Communication made simple, with José Mota
by José Mota
Improve communication first, then everything else unfolds!Whether you're a knowledge worker or someone who leads them, communicating effectively maximizes productivity, brings teams together and yields results. Learn skills, listen to relatable stories from experience and join the community of people who value this key area of life.I'm José Mota, communication coach and trainer with 15 years of experience in the software industry.--With love from Aveiro, Portugal.
Episodes
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#061 — Storytelling bridges the gap
Why is storytelling such an important skill to have? What makes stories so powerful? No better way than to share a story of my own. Stories bridge the gap. They are a great entryway between your ideas and your audience's. Because stories aim to demonstrate underlying principles, the narrative you...
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#060 — How to build effective slide decks
Steve Jobs' presentations were incredible. Why? His remarkable presence, his personal brand, and the simple yet strong slide decks made the difference. Everyone would cheer when he announced the first iPhone, or the innovative Macbook Air. The black and blue fade background with big white letters...
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#059 — Meaningful practice makes meaningful progress
Doing the right thing is not the same as doing the thing right. Meaningful practice makes progress. How do we practice? How to prepare for a big online presentation, a team workshop or a webinar, in a way that is purposeful and tells you that you're doing better than last time? I'm breaking my...
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#058 — Know your voice with paralanguage (part 2)
The continuation of last week's episode on paralanguage. If you're curious to get the context behind it, check episode 57.
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#057 — Know your voice with paralanguage (part 1)
What makes people want to see TED talks? Usually because speakers that go there have great ideas to share. And what makes them so interesting that people can be engaged for such a long time? I would personally love to acquire such incredible gravitas. They always look so collected, and yet so...
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#056 — Use eye contact and proximity to make an impact
We've been exploring posture and gestures lately. They are incredible resources that take advantage of the visual senses and pairing them with the actual message that others hear. Because we now understand how effective gestures are, it becomes important to realize the conditions in which we do...
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#055 — Gestures amplify your interactions
Conversation is one of the most spontaneous activities for people to engage in. Everyone loves talking with others, be it an extrovert on a introvert. If you think about it, introverts are very much selective extroverts; meaning, they like to expand with a limited number of people they can trust....
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#054 — Posture speaks louder than words
Imagine yourself having a conversation with somebody; a deep one, in fact. The ideas being exchanged require some effort to understand, and they take time to fully absorb. Now imagine you're absolutely still when you're talking. Arms down, fixed expression on your face, 6 feet away from the other...
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#053 — 4 tools to leverage visual communication at work
If you're part of a product team, chances are that you talk about solving certain problems on a daily basis. Teams who use Scrum, for instance, plan their work together every day. Part of their process includes understanding where they are in the context of their sprint goal. There is often the...
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#052 — Write masterfully
Go back to any situation where you had to make a decision with anyone else (maybe your team or a client). Think about the documents you had with you, and how they supported the group. Think about the experience of coming up with those documents and how different it would be if you didn't have…
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#051 — Improve your online posture
More and more, people come together to watch online webinars, talk to clients in important meetings and attend training workshops. They're more accessible, affordable and convenient, particularly for those who live far from the big cities. The challenge with these kinds of events is that we…
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#050 — Improve your online setup with these 3 essentials
Before 2020, most people would go to the office and work together. They would gather by the watercooler and chat, have important meetings with clients and partners, visit other coworkers' workstations to discuss design work, perform pair programming, or simply exchange ideas creatively. Then the...
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#050 — Natasha Hillsman: How to welcome GenZ into the workplace
Natasha Wellington-Hillsman is a Human Resources Business Partner and Leadership Coach with 25 years of experience in manufacturing and healthcare. Her focus is on Nonprofit, Career Development, Conflict Resolution, and Facilitation. She is currently a Director of Human Resources at Luminis…
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#049 — Set the context right with SCQA
Every time I record a podcast, or sometimes when I have prepare any sort of presentation to my clients or my team, I always use the same procedure: Confirm the topic and goals. Frame them well. Split the topic into key parts and support each of them. Summarize the message. Today's focus is on…
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#048 — Prepare your message with MoSMoS
Good preparation elevates your message, your confidence and your audience's engagement. When you start to develop your idea, you might realize that you might have holes you need to fill. For example: Is this idea too vague? Does my audience really understand the points I'm making? Can they keep a...
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#047 — Preparation is the cornerstone of good communication
Preparation is a crucial skill to have. While most people praise posture, confidence and tone of voice, only a few appreciate the prep work under a powerful presentation or a productive meeting. Today we'll explore the impact of preparation with a couple of examples and, after that, how to do so...
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#046 — 5 basic elements of communication
Start 2024 on the right foot! If you want to become a successful communicator, make the difference amongst your peers and leaders, and boost your career, learn the 5 essential components of communication. In further episodes we'll explore each of those elements in practice so stay tuned!
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#045 — The ABCs of communication
In a military operation, communication is not just important; it can be a matter of life or death. Clear, accurate, and concise communication can be the difference between success and failure on the battlefield. However, in the chaos of a mission, miscommunication can lead to disastrous...
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#044 — What is conflict and how to deal with it
Knowing the reasons why certain people take certain positions breaks barriers of potential conflict and increases the quality of collaboration, from coworkers and teams to the tougher stakeholders like customers, clients and directors. Let's explore the topic in three segments: what is conflict,...
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#043 — 3 benefits and 6 tips for concise communication
Our workdays are filled with different activities: making decisions, talking about the solutions we're building, building them, planning, writing email, meetings... It's 2023, and it becomes more and more valuable to grow out of our specialty by understanding a little bit of everything others...
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#042 — Tangible daily progress requires context, planning and informed execution
Many companies today appreciate the value of doing work in an iterative, incremental fashion. While there are some clear, valid outliers to this claim, most digital product companies and consulting groups understand the positive impact of delivering quality products early and frequently with…
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#041 — Criticize privately
Everyone loves being praised, especially in public. What happens when they're criticized instead? I share my story about what happened to me years ago and how I turned it into a valuable lesson.
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#040 — Ask good questions with 5W1H
Knowledge workers thrive in questions. Well, they should! How do you ask good questions? Learn about 5W1H questions and how they open up a conversation and tap into valuable insights.
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#039 — Communicate better with MoSMoS
Good leaders are good communicators. They ensure everyone understands the message and they are given enough room for clarification. When people don't understand you because you can't articulate your thoughts consistently, you lose their interest and performance goes down. So how do you articulate...
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#038 — Better to make wrong reversible decisions than none at all
Is it better to make the wrong decisions despite the risk of reverting it after some time? The answer is yes and we'll explore the topic in this episode.
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#037 — Prescriptive vs. descriptive leadership
Would you rather strictly prescribe work to your teams or open up the game in a descriptive, collaborative setting? Learn about the two styles of leadership and how that affects the relationships you have with your teams and your purpose as a leader of the 21st century.
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#036 — Product Owner, Scrum Master and Tech Lead are not one person
What if I told you that there are businesses that insist on saving money short term by combining more than one of the roles into a single person, overlooking the consequences of that decision long term? What do you think of the topic? Let me know at [email protected] or find me on LinkedIn:...
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#035 — What does the VIC triangle look like in a product team?
Email [email protected] for a free coaching call. Check episode #31 for an introduction to the VIC triangle. In this episode, I explain the application of the concept into a product team.
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#034 — What is the role of a product manager?
Back from PTO! In this episode I explain with some detail what it really means to be a good product manager, and clarifying some typical misunderstandings about the role or variations of it. Reference material: Nils Davis: https://alltheresponsibility.com/ BRIDGeS framework:...
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#033 — Values over mechanics
If you're a knowledge worker, part of a team that builds digital products or somehow are involved in them, then you must know that there are multiple ways to go about solving customer problems, some of them better than others. In the end, we all want to achieve the same result: to build something...
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#032 — Strategize and plan with ELSPARC
Group coaching series starts Oct 3rd! Get 50% off if you sign up until Aug 12th. Email [email protected] to register. — If you're a solopreneur, you understand how incredibly important it is to exercise all visionary, integrator, and catalyst skills. In this episode I'll explain you how you…
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#031 — The VIC triangle
A successful initiative requires three key components: a visionary, an integrator, and a catalyst/coach. I explain my proposition for this triangle of leadership. References: "Traction", by Gene Wickman: https://www.eosworldwide.com/traction-book
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#030 — The Goldilocks principle
Group coaching series starts next fall — 50% off if you sign up before August 12th! Email [email protected] for details and registration. --- Remember the story of that little girl and the three bears? Not too much, not too little, but "just right". I explore the Goldilocks principle applied…
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#029 — Growth mindset
Do you know this proverb that says: "An old dog can't learn new tricks"? I am telling you, that proverb is funny for adult educators like me because I don't believe that, I don't! References: Carol Dweck's book "Mindset": https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40745.Mindset
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#028 — 6 steps to speak with confidence
When we improve the way we speak, not only it relays information, it also relays emotions like inspiration, motivation, challenge, empathy, and achievement.
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#027 — Understanding procrastination #6: Time management
What good does it do to manage time if you don't know the purpose to which you use it? It starts there: your purpose.
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#026 — Understanding procrastination #5: Readiness
Waiting for the right conditions doesn't matter. Get to work and celebrate progress over perfection.
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#025 — Understanding procrastination #4: Accountability
Accountability is good on its own, without liability. Understand the difference, leverage it to be more effective and productive.
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#024 — Understanding procrastination #3: Motivation
Listen to the entire series on procrastination here: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/josemotanet/episodes/022--Understand-procrastination-1-Fear-and-overwhelm-e23r7l2 Reclaiming motivation in today's day and age is still somewhat simple, despite all distractions, competition and stimuli.…
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#023 — Understanding procrastination #2: Distractions
Oh, distractions. Who doesn't have them in 2023? Life is more exciting than it's ever been, and it's in our best interest to give the right time to the right things. When we are distracted, we lose focus and we procrastinate. It's that simple. Good news for you: there is a right time to be...
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#022 — Understand procrastination #1: Fear and overwhelm
A new series on procrastination, a very broad topic that is discussed everyday, everywhere, by a lot of different people, more or less of an expert. I'm not one of them and yet I am very much aware of this issue because I too fall into it frequently! My experience with it is very practical and...
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#021 — Rocks, pebbles and sand
You have your own jar of things you can fit in a day. Pick the rocks first, then the pebbles and finally the sand.
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#020 — Teach before you coach
Much like babies and toddlers, adults go through the same set of stages when learning and growing. Coaches typically engage with clients at different stages of growth. The starting point is always different for each of them, and yet the approach or sequence stays almost the same.
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#019 — Start painting products
How can digital products be compared to painting? How close are you to painting a product? Let's take a closer look at how the different steps of painting can almost directly map to digital products.
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#018 — 4 ways to improve time to market by reducing waste
Early and frequent delivery of quality working product is the fundamental principle that improves time to market. Learn four ways to reduce waste and improve this key value area. Referenced material Evidence-based management guide
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#017 — Transform your interactions with powerful words
Using powerful words have an immensely positive impact, borderline transformative. It will mean the difference between making a person feel apprehensive and demotivated to excited, confident and motivated. Open questions that entrust the other person are key to solid relationships based on trust...
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#016 — Bitesize: cycle time
Reverse your relationship with time when building product. Measure how much time it takes to take an idea from backlog to customers instead of how many ideas per fixed unit of time.
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#015 — Agile done wrong #3: Agile has become shallow and discredited
This is the third episode of a series called "Agile done wrong", where I discuss how organizational culture and traditional management practices often obstruct true adoption of agile practices and methods successfully. PSA: I'm offering a significant discount to a limited amount of clients on my...
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#014 — Agile done wrong #2: Estimates are never right
PSA: I'm offering a significant discount to a limited amount of clients on my 6-session coaching package. Sign up at https://josemota.net/coaching. This is the second episode of a series called "Agile done wrong", where I discuss how estimates don't work when solving complex problems.
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#013 - Agile done wrong #1: Mixing Waterfall and Agile does not work
PSA: I'm offering a significant discount to a limited amount of clients on my 6-session coaching package. Sign up at https://josemota.net/coaching. This is the first episode of a series called "Agile done wrong", where I discuss how Agile methodologies and values are commonly disregarded and…
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About this show
Improve communication first, then everything else unfolds!Whether you're a knowledge worker or someone who leads them, communicating effectively maximizes productivity, brings teams together and yields results. Learn skills, listen to relatable stories from experience and join the community of people who value this key area of life.I'm José Mota, communication coach and trainer with 15 years of experience in the software industry.--With love from Aveiro, Portugal.
Hosted by
José Mota