Lauren Sergy, Author at Lauren Sergy

Experts of Everything

Audience, ConfidenceBy Lauren Sergy May 25, 2015

Don’t be intimidated by the level of prestige of your audience members. Just because a room is filled with C-level execs doesn’t mean they are collectively CEO of Everything. Speaking to a crowd of academics and researchers? Don’t cower before their gigantic brains. I’ve met plenty of PhDs that couldn’t find their backsides with both…

Throwing caution to the wind? Think twice.

Discipline, Performance, Risk and rewardBy Lauren Sergy May 19, 2015

There are times to take risks and times to play it safe. I write frequently about taking risks with your content. Experiment. Try something new. Put yourself out there. If it doesn’t work, do a quick post-mortem, figure out what happened, then try again before the fear monster takes over and chokes you. A caveat…

In praise of flexibilty

DisciplineBy Lauren Sergy May 4, 2015

We need to exercise a fair amount of flexibility if we are going to get our message out there. I’m not just talking about flexibility in terms of how you express yourself, or to who you direct your art, or even the content of the art (whatever your art may be). I’m talking about flexibility…

White Space

Performance, StyleBy Lauren Sergy April 27, 2015

You may have noticed a shift in the way documents and emails have been formatted. Once upon a time, the mighty indent ruled the start of every paragraph. Now the indent has been largely supplanted by an empty line. I am not entirely sure where or why this trend began. At first, it seemed confined…

Your audience doesn’t know everything that you know

Confidence, Getting the message across, PerformanceBy Lauren Sergy April 20, 2015

I was at a convention this weekend, and while in the venue’s public bathroom I heard someone say something really familiar: “I don’t know what I’m going to stay on the panel. I don’t know why I said I’d do this. I’m going to start babbling and everyone there will think I’m an idiot.” So…

Guest Post: Accent Modification

TechniquesBy Lauren Sergy April 13, 2015

Today I’m bringing you a new feature of my blog: special posts written by guests with unique communication expertise. This post was written by Lynda Katz Wilner of Successfully Speaking. Lynda’s full bio and links to her work can be found at the end of this post. Enjoy! When is an Accent a Problem? Most…

Junk Food for the Content Monster

Content creation, CreatingBy Lauren Sergy April 6, 2015 Leave a comment

If you are trying to get yourself out there and get noticed, you need to give people something to see. It doesn’t matter if the thing you craft is code, art, words, or something else. People need to see what you are doing if they are going to respond. This is especially true if your…

Pages from kid’s books

Performance, Tactics, UncategorizedBy Lauren Sergy March 30, 2015 Leave a comment

Reading out loud is one of the best ways to get in speaking practice. Whether you’re working on diction, expression, breath work, or something else, grabbing some reading material makes practice a lot easier than taxing your brain trying to come up with original content. Just about anything can be fodder for your speaking…

Headspace / Workspace

CreatingBy Lauren Sergy March 23, 2015 Leave a comment

For years, my primary workspace was a desk in an office. For a few brief, shining months, I even had my own office with a door! At all of these jobs, I had quite a bit of time to twiddle my thumbs and work on my own projects. It should have been perfect: I…

Small Risks

ConfidenceBy Lauren Sergy March 16, 2015 Leave a comment

Habit and confidence. These are the friends of anyone who wants to do something extraordinary. They are also the most high-maintenance friends you could ever imagine having. Neither of them simply appear out of thin air. If they did, we wouldn’t be so interested in exceptional people. Even those we know who seem to naturally…

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