EastOregonian.com)

Possible assignment questions: Is email the appropriate channel to deliver this type of information? What is the message embedded in the choice of using email rather than other available channels? Explain.

Top 10 when NOT to email

We discuss this in class every term.

Here is one author’s list:

1. To communicate bad news, complaints or criticism
2. When you are seeking information that is not simple and straight-forward
3. When you are seeking approval on something that is involved or controversial
4. When you’re sending a few people complicated instructions
5. When you are asking for comments on a long document (probably attached to your proposed e-mail)
6. To request information from a group on a recurring basis
7. To convey instructions to a large number of people
8. To achieve consensus
9. To explore a subject or idea
10. To send news, interesting documents, links, policies, directory updates and other ‘FYI’ stuff

UPDATE 7-20-07: And here’s another’s:

  1. When you are right
  2. When you are wrong
  3. When you are mad
  4. When you don’t know what you want
  5. When you are stalling
  6. When you are drunk
  7. When you are gossiping
  8. When you see the “Re’s” pile up
  9. When you have nothing to add
  10. When the exchange is over
  11. At 3 am
  12. When you are bored
  13. When you should be concentrating on someone or something else

Your elevator speech… the final frontier…

We all remember the opening lines of our favorite TV shows. Well, idea-sandbox recommends that we find inspiration in them for our elevator speech.

It can be challenging to boil down what you do into a short blurb… For inspiration, I suggest paying attention to the 30-second narrations at the beginning of TV shows. At the start of each episode producers deliver the swift backstory and premise of the show. If this was our first viewing, we would understand what makes the show worth attention.

This is EXACTLY what you need for YOUR elevator pitch… What’s your 30-second blurb? Your backstory that builds awareness of the premise of you (or your project, company, etc…) and lets me know why you’re worth my attention?

Dismissal the Wal-Mart way

 Julie Roehm got a call from her boss’s assistant at 12:15 p.m. on Dec. 4. J. John Fleming, then chief of Wal-Mart Stores Inc.‘s marketing department, wanted a word with his senior vice-president. Walking to Fleming’s office at the Bentonville (Ark.) headquarters, Roehm recalls thinking she was about to be fired. She was right. Ten months after being recruited to help modernize Wal-Mart’s tired brand, Roehm was out.

The meeting lasted seven minutes, Roehm says. A “very nice” human resources manager collected her company badge, Palm Treo, corporate credit card, and, yes, Wal-Mart discount card. Then the HR representative escorted Roehm out a side door to the parking lot. (BW)

The rest of the article provides details about Roehm’s short stay.

How to run a meeting like Google

marissa_mayer.jpgMarissa Mayer is Google’s vice-president of search products. She is the last stop before engineers and project managers get the opportunity to pitch their ideas to Google’s co-founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page. Eight teams consisting of directors, managers, and engineers answer to her. She holds an average of 70 meetings a week.

Her goal is to make sure teams have a firm mandate, strategic direction, and actionable information, while making participants feel motivated and respected. Here are Mayer’s six keys to running successful meetings:

1. Set a firm agenda.
2. Assign a note-taker.
3. Carve out micro-meetings.
4. Hold office hours.
5. Discourage politics, use data.
6. Stick to the clock.

(via BusinessWeek).

Excellent guide to prepare your elevator speech

An elevator speech is as essential as a business card. You need to be able to say who you are, what you do, what you are interested in doing and how you can be a resource to your listeners. If you donʹt have an elevator speech, people wonʹt know what you really do.

KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE- Before writing any part of your elevator speech, research your audience. You will be much more likely to succeed if your elevator speech is clearly targeted at the individuals you are speaking to. Having a ʹgenericʹ elevator pitch is almost certain to fail.

KNOW YOURSELF – Before you can convince anyone of your proposition you need to know exactly what it is. You need to define precisely what you are offering, what problems you can solve and what benefits you bring to a prospective contact or employers.

Answer the following questions:
1. What are your key strengths?
2. What adjectives come to mind to describe you?
3. What is it you are trying to ʹsellʹ or let others know about you?
4. Why are you interested in the company or industry the person represents?

OUTLINE YOUR TALK – start an outline of your material using bullet points. You donʹt need to add any detail at this stage; simply write a few notes to help remind you of what you really want to say. They don’t need to be complete sentences.

You can use the following questions to start your outline:
1. Who am I?
2. What do I offer?
3. What problem is solved?
4. What are the main contributions I can make?
5. What should the listener do as a result of hearing this?

FINALIZE YOUR SPEECH – Now that you have your outline of your material, you can finalize the speech. The key to doing this is to expand on the notes you made by writing out each section in full.

To help you do this, follow these guidelines:
1. Take each note you made and write a sentence about it.
2. Take each of the sentences and connect them together with additional phrases to make them flow.
3. Go through what you have written and change any long words or jargon into everyday language.
4. Go back through the re-written material and cut out unnecessary words.
5. Finalize your speech by making sure it is no more than 90 words long.

(source is a pdf file)