Enhanced_by_Technology

Dr. Diane Howard's Publications

Enhanced by Technology, Not Diminished

Diane Howard, Ph.D.
Copyright © 2003

In the 21^st century, computers are ubiquitous. They affect most areas of many people's lives. Computer simulations and animations are so increasingly sophisticated and life-like that communicators and presenters face the prospect of being displaced by computer counterparts in the future. More training is taking place in virtual simulators. More instruction is being given online from multiple sources around the world. Education, business, and social service professionals are often anxious about the virtual world in which they seem to lose exclusive control, territory, power, and influence. Many of us bungle and stumble in technological communication and relationships, as we try to relate to computers, cameras, microphones, and display screens in our individual and occupational lives. This begins a series which provides insights and practical guidelines to enable us to operate and manage within this brave new world in such a way that our communication and work is enhanced, not threatened or diminished. See also my new book Enhanced by Technology, Not Diminished.

In the arena of the World Wide Web (WWW), there is a qualitatively new, virtual dimension in which we need to learn to participate effectively and viably. Elements of the visceral world, such as those related to the physical body, place, culture, seem less significant and impacting in this new arena. The WWW has created a dimension where our minds and souls can freely share, connect, and bond with people around the globe. Cyberspace scholar, Pierre Levy (1998), describes it as a deterritorialized world in which there is more of a sense of a global collective we who work, communicate, experience collectively in virtual communities, virtual corporations, and virtual democracies. It is a qualitatively different kind of collective we, than that which we experience via mass communication, when we collectively receive mass images and sound. The contemporary world of the Internet is more than simply an information highway (Levy, 1998). It is a unique dimension, which affects almost every area of many of our lives, in which we are required to learn fresh techniques to effectively collaborate, instruct, facilitate, and cooperate. We must acquire new skills to foster civil and productive relationships and communities in Cyberspace.

In the high-tech world of the 21^st century, we often need to adjust to cameras and to display screens, as well as to adapt to computers. Not only are computers an integral part of our lives, but cameras, monitors, and various kinds of display screens are becoming more integrated into distance communication events as they are transmitted via modern distance technologies. As speakers and oral communicators, we have concentrated on our vocal delivery and message content. Today we have to consider more than ever before the visual and audio aspects of our presentations. In the past, we have been taught to be aware of our non-verbal, body language. We must now adapt to sets or backgrounds behind us, lighting being used on and around us, and to multi-media elements being displayed during our presentations. We must adjust to modern technologically, visually oriented audiences by presenting in "sound bites."

Recently at a national professional speaking convention, the speakers on the main platform were outstanding presenters; however, they were projected onto big screens and lit with rock concert-like lighting, which was either dominantly yellow or mixed with shades of yellow. Male speakers in this light looked unshaven. Flaws in nearly all the presenters' faces were accentuated. They did not look well and healthy. The speakers were not lit in colors that were pleasing to human skin tones. In another situation, the owner of a new telecommunications company demonstrated his videoconferencing equipment to many VIPs at a large meeting. The CEO demonstrated his technology as he sat at his desk. A statue of an eagle was behind him on an overhead shelf. Throughout the presentation, it looked as if the eagle was perched on the executive's head. He seemed completely oblivious to the fact that his office had become a set and that the eagle had become a humorous prop.

As presenters and communicators, we need to understand how to project camera-friendly, human elements effectively and attractively onto monitors and display screens and how to guard against visual and audio distractions. Today we must adjust to modern technologies, cameras, and to various audio-visual aspects of our presentations. While protecting ourselves from being victimized and diminished by cameras and new communication equipment, we can capitalize on how computers, cameras, and contemporary technologies can enhance and enrich us. We must also present and communicate in humanizing ways, more than ever before.

Shelley McClure (1996), a powerful broadcast anchor coach, promotes High Touch in High Tech. Her position is that in the highly technological world in which we work, we communicators and presenters must project our unique human qualities. We must continue to present new and unique knowledge. As good storytellers, we must speak from our hearts. While communicating empathy for our audiences, we must mutually connect at the level of our souls. If we allow our unique human personalities to come through the new technologies, which we have harnessed, we will continue to be vital as human presenters and will be enhanced, not diminished by computers, cameras, display screens, simulations, and animations.

Computers, the Internet, and distance, technology applications touch professional, personal, educational, economic, political, and social spheres of life. They provide potential benefit for the globe. The access to information and the opportunities they provide are limitless. Communication in Cyberspace, the dimension provided by a global network of connected computers, provides potential enrichment for people all over the world. New computer-mediated, distance communication technologies do not replace older forms of on-site or distance communication, but add to, enhance, and expand communication possibilities and options around the world (Levy, 1998).

The fact is that people in many countries are rapidly using modern technological information and communication skills. Around the globe, people are involved in Internet communication. People around the world are participating in various kinds of e-communities, due in part to the informality and free access of Internet e-groups. Virtual learning communities and the contents related to them are constantly developing and expanding. Cyber communities are creating new and various cultures facilitated by emerging technological possibilities and norms.

Look for further specific, concrete guidance from me as to how to communicate effectively via Web sites, e-mail, e-discussion groups/ e-communities, and audio conferences or mail. Further, this text addresses effective e-teaching, videoconferencing, videostreaming, Webcasting, e-job hunting, and e-publishing. These practical guidelines have been developed so that we might be enhanced personally and professionally, not diminished or displaced, by modern communication technology.