Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/333548
1 0 0 V I N E YA R D & W I N E RY M A N A G E M E N T | J u l y - A u g 2 014 w w w. v w m m e d i a . c o m your employees, or you're in trade sales and you're speaking to a group of your distributors." W h i t e h o u s e , a C PA w h o 's t h e " c o u n t e s s o f c o m m u n i c a - tion" at Brotemarkle, Davis & Co. in St. Helena, also operates her own business, Even a Nerd. She developed her niche as a com- munications trainer for her fellow accountants and now specializes in helping numbers people improve their people-to-people communi- cation skills. "It's one of my core beliefs that even a nerd has a voice that deserves to be heard," she explained. She offers courses titled "Com- munication for Nerds" and "Ten Ways Even a Nerd Can Be Heard." At WISE Academy she puts the shoe on the other foot by teaching "Demystifying Financials." In this class, she helps winery personnel understand the basics of account- ing. It's an opportunity to prove her point that people find more room for understanding if one or the other is not erecting barriers of jargon. "I tell them, 'If I walk into a win- ery and you start saying things like 'malolactic fermentation,' I'm going to turn around and walk back out- side. Your language intimidates me. And we do the same thing to you when it comes to accounting.'" EXECUTIVE TRAINING Paulson, who has worked with nearly 600 wineries, offers two basic courses to winery person- nel. Her main course is "Executive Speaking Experience," a two-day workshop that's limited to six par- ticipants. She also offers half-day and one-day winery hospitality and sales trainings on becoming a gra- cious and attentive host with "cre- ative selling" skills. For the "Executive Speaking Experience," she said, "I think the crux of what I do is that I videotape. I put people through myriad video Lesley Berglund of WISE Academy points out that public speaking ability impacts every aspect of a person's busi- ness communications. the fine art of closures PDODXVDFRP *LVHOD#PDODXVDFRP he fine art of closu 6(59,1*7+(:,1(,1'8675<)25<($56