Be committed

This week one of our clients hit a grand slam on a major talk. When reflecting internally how many discreet “steps” she took from acceptance of the invitation to the final delivery, we counted 26. And those are the ones we know about.

Giving a keynote address is a daunting task. You have to answer the question on the audience’s mind, achieve your own communication goal (to teach? Inspire? Sell?), entertain them and be done before they ‘check out.’. And lest we forget, hope they remember and repeat what you’ve just said.

Our tip this month is be committed to a quality process. Had our client not truly appreciated the time and attention her talk required, it would have suffered. From the revisions of the story structure, to recordings of early versions, to editing and narrowing, to practicing and rehearsing, this is like a seven course meal. No drive-thru customers need apply.

And what we learn from Kids

Last week we finished our six-week pilot class that ended with the first US based TEDxKids event that featured elementary school students as the speakers (only one other has been done in Scotland prior to ours). We learned a great lesson about public speaking. Start them early! See the videos here, and read about our class here. And a PSA: if you have kids, I guarantee you they, too, have big ideas that should be heard!

By admin on 2/29/12, In Presentation tips