What's the difference between ambiguous and ambivalent? When is it right to say he and I, and when is him and me correct? What's the most important part of a voice mail message? What's the one mistake that's guaranteed to make an audience fall asleep during your presentation? Whether you are the CEO of a conglomerate or an entry-level candidate preparing for an interview, how you speak has an effect on how you're perceived. Grammar gaffes, incorrect word choices, inappropriate language, and inarticulate expression can peg you as both uneducated and unsophisticated. If you are uncertain about how effectively you speak, business-communications expert Gretchen S. Hirsch has all the answers in this one comprehensive, amusing, and very useful book. Full of on-target tips and easy-to-navigate lists of frequently misused words, "Talking Your Way to the Top" is a quick, entertaining reference for any businessperson interested in becoming a more interesting and powerful speaker. It teaches you to recognise and avoid: noxious nouns, vexing verbs, jarring jargon, wretched redundancies, and execrable euphemisms. Even better, Hirsch leads you every step of the way on the road to success. She gives you the words you need for job interviews; making contributions at company meetings; asking for more responsibility, promotions, and raises; giving speeches and making presentations; and chatting with your co-workers and potential clients at trade shows, cocktail parties, and company dinners. Whether you're a recent college graduate, a middle manager, or a seasoned professional, you will find "Talking Your Way to the Top" to be warm, inviting, and sometimes downright amusing as it guides you through the perils and pleasures of the spoken word on your way up the corporate ladder.
Gretchen Hirsch (Worthington, OH) is the author of Womanhours: A 21-Day Time Management Plan that Works and the coauthor of Bud Wilkinson: An Intimate Portrait of an American Legend, Helping Gifted Children Soar: A Practical Guide for Parents and Teachers, and Motivating the Gifted Child. She has contributed articles to Woman's Day, Redbook, Equal Play, The Science Teacher, and Gifted Child Today, among others. She is a writer for the Office of University Communications at Ohio Wesleyan University and president of Midwest Book Doctors, where she provides editorial consulting services for authors who are preparing manuscripts for submission to agents and editors.
""This book is as helpful to a ten year corporate veteran as it is to a recent college graduate. Anyone aspiring to climb the corporate ladder should have Talking Your Way to the Top tucked firmly under his/her arm." Sanford Livingston Jr., Senior Vice President & Chief of Staff for Commercial Banking, Wells Fargo "Exceptional leaders communicate inspiration through their choice of words and authenticity of spirit. They have found their voice. Gretchen Hirsch's book Talking Your Way to the Top provides important communication tools and tips that will enable you to find your voice and wield it wisely." Kathy Green, President Executive Coaching Connections, LLC
