by Andrea Howe | Jul 12, 2024 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
A client checked off a Bucket List item this year by attending the U.S. Masters Tournament. For the uninitiated like me, this is one of four men’s major golf championships in professional golf. The mention of golf in a conversation we had after their return got me thinking about a blog I wrote a long, long time ago (15 years, it turns out) that 100% stands the test of time. It’s a great reminder for us all that often the best way to build trust—and quickly—is to do the opposite of what our baser instincts advise.
by Andrea Howe | Jun 23, 2024 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
I’ve been traveling a lot so far this year. A Southwest Airlines flight attendant recently role-modeled something in their communication that immediately pulled my head out of my phone (in airplane mode, for the record) and got me laser-focused on them. I wrote about this very technique almost exactly five years ago. Today I’m reprising it because I believe it’s a lesson that’s even more valuable now as we strive to find ways to be heard in the face of chronic multi-tasking and short attention spans.
by Andrea Howe | Apr 15, 2024 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
Back in the day, before COVID forced some major workshop redesigns to accommodate the needs of virtual participants, I used to open every in-person session or keynote with a story. A recent opportunity to spend a day in the same physical room with 60 participants (yay!) had me thinking fondly about my favorite tale of my first-ever client meeting—which also happened to showcase a big professional trust fail on my part. Maybe I’ll reprise “The Shipyard Story” one day. In the meantime, here it is, with an important reminder for us all no matter our professional tenure.
by Andrea Howe | Mar 21, 2024 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
The last monthly-ish tip focused on what to do in the face of others’ silence. This time I invite us all to reflect on situations where we choose silence, especially in the face of potentially awkward situations, and the way that draws down on our trustworthiness.
by Andrea Howe | Feb 21, 2024 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
Sometimes you take a communication risk with clients and get rewarded with unexplained silence. For example, you might call for no other reason than to say hello, leave a message when they don’t answer, and then never hear back. So, what if anything should you do about that? In 2018 I wrote about an unconventional way to break the silence, then not long ago I was on the receiving end of a very similar strategy … and hated it. This post is dedicated to what I learned from this experience.
by Andrea Howe | Jan 2, 2024 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
And … we’re back. It’s “new year, new you” time for us all, which means that any resolutions resolutely declared are within days of faltering, according to psychologists who say we all typically backslide after the first couple of weeks. Relationship-oriented resolutions are no exception. So, I’m once again reprising my plea that we all try something a little different this year.
by Andrea Howe | Dec 10, 2023 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
The winter holiday season has descended here in the U.S. and beyond, which has many of the introverts among us (me included) uttering groans of dread as we face a dramatic uptick in social obligations. It occurred to me it might be useful to share a few tips for introverts and extroverts alike to help us all manage our circumstances for the best possible trust-building outcomes.
by Andrea Howe | Nov 15, 2023 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
I had a really great experience with a customer support person not too long ago, via chat no less. It wasn’t because they were uber-friendly (which oddly tends to annoy me); it was because they did something really simple and distinctive early on that relates to the more rational side of trust-building (which is where most are more comfortable anyway). And few of us do this enough—or consistently enough—with our own clients, whatever the communication medium.
by Andrea Howe | Oct 16, 2023 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
I was recently interviewed for a podcast and asked at the end, “What advice would you give your 20-year-old self?” My answer reminded me of a cautionary tale from the early days of my consulting career. I think there’s a good bit of generalized wisdom in my story about everyone’s relationship to authority, and how that can cost us in terms of trust and relationship-building.
by Andrea Howe | Sep 25, 2023 | Monthly-ish tips
This post is part of our Monthly-ish Tips series.
Today’s tip is my first “post reboot” tip. While deciding what to write about it occurred to me that there’s value for us all to consider how a good reboot is especially beneficial to anyone doing the rewarding—and sometimes tiring—work of a service-oriented role. (Consultants and more, you know who you are.)
