Which Coach Fits You? Written by Cathy Goodwin, Ph.D.
Karen hired a "mentor" coach to help her business grow. The coach applauded Karen's efforts to design her website. On a slow week, coach said, "Clear clutter and learn to dance." After three months, Karen had a big coaching bill, a multicolored website, an empty house and a sad little business. Karen wasn't uncoachable. She chose wrong coach. For instance, Western medicine treats body as a machine to be repaired; Chinese medicine believes sickness is caused by imbalance that can be corrected by herbs and diet. Both models have limits. If you break your leg, Western model makes most sense; if you suffer from insomnia, you might favor Chinese model. John's business is hitting a rough patch. Coach X says, "Clear your life of clutter energing-draining relationships." Coach Y says, "I will teach you mental techniques to attract new business." Coach Z says, "Maybe your business does not reflect your life purpose." Coach Q offers, "I will teach you networking and sales techniques." Only John knows what he needs. If your website needs an overhaul, you can clear clutter till your house is bare and nothing will happen. But if everyday hassles are draining your energies, you can't focus clearly on website. Let's compare four best-selling books. Cheryl Richardson's Take Time for Your Life exemplifies "life space" model: people know what they want and how to get there; they grow by self-care and personal empowerment. Choose Coach X.
| | Should You Use Rhetorical Questions?Written by Ron Sathoff
Rhetorical questions are probably as old as public speaking itself. Like anything else, this technique has its uses, but can be very tiresome if used overmuch or in wrong circumstances.Remember that a rhetorical question is simply a question asked that doesn't require an answer from another person. So think about it, when would such a question be asked? In my opinion, there are two different times when this kind of question is asked. First, you ask it when you want audience to THINK about answer, but you don't need to hear those thoughts. The second time is when you are in a situation where getting an answer is impossible -- when speaking to a large, distant audience, for instance. The problem with rhetorical questions is that they can sometimes be confusing. I've heard speeches where someone has rhetorically asked "Think about it; when was last time you were TRULY happy?" only to have an audience member say out loud, "Yesterday!" Needless to say, speaker was a little disoriented by this unexpected answer. Because rhetorical questions can be hard to handle and because they have a tendency to sound stiff and formal, I recommend that you ask TRUE questions (ones that require an answer) whenever you can. This is especially true if you are in a normal speaking situation, where you can communicate back-and-forth freely with your audience.
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