Dean Brenner

Quick, but powerful idea for you today. Let’s say you have a  meeting coming up and you will be making a presentation. Your boss and some other senior managers will be in the room… or maybe a key potential client who you have been trying to sell for a year… or maybe you will be meeting with your […]

We’ve done posts in the past about some things you’ll never hear anyone say in the workplace. But our point in today’s post is that as you go about your communication in the workplace, be it with colleagues, clients, or teammates, there are a few things that you’ll never regret giving too much of, or […]

Sometimes it is hard to know the right way to say or write something. Sometimes it is hard to know the correct tone to take. How should I speak to these people? How formal or informal should it be? The answers depend on lots of things: the nature and seriousness of the topic; the level of […]

Have you ever noticed that when people are making a business presentation, very often, they make the story sound super complicated? Have you ever noticed that once they sit down, and it is over, and someone asks simple questions, they can give simple, coherent answers? Have you ever listened to something they say in Q&A […]

Originally published with the Forbes Coaches Council, April 2018. What makes a great speaker? The qualities that immediately come to mind are things like confidence, expertise, poise, concision and great storytelling. These are all incredibly important pieces of not only engaging an audience but also persuading them. But there’s another aspect to excellent, convincing communication that can […]

In our workshops, we talk all the time about making things simple. The simple answer wins the day most of the time. In a world that is increasingly fast-paced, time-starved, and overloaded with information, the person who can make complicated things simple and easy to understand rules the world. But when I talk about this […]

Communication clarity is really hard in the 21st century… a mantra I have recited over and over in this space. It’s hard because of the noise, the competition for mind share, and shrinking attention spans. But often the best way to combat difficulty and noise is to focus on the most simple, basic elements of […]

Email has become a major problem for almost everyone we meet. We hear people from every client company complaining in every workshop, about how many emails they get, how many of them are unnecessary and how much time they waste managing their email. A tool that was designed to create efficiency has evolved to the […]

Originally published with the Forbes Coaches Council, April 2018. When you have a great new idea, launching it successfully and refining into a unique value proposition are enormous accomplishments. But don’t stop there. To truly explore the potential of a new idea, you need to keep finding ways to communicate your passion and reach new audiences. […]

When you stand up to speak in a professional setting, there are three primary ways you are interacting with your audience: the message you have developed, the slides you have created, and the delivery skills you exhibit. All three matter, because all three impact your audience’s experience. Many people think about their work presentations this […]