1. Impact
Suggested Development Activities
• Practise introducing yourself to potential customers or to new business contacts. Consider your body language,
your voice tone and what you say in the opening phase of meeting someone for the first time. Seek feedback from
a friend on how you can improve the initial impression you create.
• Consider your peer group, and rate each individual in terms of their personal impact. Try to determine why
certain people have a greater level of credibility or visibility amongst the group, and note any specific behaviours
that serve to increase or diminish their overall level of impact. Assess your own level of impact against your peers,
and take steps to build your influence if necessary.
• Take the time to look at the way you dress for your job. Is there anything you could improve? What image does it
project. Are you neat and clean? Is your image right for the people you sell to or does it need to be adjusted?
• Your posture has an enormous impact on the way you are perceived. Do you stand in a relaxed but upright
position, rather than slouching? Do you maintain an open, welcoming posture?
• Always seek to make contributions of substance, and build your personal impact and credibility upon firm
foundations of integrity, expertise and care.
• Assess your communication style in terms of forcefulness. Have a colleague give you feedback on your general
voice tone, volume, use of gestures, use of emotive language and overall fluency when speaking. Consider
engaging a speech therapist for behavioural coaching if necessary, or enrol in a public speaking training program.
[this point may be better in Engagement or Tonality, where the focus is more on the auditory]
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