Newsletter 6 - 17th February 2004

Newsletter 6, February 2004 This is the newsletter for www.mindtools.com. You have received this newsletter because you have subscribed to our opt-in newsletter. If you are not already a member and you would like to subscribe, please visit http://mindtools.com/subscribe.htm. This newsletter is published by James Manktelow and Kellie Fowler of Mind Tools Ltd. To contact us, please email newsletter@mindtools.com.

When it comes to motivating other people, we all aspire to great things: We want to lead the way. We want to get people to work together enthusiastically, towards a common goal. We want to truly inspire the people around us!

When you're motivating people effectively, it's a pleasure to see how well people respond to you, and how smoothly thing get done. But even with the best intentions and the most focused effort, it's not easy to get things right all of the time. And all of us get a bit jaded occasionally, and forget to use approaches that have worked well for us in the past.

This is why it's worth reviewing your motivation skills from time to time. However well you're doing, you'll often find ways to get even better. You and your team will enjoy the difference that makes!

This newsletter keeps you up-to-date on what’s new at Mind Tools and lets you know about new career skills on the Mind Tools website.

In our last edition, we discussed time management skills and how to more effectively manage your time to achieve your goals. As demonstrated, this is best done by prioritizing tasks and removing time-wasting barriers from your everyday life.

In this newsletter, we’ll review a proven product on increasing your memory; and in the “Old Favorites” section, we’ll take a look at tried and true mnemonic techniques, including the list method and the story method.

We’ll also preview an exciting new section on Communications, set to debut on the Mind Tools website next month.

Also in this edition, Henry Neils writes about building on your strengths. In this article, Neils discusses the difference in being good and in being great and shows the adjustments you can make to ensure you have time to develop your greatest strengths.

Here at Mind Tools, we continually strive to improve the products and services we provide you. Because of such, we are always on the lookout for useful new tools that may be of interest to you. Please let us know if there are tools, services or even additional information you would like us to explore. And, of course, we want your ongoing input and feedback, so let us know if you have any comments, questions or suggestions for the Mind Tools newsletters at Suggestions@mindtools.com.

In the meantime, enjoy using http://www.mindtools.com!

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Mind Tools Preview:
Communication Skills

Today’s businessperson spends over 75% of his or her time in an interpersonal situation, making it no surprise that poor communications are at the root of a large number of organizational problems. Effective communication is an essential component of organizational success whether it is at the interpersonal, organizational or external levels. Even so, social psychologists estimate that there is usually a 40-60% loss of meaning in the transmission of messages from sender to receiver.

Even the simplest communication is, in reality, quite complex.

Recognizing this, we are excited to announce the debut of a comprehensive section on the Mind Tools website dedicated to enhancing your day-to-day communications. In this new section, we will help you understand the communications process and help make you aware of the potential sources of communication errors. We show you how to meet these potential errors head-on and tackle them with a conscientious effort to minimize loss of meaning in your important conversations.

We are launching the new Communications section on the Mind Tools as part of our ongoing effort to meet the needs and the challenges you face each day while striving to improve your career skills. We look forward to hearing your thoughts and comments on this new section and hope you look forward to putting its information to work for you.

We will launch this new section in our March newsletter, giving newsletter readers two weeks exclusive access to it before we launch it more generally through the site.

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Tools Reviewed:
Advanced Mega Memory! (A Nightingale-Conant Corporation product)
Reviewed by Kellie Fowler

Founded in 1960 by Lloyd Conant (direct mail expert and fulfillment business owner) and Earl Nightingale (well-known motivational radio talk host), the Nightingale-Conant Corporation is the world’s largest producer of self-improvement audio products and programs. In its Advanced Mega Memory course, Nightingale-Conant utilizes six double-sided audiocassette tapes and an hour-long video to deliver the most comprehensive course on long-term memory improvement I have ever seen.

This course also includes a valuable workbook packed with useful exercises that help to illustrate and reinforce the lessons presented on the tapes, with important definitions and concepts highlighted throughout.

Designed by Kevin Trudeau, founder of the American Memory Institute and an authority on memory improvement training, this course is admittedly lengthy and involved, but well worth the time and commitment required to see it through to the end. In fact, I can honestly say that upon completing the course, I easily remembered long numbers and previously hard-to-remember names. While I have not tried to utilize my newly- learned skills to become a “card sharp,” a skill the course promises for all those who play blackjack, bridge or poker, I have used Trudeau’s techniques to remember important day-to-day information, including information and events that are crucial to my well-being and the well-being of my growing business.

Again, I used the audiocassette tapes primarily in my car, during commutes and errand running. I then put the information and techniques detailed on the tapes to use in the appropriate lessons outlined in the workbook. Often times, a day or even two would lapse between hearing the tapes and completing the related exercises in the workbook (perhaps this was my own personal test of memory improvement). As I progressed through the course, this became easier and easier, eventually removing all doubt I had about this product with outstanding claims. You see, as a journalist, I am generally skeptical of products such as this one. Even so, this product replaced my tough armor of skepticism with die-hard belief.

Since using Nightingale-Conant’s Advanced Mega Memory, I have enjoyed working the room at crowded events and reveled in the delight that comes with remembering names with little effort. I have also enjoyed applying these useful techniques to my business, instantly improving my memory recall in almost every single area.

In summary, I strongly recommend this product. Do not shy away from it because of its length or seemingly demanding involvement. Instead, take it one tape at a time and you will very quickly start seeing results. I relied on these results to act as a motivator for completing the next tape or segment in the workbook with little self-resistance. And, before I knew it, I was looking forward to the next tape and to mastering the skills and techniques detailed by Trudeau.

For more information about Kevin Trudeau and MegaMemory, go to:
http://www.mindtools.com/rs/MegaMemory.

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Advertorial: Build on Your Strengths
by Henry Neils, Assessment.com (Mind Tools partner)

Did you know that Babe Ruth was once a pitcher? At one point he made the deliberate decision to stop pitching so he could focus on batting. He took a lot of heat for his decision because he was a GOOD pitcher. He stuck with his decision though because he knew he had the motivation to be a GREAT batter.

Often the difference between being good and being great is making adjustments that allow you to spend more of your time developing your greatest strengths.

Ever had an annual performance review where the first part was about the wonderful things you did that year, but then the focus quickly shifted to a discussion about your weaknesses? It’s an all-too-common scenario. And it’s probably a waste of time.

The “fix your weaknesses” school believes that with enough discipline, determination and training, anyone can do anything. Unfortunately, it confuses weaknesses and limitations. Weaknesses reflect a lack of skill (how to do something) or knowledge (what you know). Weaknesses can be overcome by education, training, experience and practice. On the other hand, limitations reflect a lack of motivation (what you do well naturally). These really can’t be overcome, because new motivations can’t be acquired. In fact, if a person has low motivation in a particular area, spelling for example, there is very little likelihood that he or she will ever be a great speller.

The best they will be is adequate. Who wants to be adequate?

It’s a much better idea to build on your strengths.

If you want to move up from being good to being great, know what your talents and motivations are, and build on them. Why? Because you will develop what you do best and enjoy most. These are your strengths, and they are yours for life. You can build on them, and they won't let you down. Think about it: what would your life be like if you got paid to do what you do best and truly enjoy? Awesome, isn’t it?

You can review your motivational profile on-line at the MAPP member center at http://www.mindtools.com/rs/mapp.

Until next time,
Henry

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Mind Tools “Old Favorites”

This section of the newsletter is here to refresh your memory of some of the most popular techniques featured on the Mind Tools site. In keeping with our memory theme, let’s take a look at simply memory improvement techniques that you can put to use today to enhance your memory capabilities.

The Link Method is one of the easiest techniques available. It involves making associations between items in a list, linking them with a flowing image containing the items or with a story featuring them. The flow of the story and the strength of the images give you the cues for retrieval.

Taking the first image, create a connection between it and the next item. Then move on through the list linking each item with the next. It is quite possible to remember lists of words using association only. A word of caution: Oftentimes it is best to fit the associations into a story, so that if you forget one association you do not lose the rest of the list.

The key to making this work is to choose images that are as vivid as possible. Significant, coding images should be much stronger that ones that merely support the flow of the story. Similarly, the Story Method links images together as part of a story. This makes it easier to remember the order of events and create a memorable mnemonic. Where a word you want to remember does not trigger strong images, use a similar word that will remind you of that word.

Example:
You may want to remember this list of counties in the South of England: Avon, Dorset, Somerset, Cornwall, Wiltshire, Devon, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, and Surrey.

You could do this with two approaches, the link method and the story method:

Remembering with the Link Method:
This would rely on a series of images coding information:

• An AVON (Avon) lady knocking on a heavy oak DOoR (Dorset)
• The DooR opening to show a beautiful SuMmER landscape with a SETting sun (Somerset)
• The setting sun shines down onto a field of CORN (Cornwall)
• The CORN is so dry it is beginning to WILT (Wiltshire)
• The WILTing stalks slowly droop onto the tail of the sleeping DEVil (Devon)
• On the DEVil's horn a woman has impaled a GLOSsy (Gloucestershire) HAM (Hampshire) when she hit him over the head with it
• Now the Devil feels SoRRY (Surrey) he bothered her.

Note that there need not be any reason or underlying plot to the sequence of images: only images and the links between images are important.

Remembering with the Story Method:
Alternatively, you could code this information by imaging the following story vividly: An AVON lady is walking up a path towards a strange house. She is hot and sweating slightly in the heat of high SUMMER (Somerset). Beside the path someone has planted giant CORN in a WALL (Cornwall), but it's beginning to WILT (Wiltshire) in the heat. She knocks on the DOoR (Dorset), which is opened by the DEVil (Devon). In the background she can see a kitchen in which a servant is smearing honey on a HAM (Hampshire), making it GLOSsy (Gloucestershire) and gleam in bright sunlight streaming in through a window. Panicked by seeing the Devil, the Avon lady screams 'SoRRY' (Surrey), and dashes back down the path.

The Mind Tools website boasts a wide variety of easy-to-understand and easy-to-use tools for improving your memory, all of which prove to be very helpful, including:

• The Link Method
• The Story Method
• The Number/Rhyme Mnemonic
• The Number/Shape Mnemonic
• The Alphabet Technique
• The Journey Technique
• The Roman Room System
• The Major Room System

For more information on these methods, visit:
http://www.mindtools.com/pages/main/newMN_TIM.htm.

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Final note from James…

In the next newsletter, we will exclusively introduce you to our new Communications Skills section. We will also review Think Right Now’s “ Real Self Esteem Now” program, which consists of two audio CDs. Until then, best wishes and thank you for reading!

James & Kellie

James & Kellie

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