A strategy-based program providing an innovative, integrated approach to developing highly responsive, persuasive content and effectively presenting that content on any page.

TheClientHat.com

Effective business communications are critical to the success of any professional or organization. Whether it’s a presentation, proposal, email, blog, or report, informative and persuasive business communications can be the catalyst that motivates, inspires, and persuades—transforming ideas into products and services and moving people to action. Putting on the Client’s Hat provides business communicators with the tools and techniques to help win new business.

Do you want to■■ Get your message across exactly as you intended?■■ Tell your organization’s story and offering in a

compelling way?■■ Dramatically reduce costly miscommunications and

misunderstandings?■■ Deliver presentations that are more powerful and

persuasive?■■ Win more business?

Do any of these sound familiar?■■ Low new-business win rate■■ Confusion or conflict about how to create compelling,

persuasive messages…■■ …and how to present those messages on clear, easy-to-

read pages ■■ Too many requests for clarification■■ Poor response to your proposal or marketing materials■■ Undependable system for clearly identifying unstated

requirements ■■ No process for creating unsolicited bids

Put on the Client’s Hat!

STRATEGIC TRAINING FOR BUSINESS COMMUNICATORS

TheClientHat.com

Putting on the Client’s Hat

Component Content

Prior to the workshop we will:

■ Send out questionnaire(s) and conduct interview(s)■ Assess your organization’s existing materials

Day 1 Workshop orientation; foundational concepts and tools

Day 2 Core project: content development and document design

Day 3 Core project: completion and presentation; workshop recap and wrap-up

Bank of Hours Post-class coaching/consultation

Workshop Materials■■ Complete copy of the

workshop slides and handouts, supported by numerous examples that serve as on-going reference and resource materials

■■ Project and exercise kits■■ Process and evaluation

toolkits

Participants will learn to■■ Create business communications that are clear, targeted,

and client-focused ■■ Use analysis, research, and communication systems to

understand and address client wants and needs, and to answer the question “Why select us?” in a compelling way

■■ Structure and design pages that engage, facilitate understanding, and motivate action

■■ Recognize critical distinctions between writing to inform and writing to persuade, and how to apply them

■■ Create presentations that are compelling and persuasive■■ Produce high-quality unsolicited proposals■■ Use a brainstorming tool that reveals the client’s unstated

needs and wants■■ Ensure all sides of an issue are addressed■■ Think more clearly, objectively, systematically, and creatively

Beverley Sinclair 650.796.8491 beverley@sinclair-and-associates.com Nancy Webb 510.531.3611 nancy@nancywebb.com

Contact us directly to discuss your needs

Who Should Attend■■ Business Communicators ■■ Sales and Marketing

Professionals ■■ Engineers ■■ New Product Developers ■■ Team Leaders and Members ■■ Trainers and Consultants ■■ Advertising and PR

Professionals ■■ Everyone who wants to

improve the quality and effectiveness of their business communications

Why are there so many miscommunications and misunderstandings in business? Why do so many presentations and proposals fail, even when your solutions are superior?

The reality is that few people are truly effective business communicators. Strong business communicators need to know more than how to write reasonably well, be compliant, and format the results onto a page. A lot can go wrong. It’s easy to miscommunicate.

Putting on the Client’s Hat, a strategy-based business communications workshop developed by Beverley Sinclair and Nancy Webb, is an innovative, integrated approach to developing highly responsive, persuasive content and effectively presenting that content on a page. Participants learn to objectively analyze issues, generate new ideas, make better decisions, and present those ideas from the client’s point of view.

The workshops are fast-paced, practical, and interactive. In a friendly, but realistic, competitive environment, participants apply tools, techniques, and strategies that dramatically improve the content and visual components of proposals, presentations, and other business communications.

The tools, techniques, and strategies presented in Putting on the Client’s Hat apply to all business communication, including proposals, presentations, brochures, white papers, reports, websites, blogs, and emails. You’ll learn how to plan, write, and design strategic business communications that get your message across to your intended audience in a way that is compelling and client-focused.

Snapshot of the Comprehensive Training

TheClientHat.com

The Team

ComprehensiveA hands-on customized program.

Prior to the workshop we will ■■ Conduct surveys to clearly understand your

needs, challenges, and priorities■■ Interview participants to understand their

strengths and the challenges they face■■ Become familiar with your existing materials

and processes■■ Incorporate your materials into the workshop

wherever possible, and always with the participants’ and your organization’s specific needs as our focus.

The Workshop

Day OneUnderstanding Written and Visual Communication

■■ Foundational terms, concepts, and tools■■ How the communication process works and why

things can go wrong■■ Techniques for becoming more client-focused

Day TwoPutting It All Together

■■ Break into teams to strategize your team’s core communication project

■■ Apply Putting on the Client’s Hat tools and techniques to plan and develop the messaging and your document’s structure and design

Day ThreeDelivering Your Story

■■ Strategies for planning and developing your presentation

■■ Deliver the story of your core communication project

■■ Recap, Q&A, and debrief

Bank of HoursIntegral to the Comprehensive program is a block of post-classroom hours from which participants can draw for follow-on team or individual coaching, integration, or deeper learning with either or both of us.

After the workshop we will Follow-up with an Executive Summary or feedback session with stakeholders.

Program Options

FundamentalsOur core material.

Pre-workshop we will■■ Learn about your clients,

competitive environment, opportunities, and priorities

■■ Become familiar with your existing materials and processes

■■ Incorporate your materials into the workshop wherever possible, and train with your organization’s requirements in mind.

We’ll cover in one day■■ What happens during the written

and visual communication process■■ Critical success factors in business

communications■■ How to develop compelling

messages and tell your organization’s story

■■ How to structure pages and their visuals to ensure an effective and persuasive document

OptionalBank of Hours, a block of post-classroom hours from which participants can draw for follow-on team or individual coaching, integration, and deeper learning with either or both of us.

Custom BuiltWe can create a training program specifically for your business or organization by combining the most relevant modules from our Comprehensive and Fundamentals programs.

To customize it even further, we can build it around one of your own projects—perhaps an upcoming one with critical challenges, or a past one that you wish had gone better.

Contact us to discuss the possibilities!

Beverley Sinclair 650.796.8491 beverley@sinclair-and-associates.com Nancy Webb 510.531.3611 nancy@nancywebb.com

Nancy Webb

Beverley Sinclair, CF APMP

OutcomesParticipants will learn a disciplined, strategic business communications process that will enable them to

■■ Stimulate innovation by generating more and better ideas and messages quickly

■■ Consider issues, problems, decisions, and opportunities more systematically

■■ Finesse the most critical details of any document’s readability and usability

■■ Go beyond the obvious to create strategic, effective alternate solutions

■■ Create pages that accommodate how humans are hard-wired to take in information

■■ Identify opportunities to gain competitive advantage

■■ Guide readers and listeners through your documents and presentations more effectively

■■ Thoroughly evaluate your and others’ business communications

Participants learn through engaging and interactive exercises. Training materials include copious examples that demonstrate Putting on the Client’s Hat terms, concepts, approaches, and tools.

TheClientHat.com

Let’s Talk! Contact us directly to discuss your needsBeverley Sinclair 650.796.8491 beverley@sinclair-and-associates.com Nancy Webb 510.531.3611 nancy@nancywebb.com

We are Beverley Sinclair and Nancy Webb. We’ve spent the last 25 years studying business communication theory and analyzing, from both content and visual perspectives, all kinds of business communications—from proposals, presentations, white papers, and brochures to books, websites, and emails. Our research and experience provide us with in-depth understanding and insight into what makes business communications successful.

To help others understand why business communications can fail and what can be done to help ensure their success, we took the results of our research and created two business communication workshops.

We’re passionate about creating documents and presentations of all kinds that are clear, compelling, easy to navigate, and promote understanding and action. We strive to create business communications that inform, motivate, inspire, and persuade. Putting on the Client’s Hat provides professionals with the tools and techniques to achieve the same goals.

A Unique ApproachWhen we first met we discovered that we offer complementary business communication skill sets: content development and document design. But when we realized that we use the same client-focused approach to creating compelling, persuasive documents, we got excited. The tools and concepts we’d been using and teaching for years individually are a perfect pairing. Our training programs grew directly out of our passion for this strategic, integrated approach.

Because business communications are the currency of business, a clear understanding of the communication process and the visual structure of a document is crucial. The long-term success of our clients’ sales, marketing, and proposal materials—and of our clients themselves—depends on it. Integrating these two foundational perspectives is all too rare, and we are committed to filling that gap. We are proud to offer Putting on the Client’s Hat.

THE PUTTING ON THE CLIENT’S HAT TEAM

“ Great

collaborative

presentation

team, and

well-considered

stances/points.”Beverley Sinclair, CF APMP has been writing, editing, and managing proposals and other business communications for more than 25 years, helping clients in Hong Kong, Italy, France, and Mexico—as well as in the U.S. and Canada—win new business in highly competitive environments. Since 1990 she has taught proposal development and other business and marketing communications courses at organizations such as the University of Ottawa and the Schulich School of Business Executive Education Centre, as well as in-house at client sites. Her company is Sinclair & Associates.

Nancy Webb is an award-winning Visual Communication Strategist and owner of Nancy Webb Graphic Design. For more than 25 years she’s created identity systems, collateral, and books—and developed design directions and long-term strategies—for a wide variety of clients. Since 1997 she has taught and delivered programs on visual communication and Page ArchitectureTM to business professionals, both in-house and for programs like the National Speakers Association’s Speakers Academy. Her unique blend of expertise in branding and books, and her immersion in text design, have proven ideal for designing proposals.

Comprehensive Training Program

© 2015 Beverley Sinclair, Nancy Webb. All right reservedTheClientHat.com

What distinguishes PUTTING ON THE CLIENT’S HAT from other business communications training?

In-depth Pre-workshop Work Comprehensive Workshop (Three Days) Implementation Follow-up

Interview Stakeholders■ Current business communications processes and their effectiveness■ Challenges they face with current processes and systems■ Knowledge gaps they’d like to fill■ Needed improvements and desired outcomes

Interview Workshop Participants■ Current business communications processes and their effectiveness■ Challenges they face with current processes and systems■ Knowledge gaps they’d like to fill■ Needed improvements and desired outcomes

Assess Systems, Processes, and Documents■ Content organization and approach■ Overall document organization, Page ArchitectureTM, visuals, branding■ Congruence with typical customers’ messages and visuals■ Within the context of typical competition’s materials and branding

Benchmark Outcomes■ Win rates, especially new business■ Client response to business communications■ Frequency and scope of requests for clarification■ Track record for unsolicited bids

Core Content■ Foundational concepts supported by

copious examples■ Realistic hands-on team project, from

message creation through document and presentation delivery

■ Highly interactive exercises at all stages

Customized ContentFocuses on where participants need most improvement. We■ Reinforce areas of participants’ strength■ Use client materials wherever possible in

exercises and as examples■ Evaluate final class project documents

and presentations

Bank of HoursA post-workshop block of hours from which individuals draw to work with Beverley Sinclair and/or Nancy Webb on:■ Using the new concepts and

processes■ Integrating new concepts and

processes into current systems■ Improving current processes

and/or systems using materials provided during the workshop

■ DebriefExecutive Summary, or feedback session with stakeholders, documenting the strengths and challenges we’ve uncovered, enabling your organization to more effectively capitalize on the former and improve on the latter.

■ Follow-upConduct a subsequent benchmark survey to track results/progress.

To keep things simple while providing maximum value…

■ A base fee for the full Comprehensive training program covering all above components■ A nominal per person fee to cover pre-class interviews and all workshop materials (minimum of 6, maximum of 15 participants per workshop)

Interview

Stakeholders

Interview

Workshop

Participants

Assess Systems,

Processes, and

Documents

Benchmark

Outcomes

Deliver

Core

Training

Integrate

Custom

Content

Coach ,

Implement,

Integrate

Debrief

and

Follow-up

Because you can’t change behaviors by simply taking a class, we offer a customized, robust program that delivers much more value than a workshop can. Your organization will receive real value well before participants enter the classroom. You—and they—will continue receiving value after they have completed training.

Our goal is not just to teach innovative concepts and tools—we want to help you make positive change. Our program is tailored for every Client: we spend pre-workshop time understanding all stakeholders’ specific requirements, as well as your systems, processes, materials, and business environment. We train with everyone’s needs and priorities as our guide, and your organization’s systems and materials as our focus. We then follow-up with implementation and support.

Here’s what the Putting on the Client’s Hat Comprehensive training program delivers:

Fundamentals Training ProgramBecause you can’t change behaviors by simply taking a class, we offer a customized, robust program that delivers more than just a class. You will receive real value well before your participants enter the classroom, and have the option for additional value post-class.

In this workshop we cover our core content. We spend pre-workshop time understanding your organizational needs and priorities, as well as your approach to business communications. Then we tailor our core content to meet your organization’s specific requirements.

Here’s what the Putting on the Client’s Hat Fundamentals training program delivers:

© 2015 Beverley Sinclair, Nancy Webb. All right reservedTheClientHat.com

What distinguishes PUTTING ON THE CLIENT’S HAT from other business communications training?

Custom-built Training Programs

We can create a training program specifically for your business or organization by combining the most relevant modules from our Comprehensive program with the most appropriate modules from our Fundamentals program.

To customize it even further, we can build it around one of your own projects—perhaps an upcoming one with critical challenges, or a past one that you wish had gone better.

Contact us to discuss the possibilities!

For more information, or to book PUTTING ON THE CLIENT’S HAT:Beverley Sinclair 650.796.8491 beverley@sinclair-and-associates.com OR Nancy Webb 510.531.3611 nancy@nancywebb.com

To keep things simple while providing maximum value…

■ A base fee for the full Fundamentals training program covering all above components■ A nominal per person fee to cover all workshop materials

Pre-workshop Work Fundamentals Workshop (One Day) Implementation (Optional)

Interview Stakeholders■ Current business communications processes and

their effectiveness■ Challenges they face with current processes and

systems■ Knowledge gaps they’d like to fill■ Needed improvements and desired outcomes

Assess Documents■ Content organization and approach■ Overall document organization, Page

ArchitectureTM, visuals, branding

ContentKeeping your communication requirements in mind, we’ll cover:■ What happens during the written

and visual communication process■ Critical success factors in business

communications■ How to develop compelling

messages and tell your organization’s story

■ How to structure pages and their visuals to help ensure an effective and persuasive document

Bank of HoursA post-workshop block of hours from which individuals can draw to work with Beverley Sinclair and/or Nancy Webb on :■ Using the new concepts and

processes■ Integrating new concepts and

processes into current systems■ Improving current processes

and/or systems using materials provided during the workshop

Available as a Fundamentals add-on.

Interview

Stakeholders

Assess

Documents

Deliver

Tailored

Core Content

Coach,

Implement ,

Integrate

Optional