You May Be Surprised: Our emotions cause us to prejudge an audience, often in direct contradiction to the facts. For example, in a recent presentation, one trainer continually scanned the trainees to detect the friendly faces, the hostile ones, the apathetic ones, and so on. One person in particular attracted attention. Throughout the presentation he stared directly at the trainer with a look of distinct hostility on his face to the degree that it actually became distracting. The trainer felt certain that here was a skeptical individual who saw through the presentation devices and was in effect looking at the trainer’s bare soul. Yet, at the end of the lecture the individual came forward with the statement, “I’ve always had a real problem in conveying my knowledge of a subject to an audience. It seems that no matter how well I know my subject, I just can’t seem to establish a proper audience relationship. I was extremely interested in how you did it. Could you give me some additional advice on how to establish audience contact??Needless to say, the trainer was extremely surprised. This individual turned out to be the most interested member of the entire audience!

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CEO, A.E. Schwartz & Associates, Boston, MA., a comprehensive organization which offers over 40 skills based management training programs. Mr. Schwartz conducts over 150 programs annually for clients in industry, research, technology, government, Fortune 100/500 companies, and nonprofit organizations worldwide. He is often found at conferences as a key note presenter and/or facilitator. His style is fast-paced, participatory, practical, and humorous. He has authored over 65 books and products, and taught/lectured at over a dozen colleges and universities throughout the United States.