Do you find yourself beginning all your business communication in the same boring way? Are your employees sick and tired of all the endless repetitive meetings? Are you sweating trying to come up with something clever to say when you’re asked a surprise question? What if we told you the answer to all these questions was FOUR F-words?

(No, not those F-words.)

In a special lecture recorded at one of his classrooms in Stanford University, Matt Abrahams laid out 4 F-words that MUST guide all communication - business or personal. These are: Focus, Fidelity, Framework, and Feelings.

Specifically, in this lecture, Matt covers:
• How people often overlook the smallest details, leading to silly mistakes.
• How the curse of knowledge and the curse of passion cause our communication to lose focus.
• How to bring a level of accuracy and relevance to all our communication.
• The critical role of framing and frameworks in all communication is to ensure a more focused presentation.
• The importance of emotional connection - an oft-forgotten part of communication.
• The importance of regularly looping through constant practice, reflection, and external feedback in improving communication.

Implementing these concepts in your daily communication will give you the confidence necessary to take on any and every challenge that comes your way!

Key Quotes
• “Instead of using a list, I suggest you use a structure or a framework … You all know structure. If you’ve ever seen a television ad, you’ve seen a structure: problem, solution, benefit. … A structure is easy to remember.” –Matt Abrahams (13:58)
• “Many people in this valley say to me, ‘I’m communicating something technical, something financial, something scientific. There’s no emotion there.’ and I disagree vehemently. If you’re talking about bits and bytes, if you’re talking about science and technology, there is emotion. If you’re saving trees, saving time, saving lives, you can talk about emotion.” –Matt Abrahams (20:45)

Chapters
00:00 Introduction
01:15 Connection and Communication
03:35 Focus: The Curse of Knowledge and Passion
09:47 Fidelity: What Do You Want Your Audience to Know, Feel, and Do
17:35 Framing: Jargon Monoxide Poisoning
20:40 Feeling: Tell A Story
24:08 Putting it to Practice: Repetition, Reflection, & Feedback
26:19 Conclusions & Additional Resources

Relevant Links:
TiEcon: tiecon.org

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