Make Yourself Clear: How to Use a Teaching Mindset to Listen, Understand, Explain Everything, and Be Understood - Hardcover

How can you communicate effectively and create meaningful interactions in an increasingly digital world? By teaching. In Make Yourself Clear, educational experts and entrepreneurs Reshan Richards and Stephen J. Valentine explain the many parallels between teaching and business and offer companies, both large and small, concrete advice for building the teaching capacity of their salespeople, leaders, service professionals, and trainers. The rise of digital communications has led to three emergent, often problematic, forces: automation, an increase in the speed and volume of information transfer, and an unmet need for people to feel more than satisfied in their interpersonal transactions, particularly between sellers and consumers. Through a mix of research, anecdotes, case studies, and theoretical speculation, this book equips readers to build understanding within their current and future audiences by leveraging the tools, methods, and mindsets used by successful teachers. You will be equipped to understand others better, and in turn, to be better understood. Make Yourself Clear is not prescriptive, nor does it suggest rigid steps, pillars, or frameworks. Instead, it provides immediately recognizable and relatable context, suggesting actions that can be tried, measured, tested, and iterated upon in any communication context that involves the exchange of information and ideas. Ground your business communications in proven techniques Profit from expert instruction given by those who have helped thousands of readers and workshop students Develop your sales career by applying effective teaching practices to customer and colleague interactions For educators, adopt the latest best practices into your teaching style Backed by thorough research and extensive real-world testing, Make Yourself Clear opens a door to more productive communication and more effective interactions. It offers compelling and relevant insights to longtime fans of the work of Richards and Valentine and newcomers alike, leading to real and lasting benefits.

Praise for Make Yourself Clear

"Valentine and Richards have developed an innovative, fresh approach to selling that involves time-honored ideas from the world of teaching. Authenticity, immediacy and??delight are the keys to establishing strong sales relationships in the business world today. Valentine and Richards show you exactly that. This book is a win-win-win!"
—Nick Morgan, President, Public Words Inc and author of Can You Hear Me? How to Connect with People in a Virtual World

"Anyone serious about selling knows it's a profession—requiring continual self-evaluation, learning, and practice. The ability to transfer your knowledge and passion to another, while being authentic and intellectually curious, is a must. In their book Make Yourself Clear, Reshan and Steve have captured the essence of a critical, must-have component for success in selling."
—Matthew J. Guido, VP Strategic Accounts, Corporate Visions

"Leveraging their decades of experience as teachers, leaders, researchers, and entrepreneurs, Reshan and Steve bring a brand-new perspective to how leaders can succeed in today's technology-rich, fast-paced economy. Make Yourself Clear offers strategies, stories, and questions for reflection that readers will return to over time as they seek to create more meaningful relationships within their organizations."
—Dr. Beth Holland, Equity Project Director, CoSN

To sell is to teach. To lead is to teach. To train is to teach. To serve is to teach. Think like a teacher to increase your potential and transform your corporate culture.

To teach, and teach well, is a powerful force. Individuals, companies, and whole societies can be transformed through teaching. Companies that recognize the immense benefits of fostering a culture of teaching and learning attract and retain the most talented employees, make sound and profitable business decisions, and tend to have motivated and productive team members. The most effective leaders, service professionals, salespeople, and trainers are those who do what the best teachers do in effective classrooms. Approaching these areas of business as teaching provides a direct advantage, allowing professionals to serve their audiences in ways that are both meaningful and long-lasting.

Blending scholarly research, anecdotes, case studies, and practical advice, Make Yourself Clear enables readers to understand the ways business can be enhanced by teaching and how people in business can adopt a teaching mindset. Drawing from their decades of experience as teachers, researchers, entrepreneurs, and business leaders, authors Reshan Richards and Stephen J. Valentine share proven teaching and learning practices such as active/visual listening, pre-assessment, understanding by design, reflection, and more. This insightful book explains how to build understanding with current and future audiences by leveraging three dispositions—authenticity, immediacy, and delight—to create strong personal connections, enhance transactions, and establish lasting relationships. The authors pay particular attention to the challenges that arise in the networked, automated age, demonstrating how no technology can match the level of understanding and interaction of a human learner-practitioner.

Whether you are a C-Suite member, mid-level manager, trainer, or individual contributor, Make Yourself Clear: How to Use a Teaching Mindset to Listen, Understand, Explain Everything, and Be Understood both instructs and inspires, helping to instill understanding, create meaning, and make a difference in the fast-moving, complex, and often difficult modern business environment.