I've spent 20 years teaching people to communicate. Phone anxiety has never been worse. I see it most often among younger employees entering the workforce, and the issue is more complicated than it seems. Find out more.
listening skills
You’ve been in this conversation: You’re speaking, and the other person is already responding. Their words arrive before yours have fully landed. While it may not feel disrespectful on purpose, it does make the conversation less enjoyable, less expansive. Truly listening is an active choice you make in real time. … Read more
Trust isn’t created in a single moment. It grows quietly through the way we show up, call after call, conversation after conversation. It begins with the sound of our voices, the tone we choose, and the pause that lets someone else speak. Think for a moment about the last time … Read more
Whether it’s part of your work in sales or customer service, or phone conversations are part of your job search strategy, you want to continually practice the skills for creating a great impression. You also want to know ways to deal with a wide variety of communication hazards, such as … Read more
Listening is a skill we never quite perfect. So many things can get in the way of truly hearing what someone is saying to us – our emotions, our busyness, and even lack of sleep. Yet listening is the most valuable skill we bring to any conversation. Whether enjoying the … Read more
From time to time, my inbox has been like my kitchen junk drawer. You know what I mean – a destination for things I’m sure I’ll need at some point. Yet, also like that drawer, I rarely take the time to investigate the items I’ve thoughtfully saved. Not so this … Read more
One of the most sincere forms of respect is actually listening to what another has to say. – Bryant Mcgill About eight years ago my husband, David, began to show signs of early onset Alzheimer’s. In 2017 we received the formal diagnosis. Throughout this time our lives have continually changed … Read more
Listening is a skill that demands life-long attention. We never reach perfection … but we can continually improve and expand our abilities. How do I work on my listening skills? I give my full attention to radio and podcast hosts and I learn from: The depth of their research; Their … Read more
“Years ago, I worked for an amazing HR Director who always seemed to hear what I wasn’t saying. She truly taught me about the power of listening.” – Leighann Joseph This message was sent to me late last year by Leighann Joseph of Living Loud Coaching, and I am continually … Read more
“Our job isn’t to tell customers everything all at once. It’s to make them curious to learn more.” – Bernadette Jiwa It isn’t easy to admit we talk too much. Sometimes we are unaware this is our challenge. Perhaps we’ve been taught, or assumed, that providing prospects and customers with … Read more
“Communication is not saying something; communication is being heard.” – Frances Hesselbein We’ve all had the experience of speaking to someone and, much to our surprise and/or frustration, they don’t hear us at all. Even in a quiet setting, when we’ve chosen our words carefully, they seem to go missing … Read more
One of the things I love about my work is its diversity. This past week I delivered webinars to global, North American, national and local audiences. Fun, right? What stood out for me was the similarity in the feedback on all of these presentations. The same word was used time … Read more
I’ve spent a lot of time observing and researching miscommunications lately and something that I can’t seem to satisfy is the thought that we spend SO much time looking at each other’s words on a screen instead of listening to each other through a phone call or face-to-face interaction. This led … Read more
As I’ve shared in many posts over the years, I love the business numbers, the statistics, the metrics. Technology allows all of us to look closely at the numbers behind so many of our activities. Take this post for example … I can now see the who, when and where … Read more
It doesn’t seem to matter how many projects I do as The Phone Lady, I still get incredibly excited when I’m on a discovery call with a new client. As they start sharing their challenges with me, my brain shifts into high gear and I’m quickly bursting with ideas I … Read more
A few months ago an executive approached me about working with her sales team and we arranged to meet. She came to my office and we had a wide-ranging conversation about many aspects of her business and the specifics of the problems she wanted to solve. I asked lots of … Read more
Earlier this week, I was walking down the frozen food aisle in Costco. You know, the one that comes after the huge bags of chips, fresh fruit and then frozen burgers and … full frozen pigs? Well, after trying to get ahead of a slow–paced customer and squeezing my cart … Read more
Listening to audiobooks is one of my favourite things to do, especially when I’m on the road to Moncton, Charlottetown, Fredericton or Saint John. I’ve had the library app, OverDrive, on my phone for years and it feels like an exciting new gift every time I use it. I recently … Read more
My life as The Phone Lady is incredibly varied because most of my workshops and webinars are customized to clients’ specific needs. Yet all of my clients have a similar goal: they want to create strong, excellent relationships with their clients, customers and prospects. This is accomplished by inspiring generous, … Read more
After reading my post about a recent car accident and compassionate communication, Duncan Ebata of Shift! Food in Wolfville, NS, sent me this question on Instagram: “How do we structure conversations to have more compassion and still get what we need done?” Great question! How can we be both compassionate and focused? … Read more
We’ve all had this happen on the phone – the other person talks over us as we start or finish a thought. Doesn’t it make you crazy? Speaking for myself … it gets under my skin very quickly. Why does talking over happen? What does it mean and how can … Read more
A quote floated past me on Twitter last week and took my breath away for a moment. It captured a bit of wisdom that I believe deeply. I quickly wrote it down and used it as the starting point for a workshop the next day. After three hours of learning, … Read more
For all of us, no matter where we’ve lived, where we’ve travelled or what languages we speak, a phone call with an unfamiliar accent can be a challenge. What I discovered, when I moved from the Northern Ontario mining town of my childhood to Toronto, is … accents are like … Read more
Conversation is how we continually increase our sales, retain our customers and reveal opportunities. It is the key to exceeding expectations and creating consistent business growth, yet many of us have developed the habit of avoiding conversation. We default to text communication where we can edit our words, respond at … Read more
It was Sunday morning and I was enjoying a radio interview – a seasoned political journalist speaking with a high-profile guest. The topic interested me; I wanted to understand the guest’s thoughts and opinions. Unfortunately, the journalist stopped listening, and the conversation tumbled along without energy or the initial promise … Read more
One of the items on my wish list has been to talk to high school students about phone skills, and my wish came true this past week. I met with seventeen Grade 10 students at South Colchester Academy. It occurred to me that these young people could teach me as … Read more
Recently stuck in Halifax traffic, I was able to give my full attention to a radio interview. What I heard was a clear reminder of two words that, when put together, clearly announce our bias and can sound extremely confrontational. What are these two words and what might we say … Read more
To celebrate 20 years of The Phone Lady, we're revisiting what truly makes communication meaningful. Every second week, we'll share a bit of wisdom to remind us that small shifts in how we speak, listen, and connect make a big difference. (You'll also receive access to our Exclusive Resources, including 4 ebooks.)
Remember party lines? Switchboards? Yellow Pages? The traditional telephone is almost gone, but its cultural impact deserves a ringing endorsement. Mary Jane weighs in.
A fresh phone hell in the office: Younger workers who don’t say hello when they answer a call need to know it’s a problem. Mary Jane weighs in on generational phone challenges - read here.
Bosses and employees are wrestling over whether voice calls have a place in the hybrid era. The Wall Street Journal recently spoke to Mary Jane. Find out more here.
22 Minutes correspondent Brandon Hackett figures out which end is up on this thing called a telephone, with help from The Phone Lady. Watch Telephone Lessons for Millennials.