Andrew Hennigan's Blog

Networking benefits employers because a workplace where everyone has a networking mentality, helping each other routinely, is more productive and has less conflicts. But often the physical layout of buildings makes networking difficult because there are few spaces where people can interact. Redesigning your entire building to make it network-friendly might be out of reach but there are still many smaller initiatives that can be done to make interactions more frequent and more fruitful. Here are just three: Create social spaces . In some companies the only common areas are luxurious sofas in an elegant lobby area, but they are meant mainly for show and employees are afraid to sit there. Create comfortable spaces around the building where people can sit and talk. If you are not sure what welcoming looks like visit a coffee shop. And make sure there are varied seating options. Some people like sofas, others like high tables, others like benches. Variety is the key. Encour...

When people are speaking they sometimes state a fact, give an example or tell a story that they think will impress people, but then it doesn't. Their speech or presentation doesn't make an impact, or can even have the opposite effect. In these cases the speaker is sure that they have a winning argument and they are frustrated when it fails. This happens because the speaker gives their facts or tells their story but without some essential context. Because they have this context in their head they can fill in the gaps and complete the story, so they feel that the point they are making is obvious. People in the audience lack this context, so they interpret the same facts or stories in a different and sometimes completely opposite way. I call this the "Song in your head" problem because it reminds me of a children's game where one person taps just the rhythm to a song and challenges others to recognize it. Quite surprisingly even the best known songs can be unr...

Ideas come when they come, rarely precisely when you need them. One easy way to make sure that you have ideas when you need them is to write them down as they come. This is the simplest approach for coming up with any ideas but it is specially useful for a digital marketing campaign. Most of the time ideas for new campaigns are not entirely original. They are just ideas that have worked elsewhere, variants of existing ideas or the combination of two or more ideas in one campaign. You could rely on your memory to come up with a campaign idea every time that you need one, but you will find it much easier if you simply write down every campaign idea you hear about over the years. Then when you need to come up with an idea you just leaf through the book and refresh your memory. Your campaign ideas "notebook" can be a physical notebook, a box full of loose papers or a file in the cloud that you can easily access when you need it. The form doesn't matter so much except t...

How do you make your speaking more persuasive, more compelling? I suspect that some of the people who ask this question are hoping for some magical secret of body language or voice training that can make anything sound persuasive. But in a way there really is a secret -- by far the best way to be more persuasive is to test all your ideas before you use them. Few non-speakers are aware of this fact, but it is one of the key foundations of strong speaking skills. Before you use any idea on a real audience you should always try to test them in three ways : Due Diligence.   First of all you have to check your facts. When you build a talk or a presentation on flaky facts and concepts you will find it hard to be persuasive. If your content is weak then you will see this reflected in the negative body language of the audience – there will be many question-mark faces, which is very discouraging. People are also much more likely to challenge you and ask awkward questions, exp...