Talk Less, Say More: Three Habits to Influence Others and Make Things Happen [Hardcover]

Connie Dieken (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 28, 2009

Talk Less, Say More is a revolutionary guide to 21st century communication skills to help you be more influential and make things happen in our distracted, attention-deficit world. It's loaded with specific tips and takeaways to ensure that you're fully heard, clearly understood, and trigger positive responses in any business or social situation.

It's the first book to deliver a proven method to master the core leadership skill of influence. Talk Less, Say More lays out a powerful 3-step method called Connect, Convey, Convince (R) and guides you in how to use these habits to be more influential. This succinct book solves your modern communication issues in today's demanding, distracted world at a time when interaction skills are plummeting.

Communication is the single greatest challenge in business today. It takes just 3 habits to conquer it. Talk Less, Say More will help you achieve more with less. Less wordiness. Less tune-out. Less frustration. You'll gain more time. More positive outcomes. More rewarding relationships.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Talk Less, Say More has become an integral part of our sales training program. In today's manufacturing environment, our sales engineers must be able to quickly gain mind share of our customers, deliver the appropriate messages, and win new business. Talk Less, Say More provides the communication tools critical for success."
—Dana Fritz, Manager, Global Sales Training Rockwell Automation

"Talk Less, Say More is the answer to become an effective communicator. Connie's principles can be employed immediately to improve both your personal and business interactions."
—Terry Bauer, Corporate Director of Sales Execution Reinhart FoodService

From the Inside Flap

Talk Less, Say More is a revolutionary guide to 21st-century communication skills to help you be more influential and make things happen in our distracted, attention-deficit affected world. It's full of specific tips and take-aways to ensure that you're fully heard, clearly understood, and will ignite positive action in any business or social situation.

You'll achieve more with less. Less wordiness. Less tune-out. Less frustration. You'll gain more time. More positive outcomes. More rewarding relationships.

Whether you're a business leader, emerging leader, or salesperson, you need to persuade others to succeed. This book will get you there. It will help you cut through distractions, demands, and information overload to get real results.

Author Connie Dieken coaches leaders to communicate with purpose. She'll help you instantly gain more power and influence while spending less time being tuned out.

With this book's fast-paced, no-nonsense style, you'll discover Connie's Connect-Convey-Convince® methodology. These three powerfully simple habits will help you:

• CONNECT with anyone to instantly capture their undivided attention

• CONVEY and nail information without overloading or confusing

• CONVINCE anyone to take the action you want and feel good about it

Communication is the single greatest challenge in business today. Talk Less, Say More will help you reach your A-game in interpersonal communication, giving you more power to change minds and inspire remarkable results—while talking less.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (September 28, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470500867
• ISBN-13: 978-0470500866
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.7 x 8.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #158,182 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Connie Dieken is the nation's leading authority on influential communication in our distracted, short attention span world.

She's the founder and chief experience officer of onPoint Communication, LLC. She coaches leaders at organizations such as Apple, Olympus, McDonald's, Moen, Deloitte, Pacific Life, Bausch & Lomb, and American Greetings.

Connie guides leaders, emerging leaders and sales teams to be remarkably influential and raise their Communication Intelligence(R) in four areas: presentation skills, media savvy, executive presence, and high performance interpersonal communication.

Connie developed her expertise in the television industry. She spent more than twenty years as a television news anchorwoman, reporter and co-host of America's longest running television talk show, The Morning Exchange. Her broadcast excellence was recognized with her induction into the Radio/Television Broadcasters Hall of Fame. She is a multiple Emmy award-winning and Telly award-winning journalist and has represented more than 50 companies as their spokesperson, including Intel, Sealy, General Electric, Ernst and Young, and Goodyear. She's also the voice of Diebold automated teller machines worldwide.

It was in broadcast studios where Connie discovered the real reason she was put on this earth - to help leaders communicate influentially so they can make things happen.

Connie's contributions as a business leader have also earned top honors. Among them, she's earned a Leadership Think Tank Award, a Top Ten Women Business Owners Award from the National Association of Women Business Owners, and the elite Certified Speaking Professional designation which is awarded to the world's top speakers by the National Speakers Association.

Her business communication insights have been featured in The Los Angeles Times, Crain's Business, The Chicago Tribune, Women's Day, and in dozens of publications across the country. In addition to Talk Less, Say More, Connie has also co-authored four other books - Communicate Clearly, Confidently & Credibly and the 303 Solutions book series.

Connie delivers her expertise through keynote speeches, coaching programs, workshops, leadership retreats, webinars, an iPhone app, the Daily Dieken Twitter tweets, and the Stay OnPoint with Connie blog.

She is also an active contributor to many charitable and civic programs and is a dedicated parent of teenagers who keep her on her toes about inter-generational communication.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

140 of 150 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Says a bunch of obvious stuff in superficial ways August 24, 2010

By Brian Sharp

Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase

I do not think there are many people that will find this book useful. Most people will be in one of two camps:

1.) If you think about communication at all, probably nothing in this book will be new to you.
2.) If the information in this book *is* news to you, then its style will not be helpful to you.

The book is intentionally short and takes a very imperative tone. I read the whole thing in under 30 minutes. The problem is, with nuanced topics like communication, when you distill them down that far, you end up with recommendations like - I am not making these up, they are taken directly from the book:

"Be tolerant of different viewpoints"
"Contain the outbursts"
"Show respect"

Those are particularly egregious examples, but my point remains, as I read this book every page just felt blindingly obvious.

That would be fine, if the book were evocative and resonated. Plenty of books in this genre tell us what we already know but do so in an emotional way so that it really sticks, or speaks to us anew. Patrick Lencioni's "Five Dysfunctions of a Team" is a great example - the whole book is an evocative 'fable', a story, with well-developed characters that bring his points to life.

By contrast, Talk Less, Say More distills even the stories down. Here's an example, verbatim:

"Sharon learned the hard way that firing off an e-mail was not the right way to thank the vice president who interviewed her. The vice president chose another equally qualified applicant, in part because the other applicant took the time to send a handwritten thank-you note. Sharon lost the job by not noticing that the vice president valued a personal approach. If she'd scanned his desk during the interview, she would have noticed many handwritten notes."

That's not evocative at all. All of the stories are just like that - very matter-of-fact with no interesting characters or anything memorable. There's nothing emotional to any of them.

In fact, I found nothing emotionally compelling about the entire book, and that's why I say that if this information *is* new to you, I doubt you'll be able to meaningfully use it. Dieken provides checklists at the end of each section for what points you should work on, but if you have the self-awareness to fill out those checklists, then by definition you don't need them.

I'm sure when Ms. Dieken works personally with clients, they benefit immensely because she's able to observe them and give personalized feedback, but the value isn't just in the words she's saying but her demeanor, her engagement, her personal connection: all the things she talks dispassionately about in this book.

Some people might find this an entertaining read, but it's hard to imagine anyone reading this book and actually using it to become a better communicator.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Read Less, Learn More October 15, 2009

By M. Kraft

Format:Hardcover

Talk Less, Say More gives valuable, real-world communications advice from a true communicator. I found this book to live up to its title, as it gets to the point clearly and quickly. If you have any contact with the public, or even with co-workers and clients, this will definitely help you get your points across with more impact.

MK

14 of 17 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderfully Concise Advice November 10, 2009

By Larry Underwood

Format:Hardcover

Quite possibly, our society became programmed to provide way too much information, thanks to our institutions of higher learning (Rockford College, Class of '74); it always seemed the professors wanted us to be windbags, spewing out an inordinate amount of information, just to prove we really understood the material.

Nowadays, nobody wants to listen to complicated, long-winded disertations; they want to know (in 140 characters or less, if possible) what they need to know, quickly and concisely. They don't have the time or patience to listen to any rambling messages. Cut to the chase.

Clearly, Connie Dieken understands that; her advice is wonderfully concise, and certainly right on the money. It's perfect for the fast (and getting faster) paced world we live in, where everyone's hooked on Twitter or Facebook. Without a doubt, now more than ever, "less is more" for engaging others to receive your message.

You get the picture; now go buy the book: Talk Less, Say More: Three Habits to Influence Others and Make Things Happen