Do Over!

The start of a new year is the annual do-over that every human being on the planet is given. Remember when you'd play kick ball and the ball would go flying out of bounds and everyone in the school yard would cry, "Do over!" Well that's what we get every single year at the start of a new year.  It's an opportunity for us to wipe the slate clean.

A fresh start.

I speak with high school students four to five days a week about college interviews, time management, public speaking skills and so forth. However, my favorite topic to chat with them about is life's biggest do-over...their freshman year of college.

I remember driving up to Marist College in the family station wagon with our entire family. I'm the oldest, so taking me to college was a family affair. The entire ninety minute drive, my father was giving me tips about how to be successful and what pitfalls to avoid. "Don't get caught behind the eight ball!"...and so forth.

 Being the typical eighteen year old know-it-all, I rolled my eyes at a lot of it.

All I could think about was would I be accepted? Would my roommates be freaks? Would I make friends? Would I be able to make it?

However, he caught my attention with the last thing he pointed out.

He said, "Your freshman year is a clean slate. Nobody knows you here. When you set foot on that campus you have the opportunity to be anyone you want to be. It's up to you how people perceive you. There are no pre-conceived notions about who you are. It's a do-over and it's entirely up to you."

This was an ah-ha moment.

He was absolutely right and it's even more important for today's Digital Natives to understand. The bulk of our communication with other people is non-verbal and yet most give little thought to how they're using it. It takes less the thirty seconds to make an impression on someone and in those thirty seconds it's highly likely we're not saying a word. People form opinions based largely off of what they see. Is it fair? Nope. However, it's very real.

Digital Natives, as a generation, are behind the curve on their non-verbal communication skills. It's the students who have a high Non-Verbal IQ who are going to stand out from the crowd and achieve true success. The students who walk tall, make eye contact, smile and shake hands...they're the ones who will rise to the top.

So how about you? How's your Non-Verbal IQ?

The Tip Factor

As a digital immigrant, I am as guilty as anyone of being hooked into technology for far too many hours. I think most of us suffer from tech-overload nowadays. We've got our hands on the keyboard, eyes on the screen and earbuds snuggled firmly in our ears. However, as digital immigrants we were afforded the opportunity to develop our interpersonal communication skills and written communciation skills prior to the technology invasion.

The same cannot be said for our students--the digital natives.

Today's high school student was born and raised in a digital landscape and as a result their  communicaiton skills have been somewhat neglected. It's not a criticism, it's merely a by-product of the world that they have grown up in.

How often have you been speaking with your student and they're not looking at you but checking their phone, or simply not looking at you?

However, it's not just the interpersonal communication skills that have taken a hit, their written communication has been equally effected by the day-to-day use of techno-communcation.

For example, does your student's email address make you cringe? Do they write a formal email using text language?

I've been speaking in high schools accross the country for ten years and in almost every class I go to, I ask students if they've ever received a letter, an honest-to-God, hand- written letter. Not a card from Grandma with twenty bucks shoved in it, but an actual letter. Ten years ago half the students in class would raise their hand but today in a class of thirty students, only two or three hands go up.

Amazing.

It's not all discouraging news. Our young people process information faster than we do, can switch gears on a dime and are ready for just about anything. They are an extremely adaptable generation and this means that they can learn easily. This is very, very good news.

If you're interested in getting your digital native some back to basics communication skills, I hope you'll give us a call and check out our interactive workshops.

Technology may be here to stay and embeded in our daily existence but no matter how much technology we have, we will never eliminate the human factor.

The Tip Factor is the way many college admission counselors refer to the all-important college interview. When a student goes in for a face-to-face meeting with the counselor it allows them to become a human being and not just one application amid thousands. When a student meets with an admissions counselor and has a fantastic interview, it can help tip them into the "yes pile".

However, for many of our digital natives a face-to-face interview is a daunting task simply because they don't have the necessary skills to help them navigate those waters.

So here's the question....How do the digital natives in your life handle face-to-face interactions? Do they have The Tip Factor?