The Black Dot

Did you ever do something that everyone says is excellent, except for one person? But you find yourself focusing on that one negative response?

It’s like this large white paper with a small black dot on it. 99%of the paper is clean and this 1% is what you focus on.

We’ve been teaching executive speaking for many years. People leave with usable skills and good feelings of a shared team-building, learning experience.

Recently, we facilitated a workshop with 18 people. Fourteen rated the workshop "excellent," three "good" …and one "poor !!! "

Since "good enough never is," we strive for excellence. We read every evaluation very carefully, to see how we may improve.

Let's take in what everyone says. See if we can use it.

The key thing: Don't focus on what you can’t do, or on the one person with whom you didn’t connect. Just keep doing what you do best. Make adjustments along the way, so you get better. When you try to become all things to all people you create a problem for yourself. Some people you can never reach. Sometimes it has nothing to do with you.

An old joke: A waiter approaches a table where an elderly couple has just finished dinner and says, "Is anything okay”? Sometimes you just can’t please everyone no matter how hard you try. So listen to feedback. Trust your instincts. Take in what you need to make your work even better. Focus on the big picture…not the black dot. nn____________________________________________________________

Robert Gedaliah and Rande Davis Gedaliah work with companies that nwant to raise their levels of performance and with people who want to communicate more clearly. www.SpeakingForResults.comn