Archives for 2009

Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds – Book Review

Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery

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More and more agencies are using presentations to convey information to their clients and staff. I highly recommend this book as a resource for ideas for successful presentations. The book discusses how people process information and ways to present so that they get the most from the presentation. Practical examples are given.

I have learned a great deal from this book. I have been incorporating more and more of its ideas into my presentations.

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Accomplishing Change

In a few presentations on the subject of change I have made a point that change is easier if it is for something we want to do than something our employer wants us to do. I use the example of how easy it is to change when we want a new cell phone. If we choose to change to a new cell phone you don’t hear a lot of grumbling. We tend to embrace the learning process and in a short period we know almost everything there is to know. We are telling everyone that will listen all we know and how wonderful our new phone is.

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Apple School

Last week I attended my first Apple school session. My One-On-One session was great. Rachel, my instructor, was knowledgeable, had great teaching skills and was fully engaged in our session. However, it was a challenge to keep my people watching habit under control and pay attention to why I was there.

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Integrity

I was taught long ago that without integrity my knowledge means little. Of late, roads that I have taken have caused a number of people to question my integrity. So I think it is time to address these issues.

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Moving to MacBook Pro

I have been thinking about a new laptop for awhile. My current one is 4 years old and giving me a good deal of grief. When we visited with our granddaughter in September she had acquired a MacBook Pro. She is studying graphic arts and the classes require that she use Mac software. I enjoyed using her MacBook and added this to my list of considerations. I have spent a great deal of time researching what I want. I am tied to a windows computer in order to work with certain programs used by my clients. So who says I can’t have two laptops? Here she is all dressed up and ready for the party(ies).

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Why Would I use Twitter?

Last week I was privileged to be the facilitator for two sessions at the Big I of Nebraska’s first Technology Day.  In the afternoon session we discussed the potential errors and omissions issues that using social medial my pose and then we looked at the different social media resources.  When we were discussing Twitter.Com, a lady said the following:  I have read that the majority of tweets are meaningless, so why would my agency want to use them?

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Make the Noise Go Away by Larry G. Linne

moz-screenshot-1I met Larry Linne several years ago at a Sitkins 100 meeting now known as Sitkins International.  He was a speaker and his subject was on sales management.  Who knew he was writing this wonderful book?  I so wish I had known all that is in this book when I owned a managing general agency.  Oh did I lose sleep and it was very noisy.  It would have also been helpful for those positions where I was second-in-command.

Find your Strongest Life by Marcus Buckingham – Book Review

Are you in a dead end job that drains the life out of you each day?  When you arrive home at the end of the day you have no energy to be present for your family?  Almost everyone has been in this position at one time or another.  “Find Your Strongest Life” should be read by every woman of every age so that you know what action to take to propel yourself from this situation.image

Producer Intelligence – Not Captured in Agency Management System

One of the big issues I find that every agency I work with has is how to capture conversations the producer has with clients, underwriters, etc.  In some agencies producers aren’t allowed to log into the agency management system to enter their documentation into an activity.  Other agencies that do have producers logging into their system don’t get better results.  Unless a producer has a laptop configured for access to the agency management system, the chances of them to entering this information is nil to none.  Even for those producers with laptops and access to the agency management system, only a minority of them will update the system.

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Getting Results for Change to Agency Management System

I have previously outlined what I think are a number of issues relating to agency management system vendors not taking proper care of the software and not being future thinking.  I also covered what I think are the issues agencies have in resolving issues with their agency management system.

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