The 2 Best Success Skillsets

Had a great time yesterday speaking at the first-ever Strategic Growth Summit here in Miami.  One of the things I shared was what I believe are the two most lucrative skills you can develop as a leader, entrepreneur, or marketer.  Or truth is, pretty much for your career overall, whether employee or entrepreneur.

Important to note: how you relate to people, having empathy and understanding are probably the most important variable for success.  But in terms of hard skills, the following two are the ones to study.

Those two skills are:

• Public Speaking
• Persuasive Writing

Obviously since I’m both an author and a professional speaker, I’ve made those skills integral parts of my career.  But you don’t have to become an author or speaker to benefit from developing these skills.  They will improve everything you do in business.  (And arguably, life.)

Because what we are really talking about is communicating with power.  Having the ability to persuade, and influence outcomes.  Being able to rally people around an idea, further a cause, or even create a movement. 

People who can speak and write well are agents of change.  They get shit done.  You could be a VP who needs to get buy-in for a new initiative your company is launching.  A political candidate who wants to be able to convey a complicated policy position in language the average person can understand.  You might be a Little League coach, or the volunteer coordinator at the local library.

If you want to have better results, you need to be able to communicate on a world-class level. 

You cannot develop your writing ability without improving your thought process – the way you think.  You don’t have to be able to deliver a keynote speech in front of 10,000 people.  (Although don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.)  But you should be able to serve on a jury or a committee, and make a compelling case for what you believe in.

Not to be melodramatic, but there is no better way to say this: The people who change the world are great communicators. And if you become proficient at both speaking and writing, you’re going to do amazing things and produce monumental results.  We’ll talk about this more, and the idea of “skill stacking” on the next post.

And in the Divine Order, perfect timing, exquisite serendipity, shameless self-promotion, message-from-the-universe department: my next Speakers School is coming up soon.  You can find the details here.

- RG