Apr 25, 2014 | News
ILScorp is pleased to let you know that your subscription to our Life insurance continuing education bundle now includes the following new course: Comprehensive Estate Planning with Life Insurance.
Life insurance is not easy to sell and while many try, few succeed in growing healthy, profitable careers. There is often a trade-off between people skills and technical skills. You may notice that successful fellow agents weak in technical skills probably have strong people skills and vice versa. Certainly there is a required combination of human and technical aptitudes to manage an estate-planning file.
This course will assist with the basic estate planning skills by covering the following modules:
- The role of the Life Insurance Agent;
- The Estate Planning players;
- Other common strategies with Life Insurance;
- Death & Taxes; Tax considerations;
- Estate Planning Topics;
- Corporate Estate Planning strategies;
- Charitable Giving and Bequest Planning;
- Trusts.
This course will explain the technical and people skills needed for successful career in Life Insurance. This course includes nine lessons with interactive videos, downloadable texts, chapter quizzes and a final exam.
This course is accredited in AB, MB, SK, BC for 2 CE hours. It is included in our Life & AS subscription and available f0r individual purchase for $159
Feb 12, 2014 | News
Public speaking, regardless of your audience, can be a daunting task. You have a large group of people’s undivided attention, and you can have a direct impact on their lives (and potentially your future). Entrepreneur.com and Jason Headsetdotcom offer 10 tips to “not to screw it up” when speaking for a business audience:
1. Tell great stories. If you read nothing else in this article, focus on this tip. Think about stories you can tell that are interesting but also have a lesson learned in them. We all have stories we can tell, but will those stories resonate with an audience? Will the audience be able to relate to them? If you use a visual presentation it should be an accompaniment to your stories.
2. Do NOT read your presentation from your laptop, or worse, notecards. While speaking in front of an audience can be nerve-racking, you agreed to do it! So give the audience and the event the respect they deserve. Practice your presentation and know what you’re talking about it. The worst thing you can do is sound like a robot on stage.
3. Use video to increase your comfort on stage. Record yourself giving a speech and watch it back to see how you did. The more you do this, the better you’ll get at it. Invite a few friends or colleagues to watch you “rehearse” live. Have them give you constructive feedback that you can work on.
4. Don’t be the “stats and quotes” person. We’ve all seen it – someone gets on stage to talk about something interesting, and instead of giving their perspective, their presentation is littered with statistics from other websites and quotes from other people. You can surely back up some of your talk with stats and quotes if needed, but you should first and foremost share new information and offer your own insights. Without knowing it, people will find great quotes from your talk that you didn’t even think were great.
5. Use Guy Kawasaki’s “10 20 30 Rule of PowerPoint.” Even the greatest speaker can have people distracted by their phones or laptops. Use big bold images and text in your presentation. Guy Kawasaki’s rule is 10 slides, 20 minutes, 30 point font. Text on a slide should be big and void of long sentences (short bullet points are great).
6. Bring the energy! Move around on stage, have confidence when you speak and engage with the audience makes a huge impact. If you have energy, the audience will give it back.
7. You don’t have to tell jokes. Many aspiring speakers make the mistake of trying to be someone they are not when they’re on stage. Most of the time this is by trying to be a comedian. You don’t need to tell jokes to make an audience laugh. If you aren’t used to telling jokes in front of an audience, your speaking presentation shouldn’t be the place to start.
8. The audience is afraid of Q&A. If you want to leave room in your presentation for Q&A, be prepared to have the audience not raise a single hand. Think about it, when was the last time you raised your hand in a crowded audience?
If you are going to have Q&A time at the end of a talk, give the audience a heads-up at the beginning of the talk and say something like “Hey guys, I’ll have 10-15 minutes at the end to do Q&A, please write down a question or two while I’m talking so I look popular at the end when everyone raises their hands.” By doing this simple thing, it primes people to be ready to ask questions at the end.
9. Don’t like Q&As? Take questions after your talk, off stage. This is an easy way to not have to interact with the entire audience’s questions, and you can talk to people one-on-one off stage. PeoPublic speaking, regardless of your audience, can be a daunting task. You have a large group of people’s undivided attention, and you can have a direct impact on their lives (and potentially your future). Entrepreneur.com offers 10 tips to “not to screw it up” when speaking for a business audience:
10. Be yourself. The more you try to act like someone you’re not on stage, the more people will see right through you. The more you act like yourself, the more confident you’ll seem, and the more the audience will be able to relate to you.
Still need more help with public speaking? Stay tuned for exciting new course launching this month from ILScorp!
Excerpted from Entrepreneur.com
Jan 31, 2014 | News
Fear of public speaking (known as Glossophobia) is one of the most common fears in North America, with 74% of people reporting they suffer from speech anxiety. Feeling some nervousness before giving a speech is natural and can even be beneficial, but too much nervousness can be detrimental. Here are some proven tips from Toastmasters on how to control your butterflies and give better presentations:
1. Know your material. Pick a topic you are interested in. Know more about it than you include in your speech. Use humor, personal stories and conversational language – that way you won’t easily forget what to say.
2. Practice. Practice. Practice! Rehearse out loud with all equipment you plan on using. Revise as necessary. Work to control filler words; Practice, pause and breathe. Practice with a timer and allow time for the unexpected.
3. Know the audience. Greet some of the audience members as they arrive. It’s easier to speak to a group of friends than to strangers.
4. Know the room. Arrive early, walk around the speaking area and practice using the microphone and any visual aids.
5. Relax. Begin by addressing the audience. It buys you time and calms your nerves. Pause, smile and count to three before saying anything. (“One one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand. Pause. Begin.) Transform nervous energy into enthusiasm.
6. Visualize yourself giving your speech. Imagine yourself speaking, your voice loud, clear and confident. Visualize the audience clapping – it will boost your confidence.
7. Realize that people want you to succeed. Audiences want you to be interesting, stimulating, informative and entertaining. They’re rooting for you.
8. Don’t apologize for any nervousness or problem – the audience probably never noticed it.
9. Concentrate on the message – not the medium. Focus your attention away from your own anxieties and concentrate on your message and your audience.
10. Gain experience. Mainly, your speech should represent you — as an authority and as a person. Experience builds confidence, which is the key to effective speaking. A Toastmasters club can provide the experience you need in a safe and friendly environment.
Learning how to speak confidently in both business and social settings can be a challenge, but is also an important skill for success in the workplace. Stay tuned for an exciting new course coming from ILScorp!
