PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
The Secret to
Excellent Engagement
By Mindy Gibbins-Klein
E
ngagement involves a heart-to-heart that relationship. What would you like to clients and I will give them the benefit of
connection with your client, customer, achieve with that relationship that you are not the doubt because they probably don’t
audience or reader. It is based on two achieving now? Chances are, it has something know about the techniques that you and I
parties having similar values, and operating to do with engagement. Maybe you are not on know.
under an umbrella of mutual trust and respect. the same wavelength. Maybe they want more You are the one reading this article so
Thought leaders need to project this trust and of a personal relationship with you. Or perhaps you are the one who is in control of the
respect first, in order to have it returned to you are the one that would value the personal relationship at the moment. This is your
them. Is it strange to see the word ‘heart’ in relationship but they are keeping you at arm’s little secret. If you choose to improve the
a business book? I have seen the word being length for some reason. engagement with someone, you can. By
used more often recently because our society Ask yourself, “What would happen if I focusing on engagement, you can at least
is changing. Folks are realizing once again that pushed that boundary out a bit, if I just created keep up with customer demands, and
people do business with people. I think for more engagement within that one relationship ideally get one step ahead of them.
awhile we may have forgotten that. with that one person?” Then ask yourself how Extracted and adapted from
Think about your own interactions with you could achieve it. As NLP Practitioners, we Mindy’s new book 24 Carat BOLD:
employees, clients, affiliates, shareholders, have many tools in our kit bag that can help us The Standard for REAL Thought
other stakeholders. Think about the level of create better relationships through enhanced Leaders (£10.99,
engagement that you are willing to allow in rapport. We just need to get out of our own Ecademy Press).
way sometimes and let our
Real thought leaders push
natural instincts lead the way.
Engagement is also a two-
the boundaries and go
way street. Your customers
and clients want to engage
beyond what is expected with you, and with all the
communications tools available Mindy Gibbins-Klein the UK’s leading writing and
those relationships. When we hold back and we to them now, such as email, mobile phones,
publishing strategist, best known as The Book
don’t engage or we engage at the level that we blogs, communities and the like, they expect
Midwife and co-founder/director of Ecademy
feel ‘appropriate’, we only get a limited result. to find you and enter into a conversation
Press business publishing. Her mission is to
Real thought leaders push the boundaries and with you.
create thousands of real thought leaders who will
change business and society with their ideas.
go beyond what is expected; they go way beyond When someone takes the time to read your
what their competitors offer. book, listen to you speak or work with you
An international speaker, trainer and consultant
Engagement is one of those woolly areas privately, they are engaging with you. Etiquette
with 20 years in marketing, training and
that you can’t quite put your arms around. and common sense would dictate that you
coaching, and over 100 clients who have written
You can’t really measure it, can you? However, engage with them in the right way or you risk
and published excellent books and articles
we still need to focus on it so we can improve alienating them. The worst offence, in my quickly using the Book Midwife methodology,
things where possible. When everything else is opinion, is a superior or condescending tone. I Mindy writes and speaks to thousands of
equal, engagement can be the key to winning hate being lectured at, don’t you? Not only is it
executives, business leaders and entrepreneurs
deals and success in business. an old-fashioned way to get a message across,
each year about how to become a thought leader
Think of one person that you deal with but it is seen as rude nowadays. Astonishingly,
and turning expertise into enhanced credibility
in business; it doesn’t matter who it is; the some coaches and consultants employ this
and more business.
first person that comes to mind. Think about type of communication when speaking to their
rapport - Autumn 2009
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