The Truth About Public Speaking (and the Media) Blog

Show Your Face

Another thought from the scientific presentations I attended earlier this week: Never ignore your audience. And there are oh so many ways to accomplish this negative feat.

Take, for instance, the speaker who was so focused on his slides and pointing to them with a laser pen that he oriented his body solely toward the screen, paying no attention to fully half of his audience (including me). The screen was to his right (poorly positioned in the first place, but who knew? Clearly not the conference organizers). I was in the section of seats to his left. When he leaned on the lectern and twisted his body to talk to the slides, all I could see was the back of his head. He maintained this posture for the entirety of his presentation.

Had we encountered each other later in the hallway, I would have had no idea who he was. Why? I never saw his face as he spoke! I would have been reduced to asking him to turn around to see if I could recognize him from the back.

Ban the Laser Pointer

Okay, maybe banning all laser pointers is a bit extreme. But the fact is few presenters know how to use them. Plus, the practical need for them is remarkably low.

I attended a scientific meeting yesterday and, as usual, nearly every speaker overused the little red dot. A few actually knew how to work it. Most, however, shot the beam on the wall as often as they hit the screen.

To be sure, nerves play a part. And even the steadiest of hands are likely to experience some shaking depending on the distance between the pointer and the screen. That is why, when you do use it, it is best to draw tight circles around the object of your desire as opposed to trying to zero in on one particular spot.

The trick here, as with any physical prop, is to decide whether you need a pointer and, if so, exactly when you plan to use it. Not every slide demands the dancing dot, so be judicious with its use. Moreover, there are plenty of other methods for highlighting portions of slides -- different colors and builds, for instance. After all, the audience is not there to see a light show; they arrived expecting to gain from your expertise.

You Don't Get Good; You Get Not Bad

I had the opportunity to see Marcus Buckingham while he was on book tour last month. He is an ex-Gallup employee who has picked up the mantle of playing to one's strengths rather than focusing on weaknesses.

One of the lines of his speech hit the mark (and I am paraphrasing): When you try to turn around bad (i.e., your weaknesses), you don't get good. You get not bad.

That is quite a powerful distinction, and one, in fact, that I pointed out to a public relations person I was talking with earlier today. She suggested media training was the art of trying to get someone to stop doing something negative. I suggested it is more a matter of highlighting strengths combined with a commitment to work on challenges over an extended period of time. Or, to paraphrase Buckingham further, when you try the beatdown approach to media training, you don't get strong. You get not weak.

Long-winded Speechwriters

Last week, C-SPAN aired a presidential speechwriter forum held at the JFK library in February. It seemed like a promising opportunity to learn about the practice of speechcraft from some of the masters. Unfortunately, the masters disappointed for the most part.

Panelists were Kennedy speechwriter Theodore Sorensen, Nixon's Ray Price, Chriss Winston from the George H.W. Bush days, and Ted Widmer who wrote international speeches for Clinton. Linda Wertheimer of NPR moderated. Sorensen and Price in particular were long-winded, regaling the audience with back room stories they had doubtless told hundreds of times before. Winston was the only one who stayed on topic, giving insights into actual speechwriting which was, after all, the subject the audience ostensibly came to hear about.

One lesson here: If you are invited to appear on a panel, ask what the organizers want you to cover. Then stick to it. No freelancing. Those in attendance are there to hear you talk about a certain subject. I find old political war stories fascinating, but that was not the bargain into which I entered when turning on C-SPAN.

Wertheimer did her best, trying to pull the panelists back to talking about speech writing, but they just couldn't resist telling those old war stories. Which brings us to another lesson: Moderators face a challenge in keeping things on track. If you are asked to moderate, there are times when you will need to put your foot down, in essence serving as the audience's ombudsman, no matter how many bigfoot experts appear on your panel.

A Chance for Civil Discourse

Imus is gone. Clearly, his final tirade against the Rutgers women's basketball team went beyond the pale of any notion of polite public conversation. But this discussion should not end there.

In an era where coarseness of language is taken for granted by too many of us, is it too much to hope that Imus' public meltdown might spur a greater sense of civility? In an era where the word "sucks" is used even in business meetings these days, might we use the fired DJ as a poster boy to help us curb our tongues?

This coarseness is growing insidiously from the morning shock jock teams (most of whom are far more rude and far less intelligent than Imus) to the guy I overheard on his phone last evening, talking loudly in the middle of a crowded department store (replete with little kids), saying loudly how he hated that b**** (yes, I told him his language was offensive; no, he didn't pay any attention).

I'm trying my best to monitor my own civility, for such language has no place in the media, in presentations, or in any business setting.

Inside-the-Beltway Testimony Advice

Today's Washington Post Outlook opinion section gathered advice for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales as his date with the Senate Judiciary Committee looms on Tuesday. The AG has reportedly been holed up with advisors who are putting him through the paces of a testimony training workshop. For his sake, he had better hope they are not overpreparing him. Yes, there is such a thing, and it can result in a flat, robotic, uninspired performance.

There is some sage advice from experienced Inside-the-Beltway hands like Richard Clarke, Ken Duberstein, and Charles Ogletree (the latter counseled Anita Hill). I find it difficult to believe, however, that John Dean undertook not one ounce of preparation for his Watergate grilling.

Robert Bork, whose nomination to the Supreme Court was rebuffed by the Senate in 1987, tells of the travails of the "murder board" (a preparation technique used by some that involves simply shouting questions at the witness; frankly, I prefer a more highly developed option I call The Third Degree). Bork says that no one role played committee members he would encounter; if that is true, his preparation team did him a serious disservice. Yet I do not recommend the other genteel extreme he took of gathering friends around the dinner table to discuss matters. That is far too casual a setting, plus your friends are not likely to tell you painful things you need to hear.

Scientists and Stories

Scientists and other technical professionals, take heed of an op-ed in today's Washington Post by Matthew C. Nisbet and Chris Mooney titled, "Thanks for the Facts. Now Sell Them."

The duo argues that technical arguments and data dumps are meaningless to most of us. While they concede that "a small audience of science enthusiasts" exists, they point out that the bulk of us need to be convinced in a more straightforward manner. Here, here!

I work with doctors and scientists a fair amount in media training and presentation skills workshops. I could retire a wealthy man if I had the proverbial nickel for every time one of them expressed the opinion that the data explains everything. Maybe it does. But the message must pass the "Who cares?" test. Blather about coefficients and meeting primary end points are meaningless to a general audience. If you want to persuade only a narrow band of fellow technicians, dive into the data. If, however, you seek to move the dial on the public opinion meter, you had best talk in more conversational tones.

Nisbet and Mooney lay a solid foundation. Allow me to take it a step further by suggesting one concrete action that is all too often shunned by technical experts -- the power of a story. In the case of a doctor, that story might center on a patient who showed dramatic results during a clinical trial. For an IT worker, the story could revolve around an application that saved each salesperson four hours of time every week.

The writers hit the nail on the head as they conclude, "If scientists don't learn how to cope in this often bewildering environment, they will be ceding their ability to contribute to the future of our nation."

Meeting Expectations

Too many organizations view moderating or facilitating a discussion as an afterthought. Far from it.

Your moderator holds the key to the success or failure of your event. Take the example of a recent discussion forum I attended. The event was billed as an interactive exchange among all those in attendance. Sadly, I knew I was in for a long session when the moderator fired up his PowerPoint slides. He took the first 30 minutes or so as an opportunity to lecture (worse yet, offering a thinly veiled commercial for his business). Now, lectures have their place; I conduct my fair share of them before large groups. But this was not a large group. In fact, his slide presentation overwhelmed the format. Plus, it was not billed as a lecture, but as an exchange of ideas.

Some recommendations: First, make sure you spell out specifically what you expect of your moderator. Second, tell her what type of session you envision. Third, if other panelists are involved, set forth how long you expect each to speak, if you plan to take audience questions, and, if so, for how long. There is a lot more they need to know (I like to offer organizations I work with a one-page "cheat sheet" that clarifies the moderator's role). But make sure you at least achieve clarity on these basics. It could prevent your audience from zoning out as those of us in that recent audience did.

If you find yourself wearing the moderator's hat, devote time to preparation, much as you would if you were a featured speaker. The moderator is not there to glorify herself, but to shine a positive light on others.

Kudos to NBC Nightly News

It has been ages since I have seen a sound bite as long as the one aired on this evening's NBC Nightly News. The lead story involved the flap over Don Imus' nasty on air comments about the Rutgers women's basketball team.

The NBC newscast devoted close to 10 minutes to the issue, including an extended interview with coach C. Vivian Stringer. It helped that she was eloquent, passionate, and reasonable throughout. Still, it was stunning in this age of the six-second clip to witness the network's flagship newscast devoting so much of its time budget to one story and one individual.

I don't dare hope that this represents a trend toward longer form TV journalism. But someone at NBC is clearly thinking in the right direction. Let's hope they get all the encouragement they deserve.

Suspicions of Reporters Fuel Poor Public Image

An interesting read in the April 2 issue of the New Yorker. "Selling Wal-Mart" by Jeffrey Goldberg recounts the corporate behemoth's public relations efforts, including its recent strategy of hiring supposedly liberal Democrats in an attempt to soften its image.

There are insights aplenty into the corporation's media outreach tactics, but one passage in particular caught my eye. Goldberg writes that the company's chief spokesperson, Mona Williams, keeps in her office a framed copy of a 2003 Business Week article headlined, "Is Wal-Mart Too Powerful?" When he asked Williams about it, she replied, "I keep that there to remind me never to trust reporters." Goldberg adds that she made the comment without smiling. Maybe she was kidding to some degree, maybe not. But her quote raises a broader point.

If you work for an organization that feels besieged by the press, I suggest you take a critical look at your media relations team. If those staffers voice knee-jerk suspicions of all reporters, you have a major problem that screams out for quick and decisive action. A dose of skepticism is fine; outright suspicion places your organization in a constant and untenable defensive posture. It makes it appear as though you have something to hide and there are few things that will set a reporter's nose to twitching like the feeling they are being stonewalled.

Now, I am not suggesting that you open the family jewels to the press. But your media advisors do need to grasp the value of cooperating with the fourth estate whenever possible. Any senior officer charged with media relations should have some print or broadcast experience. If they have never walked a mile in a reporter's shoes and, thus, have no sense of the crush of deadlines, cranky editors, and cantankerous news sources, they are more likely than not to fall into a defensive crouch. And that generally results in a losing image for your organization.