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or...
stop being so darned professional and take a break today!
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Welcome! If you enjoyed last month you'll be craaaaazy about this month!
The purpose of this ezine is inspiration, humor, business, personal and just plain fun: aka the don't-take-yourself-so-seriously ezine.
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In case you've missed past issues of the ezine Click here to visit the archives. |
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Happy New Year!
As always, I start my new year at my Naples home; exhaling, planning, working, relaxing and visioning. I am actually taking a visioning course this month...stay tuned on that one.
My theme for 2016 is mindfulness (see that new column below, plus two others: Quirky Questions and Mikkipedia, as well as our new guest columnist, the great Gustavo Grodnitsky, writing about culture).
The holidays always start with my Vistage parties: KEY members
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Key party: Amy Kleiman (L) and Lisa Dunsky
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at Nacional 27 with a live Latin band (I was in heaven!) and CEO members at Chicago Cut.
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| | CE party: (l to r) Dave Dastur, Speaker Steven Snyder, Bob and Elaine Cole |
The next week THE son, aka Jason, arrived for the holidays  and as he said before he left, he was "socially exhausted." Here's why: The night before Xmas eve we had dinner with our 'adopted' family, The Reiffs at Fig and Olive.
On Xmas Eve, I always cook for friends. This year it was the Roitblatts, Lisa Dunsky, Michele Goldsmith and Bill Keller.
On Xmas day, after exchanging gifts, Jason and I were off to BFF Lynn LaPalermo's for dinner.
When Jason went home to NY I went home to Forida.
Had lunch at Ridgeway Grill with one of the stars of the speaking industry, Connie Podesta. We always knew of each other but didn't really know each other so we did a three hour power lunch. What fun!
"My Sam" aka former Director of Everything arrived for New Year's eve and a weekend of fun, food, films and...(oh no, it's not alliterative)...shopping!
A week later I was at Petar's (I love to try new restaurants) with the Beaulieus and Barbara Monti (FL Vistage Chair)
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Beaulieus and Barbara Monti
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Had a great time at the National Speakers Assn, South Florida chapter and ended my three week Florida retreat with Speakers School in Naples as my first one to kick off the year of schools around the country.
I'm excited for the new year. Are you?
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 Executive speech coach Mikki Williams talks to Jeffrey Hayzlett, primetime host and chairman of the C-Suite Network, about teaching C-suite executives how to become more effective public speakers.
 CLICK HERE to watch my interview with Jeffrey Hayzlett
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 God Never Blinks 50 Lessons for Life's Little Detours
by Regina Brett
When my BFF Gretchen Hartke gave me this book as a holiday gift, she knew that I mainly read self-help and business books, with the occasional memoir thrown in. This was a perfect book to start off the new year. Is it profound? No! Is it anything new? No! Then what is my fascination and why do I try to encourage you to read it?
I wholeheartedly believe that affirming that which we know to be good for us is a powerful and worthwhile endeavor. GIGO. Garbage in, garbage out. It's light reading and I don't know about you, but sometimes I just need something light, like "life isn't fair but it's still good..."
Who knows, it just might ramp up your resolutions!
NOW GO GET THIS BOOK!
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 Keep 'em comin', Ellen Hefter! |
 SHOE-BE-DOO |
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If I liked Starwars...maybe!
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Scans your inbox to find how many subscriptions you have, then gives the option to either unsubscribe or consolidate them into a daily digest called a "Rollup" - in one swipe.
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MIKKI MOUTH Things I Wish I'd Said and Some I Did Say!
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Enjoy a quote each month from my book - some funny, some poignant, some professional, some just darn cute!
Sometimes I pretend to be normal but it gets boring so I go back to being me!
~ Ain Eineziz
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NOW...not one, not two, but THREE divisions of
The Mikki Mouth Club!
CLICK HERE for more information
If you want Mikki's expertise at an affordable price on an ongoing basis The Mikki Mouth Club is for you.
Questions? We've got answers!!
Just call 312.664.8447 or send us an email
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 QUIRKY QUESTIONS |
Introducing Quirky Questions, replacing Perplexing Ponderances (have you noticed
that I love alliteration?).
I often ask my Vistage members, aka execs, a question to ponder, be it for fun or for inclusion, sharing, challenging or just to get to know each other better. Perhaps these questions will serve you at your next dinner party, your own introspection or just put a smile on your face.
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If you could have personally
witnessed anything, what would
you want to have seen?
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 SOCIAL MEDIA GURU GUY by Dave Nelsen |
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Dave's formal title is President, Dialog Consulting Group. From 2005 to 2009 he was CEO of TalkShoe, a social media company now serving more than one million monthly listeners...and the fabulous company I use to produce my monthly teleseminars.
Social Media: 10 Things Not to Do "Social" is not your father's marketing. When participating in social media and social networking in business, here are 10 basic rules about what not to do:
- Don't get started in social media if you have significant product weaknesses or customer support issues. Social media makes good businesses more successful and bad businesses bankrupt.
- Don't use social media to explicitly sell. Instead, educate, enlighten, inform, and entertain your audience. In so doing, you'll position yourself and your company as experts.
- Don't "set it and forget it." Lack of conversation makes you look worse than not showing up at all. Once started, sustain your participation and interaction.
- Don't go negative. Never, never, never criticize your critics. Thank them for their input and do your best to address their issues. Even if you can't make your critics happy, you'll demonstrate to everyone else that your company is tuned in and responsive.
- Don't mix personal and business accounts. In fact, please make sure that your company owns your social media accounts. After an employee departs, the company may not be able to access their personal account.
- Don't expect to control the conversation. Social media is not an advertisement, product brochure, newsletter, email blast, or one-way monologue; it's a conversation. Conversations are bidirectional and can have rough edges. It's likely that your customers and prospects are already talking. Join in.
- Don't worry about a little negativity. Studies show that a little negativity increases credibility and empathy. Paraphrasing Abraham Lincoln, "You can't please all of the people all of the time." Be responsive to the negative, but know that such information can actually accelerate purchasing decisions.
- Don't feel the need to talk about everything. I like sausage, but I don't want to see it made. Be honest and use discretion. Authenticity is one thing; opening the kimono is something else.
- Don't be a generalist. With literally hundreds of millions of blogs, videos, podcasts, tweets, etc., to choose from, every individual can tailor their content consumption to his or her exact interests. Focus on one topic and do it well.
- Don't overwhelm your followers with too much information. Everybody is busy. Providing too much information is as bad as providing too little. Find the "Goldilocks Zone." As a side benefit, this helps you to focus on the content with the highest value.
Social media is now "table stakes" for interacting with your customers, partners, suppliers, and even employees. By getting started today, your company can (to borrow an idea from Charles Darwin) adapt to a changing environment more quickly than your competitors - to survive and even prosper. Now is the time; what are you waiting for?
You can find more formal details here:
To contact Dave directly:
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LIFE LESSONS...FUNNY, FIT  OR FABULOUS
by John Godoy
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John Godoy is a healthy lifestyle expert. Through personal coaching, training and healthy lifestyle seminars, John guides clients in developing and sticking to the healthy habits necessary to tap their bodies enormous energy reserves - enriching their personal and
professional lives.
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Another new column for 2016
MIKKIPEDIA
The encyclopedia of wacky definitions
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ABDICATE: To give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach. |
 THE HAPPY COOKER That was the name of one of my businesses and oh, come on,
I know guys cook, too.
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Red Wine-Braised Short Rib Stew
4-6 servings
For the short ribs:
1 tablespoon ghee or olive oil
3 pounds boneless short ribs, trimmed
1 tablespoon sea salt  1 onion, peeled and chopped
1 carrot, scrubbed and chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
1 cup port or red wine
6 sprigs fresh thyme
4 whole garlic cloves
2 cups Beef Bone Broth
Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley, for serving
For the vegetables:
2 potatoes, diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
8 shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, caps chopped
1 tablespoon ghee or olive oil
1 teaspoon sea salt
Prepare the short ribs: In a large oven-safe pot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat, heat the ghee or olive oil.
Pat the short ribs dry with paper towels and season with the sea salt. Gently place the short ribs in the hot ghee or oil and sear on all sides until golden brown, about 4 minutes per side, turning as needed and searing in batches if needed to avoid overcrowding the pot. Transfer to a plate.
To the same pot, add the onion, carrot and celery and cook until the veggies begin to brown, stirring as needed to avoid burning, about 5 minutes.
Add the wine and deglaze the pot, scraping the browned bits loose from the bottom of the pot. Add the thyme and garlic and bring to a simmer. Let the wine reduce by half, about 10 minutes, then remove the pot form the heat.
Place the browned short ribs into the wine reduction along with the bone broth and let marinate for 1 hour in the refrigerator. Alternatively, you can prepare this dish in advance by letting the ribs marinate for a full 24 hours-well worth it in our opinion.
Preheat the oven to 350�F.
Remove the pot from the refrigerator, cover with a lid or aluminum foil, and transfer to the oven to braise for 2 1/2 hours.
At the 2 hour mark, when 30 minutes remain on the cooking time for the short ribs, prepare the vegetables: On a baking sheet, toss the potatoes, carrots, and mushrooms with the ghee or oil and sea salt. Spread out in and even layer and roast in the oven for 20 to 25 minutes, until the potatoes and carrots are knife-tender.
Remove the pot with the short ribs from the oven, uncover, and transfer the meat to a plate. Strain the braising liquid into a deep serving dish; discard the solids from the liquid. Add the roasted veggies to the serving dish and stir to distribute evenly. Using your hands or a fork, break the short ribs into chunks and stir in as well. Garnish with a little chopped fresh parsley and serve family style.
The stew or any leftovers can be refrigerated for up to 1 week, or frozen for up to 6 months.
YUM!
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Introducing our 2016 guest columnist: GUSTAVO'S CULTURE COLUMN
by Dr. Gustavo Grodnitzky
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Culture Trumps Personality
Anyone who has heard me speak to an audience knows that I define culture as the environment in which we live and work, including beliefs, behavioral rules, traditions and rituals. Personality is a set of behaviors that hang together to create a tendency within our full behavioral repertoire. In short, personality is a tendency to behave in a certain way.
We know this intuitively because if you take someone who is LOUD and BOISTEROUS and ALWAYS TALKING AT THE OP OF THEIR LUNGS, and you walk them into a church, a museum, or a bank, what are they likely to do? Most people will get quiet. Have you changed their personality? No, you've changed their environment. When you change people's environment, behavior follows.
Why?
Human behavior does not occur in a vacuum, it occurs in a context, which means in relationship to circumstances, environment and culture. When you change the context, behavior follows. Why is this important in business? The context in which we, live and work is called corporate culture. This means if we have employees and/or coworkers who are goal-oriented, motivated by teams, and driven by performance, it's because their corporate culture demands it. Conversely, it also means if they don't care about goals, don't care about teams, don't care about performance, it's because their culture allows them not to care.
Don't allow unacceptable behaviors to exist in your place of work because of personality.
Culture trumps personality.
When you change the context, behavior follows. Culture trumps personality.
Does this work for everyone? According to clinical data, about 10% of people in the United States have a diagnosable personality disorder. People with personality disorders have many issues, one of which is that they are too busy trying to negotiate internal stimuli to understand or attend to external stimuli. This means they are much less likely to attend or be aware of changes in the environment that other people would notice, and then change their behavior. So, using the same example from above, if you take someone with a personality disorder who is loud, boisterous, and always talking at the top of their lungs, and you walk them into a church, a museum or a bank, they will be the person who continues to speak loudly. They will be unaware or indifferent to the change in context, draw unnecessary attention to themselves and/or their group, and quite possibly be thrown out.
In business, rather than speak in terms of personality disorders, I prefer to speak about personality styles. Some people are very aware of context and are responsive to changes in environment or context. Other people are far more rigid, less adaptive and less aware of changes. I would suggest these are the types of people you don't want in your organization. They tend to create a culture that is toxic and difficult to alter. When I speak about culture trumping personality, I'm really speaking of the majority of people in our population who function within healthy and normal limits. When you create a strong culture in your organization, these are the people who come to your organization, and more importantly, they stay....
Dr. Gustavo Grodnitzky (Dr. Gustavo) is a speaker, author, consultant, and psychologist whose diverse background brings a unique and multidimensional perspective to his global clients. For the past 15 years, he has focused on engagements with corporate clients, and has worked with Global 1000 companies around the world, as well as with smaller, often family-run, businesses addressing a variety of topics, including corporate culture, emotional intelligence, anger management, and integrating multigenerational workforces. DrGustavo.comgustavo@drgustavo.com |
 HE WHO LAUGHS...LASTS! |
To book me or any of the other guest columnists like Dave Nelson, Brian Beaulieu, John Godoy, simply contact us. For any or all your presentation needs on any topic at any price point, be it keynote, training, seminar, emcee, facilitator, moderator, concurrents (I just don't do floors or windows) I know many great speakers from my years with the National Speakers Association and Vistage International.
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Introducing Mindfulness Motivation, another new column for 2016 to replace last year's Conscious Kindness. Every January I choose a theme to live by. This will be my fifth year. It started with Inclusion, then Intention, Gratitude, Conscious Kindness, and this year, it is Mindfulness. I document daily how these themes affect my behavior and choices. In the spirit of sharing, I offer mindfulness as something to consider for your year.
To kick off the column, I'd like to share one of the many definitions of mindfulness, yet this one in particular resonated with me.
What is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness is a state of active, open attention on the present. When you're mindful you observe your thoughts and feelings from a distance, without judging them good or bad. Instead of letting your life pass you by, mindfulness means living in the moment and awakening to experience.
---Psychology Today
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 Speakers School is on the road in 2016!
Now, more Speakers Schools than ever - probably in a city near you...or a great vacation spot.
CALL NOW FOR MORE DETAILS: 312.664.8447 OR SEND AN EMAIL TO REQUEST MORE INFORMATION.
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 See where Mikki will be speaking and piggyback your company or association event. Or just invite her to dinner or shopping!Click the calendar to view her schedule.
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MIKKI WILLIAMS, CSP, CPAE
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Mikki Williams earned the dual designations of CSP (Certified Speaking Professional) and CPAE (Council of Peers Award for Excellence) Speaker Hall of Fame from The National Speakers Association, an achievement attained by fewer than 1% of all professional speakers. She specializes in business dynamics and human potential. She has been named one of the top speakers in the country by Meetings and Convention Magazine along with Zig Ziglar, Tony Robbins, Colin Powell, Lou Holtz and Mike Ditka. Mikki is also one of the top tier speaker resources for Vistage International, the world's leading executive organization, and Group Chair of two of their peer advisory boards in Chicago.
Her company Mikki Williams Unltd. produces Speakers Schools in Chicago, a monthly ezine: Hair She Is...! and a blog: Mikki Williams' Blah Blah...Blog. She is sought after for business, life and presentation skills coaching through her firm Coaching, etc... She also facilitates The Mikki Mouth Club, an annual subscription-based presentation skills coaching membership with three distinct divisions...Speaker Source, Accountability Academy and Keynote Kamp. If you need other speakers, she can book you the best through her Outrageous Orators...speakers who rock, an uncommon speakers bureau.
To hire Mikki or learn more about any of these services:
CALL ME: 312.664.8447
E ME: mikki@mikkiwilliams.com
SEE ME: www.mikkiwilliams.com
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Thanks for joining us!
Me and "the staff" at Mikki Williams Unltd.: Marissa Pedroza, Director of Everything. When you have a director of everything what else do you need?
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To unsubscribe please use the link at the bottom of this newsletter (but we'd rather you didn't!). All contents � 2012 Mikki Williams, except where indicated otherwise. All rights reserved worldwide.
Duplication or reprint only with expressed permission from Mikki Williams. All trademarks are property of their respective owners. All contents provided as is. In our extensive research we've made every attempt to be accurate in attributing quotes, poems, jokes and the like, and want to apologize in advance if we have not given proper credit or given it erroneously. If you are the owner of the rights of any of this content, please contact us so we may arrange for appropriate permission and give credit. |
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