What's the difference between ambiguous and ambivalent? When is it right to say he and I, and when is him and me correct? What's the most important part of a voice mail message? What's the one mistake that's guaranteed to make an audience fall asleep during your presentation? Whether you are the CEO of a conglomerate or an entry-level candidate preparing for an interview, how you speak has an effect on how you're perceived. Grammar gaffes, incorrect word choices, inappropriate language, and inarticulate expression can peg you as both uneducated and unsophisticated. If you are uncertain about how effectively you speak, business-communications expert Gretchen S. Hirsch has all the answers in this one comprehensive, amusing, and very useful book. Full of on-target tips and easy-to-navigate lists of frequently misused words, "Talking Your Way to the Top" is a quick, entertaining reference for any businessperson interested in becoming a more interesting and powerful speaker. It teaches you to recognise and avoid: noxious nouns, vexing verbs, jarring jargon, wretched redundancies, and execrable euphemisms. Even better, Hirsch leads you every step of the way on the road to success. She gives you the words you need for job interviews; making contributions at company meetings; asking for more responsibility, promotions, and raises; giving speeches and making presentations; and chatting with your co-workers and potential clients at trade shows, cocktail parties, and company dinners. Whether you're a recent college graduate, a middle manager, or a seasoned professional, you will find "Talking Your Way to the Top" to be warm, inviting, and sometimes downright amusing as it guides you through the perils and pleasures of the spoken word on your way up the corporate ladder.
I'm a working writer and "chief surgeon" at Midwest Book Doctors, an editorial consulting service for those who are preparing manuscripts for submission to editors or agents. You can find out about the company at www.midwestbookdocs.com and more about my writing career at www.gretchenhirsch.com.
As a writer, I've penned seven books, two of them award-winners and all but the last one nonfiction. The most recent is Back Again to Me, a novel about teen pregnancy and the adoption decision. This novel will be followed by another. The characters are currently revealing themselves to me, so I'll have the outline shortly, I hope.
What I love about being a writer is the chance to continue learning every day. I've written about football, Y2K (remember that?), financial products, foster care, AIDS, gifted students, business English, difficult conversations, time management, prostate cancer, women's relationships--and more. I've written catalogs, magazine articles, white papers, brochures, annual reports, magazine and radio ads, and even scoreboard messages and poster presentations. Writing is a profession that never grows stale and never ceases to be interesting.
I've had my own writing-related companies for nearly 20 years; my clients have come primarily from health care, finance and banking, education, and the nonprofit sector. I have a sincere interest in helping people advance their personal and professional goals through clear, simple writing and speaking. I've built my career on it and it matters to me.
I love speaking, too, about almost anything related to writing or publishing and hope to do more speaking at writers conferences. I enjoy conferences because I get to meet and speak with people who are as excited about writing as I am--and that's a delight.
