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Posted by Sarah Brown on 13 May '14

What first impression do you make?

First impressions are critical and include everything from how you stand to your business card - are you making the best first impression?

I’ve been thinking about first impressions a lot recently. Firstly, we are going to be running workshops for young entrepreneurs to help with their customer communications and so we have been developing ways to get 15 year olds to think about the impression they make and how to improve their communications skills.

Then last week Bob did a presentation about body language focusing on the handshake and its importance in building rapport or destroying it if you get it wrong. And today I was at an exhibition with Geoff Ramm speaking about the best business cards he has come across. His second favourite was one for a safety guy who fitted illuminated escape routes in ships which glowed after getting solar charged just like his escape routes. His favourite was a wine grower who is very focused on ecology who has a card with seeds implanted in it that you can put in the soil to grow.

Our cards have a big white space for the ideas we will give you in a meeting and are even specially coated to ensure that they are easy to write on. The frustration is that people always do get an idea when we meet but then they don’t write on the card! But even more frustrating sometimes when I meet them again they still complain about the same issue and the idea which could have solved it has been ignored or forgotten. As someone probably not Einstein said:

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results.”

I know change can seem overwhelming so I now think I will need to not only have a business card with space for the idea but also with space for the first step to be taken to start making it happen. What does your business card say about you?

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Tags: innovation focus on action

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