Speak Up! Effective Communication

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode WOTD Gregarious gre·gar·i·ous adjective 1. (Of a person) - Fond of company sociable. 2. (Of animals) - Living in flocks or loosely organized communities 3. (Of plants) - Growing in open clusters or in pure associations… No matter the situation you find yourself in, storytelling is one of the mo...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our episode today…How we talk about money. If I think back to the earliest time of my career as a service advisor - my closing interactions with clients on occasion, felt somewhat awkward when taking payment.  It wasn’t awkward because the business component of the job is wrong or weird...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our Episode today - We’re discussing some current millennial insights. Yep.  Everyone’s favorite generation to reference is now well into their 40’s and comprises a significant portion of the job market today. While on the surface - the aftermarket (and everyone else) appeared to strugg...

Thank You To Our Partners, The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode I want to discuss the benefits of the recent camping trip my wife I and enjoyed in Northern Michigan. As our listeners well understand - we talk a lot about getting outside our comfort zones on this podcast - and while that is usually in the context of practicing our communication sk...

Thank You To Our Partners, The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our episode today… I want to discuss the benefits of the recent camping trip my wife and I enjoyed in Northern Michigan. As our listeners well understand - we talk a lot about getting outside our comfort zones on this podcast - and while that is usually in the context of practicin...

Thank You To Our Partners, The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode Email-Seriously! In many business conversations the first correspondence is often by email and it is NOT going away anytime soon. While YES email in general has MANY problems there are still professionals who are more responsive to emails than texts or phone calls. We’ll be talking a...

Thank You To Our Partners, The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode The idea for this episode came from an inquiry originating with one of my colleagues. They had read an AI description of how a check-in process would work within a software platform, and he rightly reached out to me to check to see if the AI response was accurate. It was not accurate...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In Our Episode today we’re diving into the ASI - The annual report from JD Power that measures client satisfaction amongst major brands in the non-dealer auto repair world - which we affectionately call the “Aftermarket” Today’s Word of the Day is: Extrapolation Noun noun: extrapolati...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In this episode of Speak Up - our host Craig O’Neill welcomes his friend and colleague, Brandon Crusha to talk about what Memorial day means to him. Brandon served in the United States Marine Corp and was deployed multiple times to Iraq. He invites our listeners to enjoy their day - a...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our Episode Today: Our host Craig O’Neill welcomes friend and newly minted Certified Speaking Professional - Jimmy Lea to talk about his journey! The NSA Certified Speaking Professional (CSP) designation is a notable achievement that involves many phases of approval.  This is...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our Episode Today: Listeners will recall the Pilot Talk ( Episode 34 ) with Austin Brumfield - and this time our host Craig O’Neill welcomes Austin’s amazing wife, Evangela, to the podcast! Evangela is a pilot, an Airframe and Powerplant Mechanic, and a missionary. As mentioned wit...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our episode today, we welcome guest Hunt Demarest, CPA ABV. Hunt is the host of Business by the Numbers and, as our host Craig O’Neill will tell you… Hunt uses words really well for a numbers man! This episode came to be after Craig found himself on a walk and listening to one of H...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our episode today, our host Craig O’Neill welcomes founding sponsor and friend, Jeremy Glassco to discuss the potential merits and the root of the desire to step away from devices and “de-smart” with regards to phones. Our loyal listeners will remember Jeremy from Communicating Wit...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode Todays Show Post -  Our notes today will be in a different format, written by our host. Welcome to another episode of Speak Up - Effective communication. Your place for focusing on elevating our communication skills in the auto repair industry - I’m your host Craig O’Neill… . I w...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode One of the greatest joys for our team at ARN and this show is to welcome listeners of “Speak Up” to join us and SPEAK UP as a guest along with our host, Craig O’Neill! Today’s guest is Drew Van Der Wiede. A Service Manager from Mahomet Car Connection in Mahomet, IL - Drew recently att...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In our episode today: Craig is talking about family business dynamics with Maryann Croce - Fellow Toastmaster at Remarkable Results Toastmasters, fellow Transmission Repair professional, and industry friend who knows the good - but understands the struggle so often described when you...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode In this episode, Craig O’Neill features his guest, friend, CEO, and co-presenter from Vision Hi-Tech Training & Expo, Chris Cloutier! Vision came and went so quickly - it became necessary for these two to coordinate a stop, sit down, and reflect on their takeaways from the Speak U...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Watch Full Video Episode Today’s guest is Darren Mclea - whom our host, Craig O’Neill has been friends with since meeting the Mcleas (virtually) in 2018.  In those days, Darren and Craig were working together on projects for adopting technology - but today’s episode goes much farther back than that! Both...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound We’re speaking up… WAY up in this episode - as our host Craig O’Neill welcomes his friend and Certified Flight Instructor (CFI), Austin Brumfield, to the show. Anyone responsible for training people to do things new will enjoy takeaways from Austin as he emphasises the importance of communicating calm, clear,...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound In this episode - our host, Craig O’Neill welcomes two guests from his home Toastmasters club, Dylan Jayce and Evan Wisner. While Evan is familiar to our loyal listeners as - Dylan will be a new voice - and you’ll hear about the journey Dylan has been on as he represented Grand Rapids Toastmasters - Club 404...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound In this episode, our host Craig O’Neill welcomes his friend and colleague, Brandon Crusha to discuss a simple but often uncomfortable topic among practitioners of change. The slogan:  “This Sucks - and it Works!” Craig was inspired to discuss this topic with Brandon after reading a post about slogans tha...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound Early 2018 our host, Craig O’Neill attended multi-day training session by Dennis McCarron In this episode - Craig invites Dennis to highlight one of his favorite takeaways from that training. Of course - the takeaway is an acronym… A.P.A.C. Acknowledge Probe Answer Confirm APAC is a pragmatic model for solvin...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound: Craig O’Neill, welcomes his friend and communications expert, David Boyd, as our guest.  Listen up to hear the thoughtful conversation between David and Craig across a variety of topics and questions related to the phones skills of your staff, AI use in the world today, and the outlook for the future. A...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound: In our episode today - Craig introduces listeners to a concept that has helped to shape his own journey, the concept of being “Supermedium.” This concept is related to fitness goals and how people often do not focus their goals on very specific objectives - which can lead to wasted effort and actually hinder...

Thank You To Our Partners The Institute, AutoFlow, AutoLeap, Shop Dog Marketing, In-Bound: In this episode, Craig is concise as he reflects on the timeless wisdom of Martin Luther King Jr. and how his principles of nonviolent conflict resolution remain highly relevant today. Inspired by recent readings of King’s works, specifically his iconic Letter from Birmingham Jail, Craig explores how these l...