COOK UP A TASTY, NOURISHING & MEMORABLE PRESENTATION

As a member of the World Affairs Council, I entertain many international State Department guests for dinner when they are in Seattle. I love to cook and recently I’ve been noticing how creating a successful presentation can be so much like cooking.  When I cook I begin with a desire for something tasty and nourishing.  If I have invited others to share this meal, I consider their dietary preferences, whether allergies or religious/cultural preferences.  

I first look in my refrigerator to see what is there: meat or fish, cheese, butter, tofu, fresh veggies and fruit, fresh ginger, tamari, and begin to get a sense of where this meal is going.  Then I make my big decisions: what is the main theme of this meal?  What are the accompanying flavors that will make this dish special? I look in my cupboards for additional elements: rice, cornmeal, quinoa, kasha, dried or canned beans, pasta, garlic, olive oil, nuts, herbs and spices.  If I wish to try a new combination of these I research in my cookbooks or online.  Out of lemons?  I am lucky and can go right across the street and buy them and any other missing ingredient I might need at my neighborhood grocery store.  Or, I might go up Highway 99 to the great Pakistani grocery store to buy Halal meat for my Muslim guests.  And then I figure my timing and I’m ready to go!

Putting together a presentation can be just like that.  Know who your audience members are and what their preferences are for you want to make your message accessible.  Then gather all the elements you have at hand or can find easily, and see which of these will be your main message to this audience.  Next, assemble those stories, images and kinesthetic ideas that will clarify, enhance, and entertainingly involve your audience.  Plan your timing and you, too, will be ready to go!  

However, just as when cooking, practice makes a huge difference.  If you try a brand new recipe on your guests without trying it out beforehand, you really do not know how it will turn out.  And when you try a brand new presentation on your audience without practicing, you are also in a danger zone.  So, you must practice, practice, practice.  You can try bits of it out on your friends, colleagues and family - like giving them tastes from your cook pot.  In this way you can find out how clear and appetizing your message is and can do the final seasoning.

Bon Appetit!

Come to our workshop on November 22nd to practice cooking a presentation: Speak with Clarity !  See here for details: 

TELL ME A STORY

Watch how your mind is working here to take this image and turn it into a story. Whether or not your mother or dad read or told you the story of Little Red Riding Hood, this image immediately compels you to try to understand it.  How do you do that?  By making up a story.  The juxtapositioning of these two figures, one threatening and in disguise and the other with wide eyes, causes us to make a story, to create a scenario or a variety of scenarios.

Storytelling is an integral part of public speaking.  The speaker must engage the audience using sensory elements because we are all dependent on our senses  to give credibility to information.  Stories embody all of these elements, making the information real.

By finding and using simple stories (real or imagined), examples, anecdotes, metaphors, and analogies to illustrate each of your points - the information will come alive!  Each point needs a story to illustrate it - either from your own experience, an experience you have read or heard about from others, or a "what if", a story in the future.

Stories and metaphors are wonderful vehicles for your openings and closings.  Use memorable, sensory details to establish a connection with your audience.  A short personal story about something you saw or did this very morning on your way to the presentation site, for instance, can be used to quickly give them a sense of you and your attitudes and perspective, as well as supporting the main message of your whole presentation.  This can then be bridged or verbally connected to your main message. 

Metaphors have a special gift, because of their poetic nature, able to drop into the conscious and unconscious mind simultaneously.   If, for instance, a speaker refers to the community library as a "nest" made up of many kinds of "materials" and a welcoming "home-away-from-home" with "nurturing" librarians, she creates a picture and an experience.  If the speaker actually draws or produces a picture of a nest at the same time, that image will be inscribed in the audiences' memories helping them to recall later. 

Use stories to illustrate your main points.  Little real life anecdotes can give your points credibility.  Share your own experience about the skills, information or ideas you're teaching them.  

Make sure they are filled with the sensory details that communicate a sense of reality.  Instead of saying, "he was angry," you can communicate much, much more by saying, "his skin was flushed and he paced back and forth like a caged tiger, his eyes darting around, looking for a target to pounce on." 

Embody your stories - draw your listeners in. Practice broadly, play with the characters, search for the highs & lows, the pacing and volume. One cautionary note is to make sure that you don't get so carried away with your stories, that they get more focus than your main points.  Stay on course.

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Do you want to increase and deepen your storytelling skills? Come, participate in our STORYTELLING INTENSIVE WORKSOP coming very soon!  Click here for details.

ENJOYING YOUR AUDIENCES
Last evening I visited my 98 year old mother in the Memory Care section of her retirement residence. Weakened with dementia and a painful back, she nevertheless still has a wild spirit, artistic temperament, love of language (English and French) and an outgoing, self-important social nature.


When I walked into the dining room I saw that she was fuming, spitting fire. Knowing she can easily have tantrums and cruelly verbally attack those around her when she is frustrated, I rushed to her side, sitting close beside her to calm her and help her change her attitude. She sputtered that one of the other residents wouldn't talk with her, was just looking at her with no expression on her face, that it was infuriating and that the woman should not be allowed to behave that way.

I talked with her about love, how these people are not capable because of their health condition to respond to her the way she would like them to. That they are very vulnerable and their feelings would be terribly hurt if she is mean to them. I tried to tell her in a way that was not scolding, just informative, that it was important for her to be kind to the people there - all of them. That even if she felt frustrated, picking on her fellow residents was not OK.

She finally got it. She was very apologetic. I could see she was seesawing back and forth emotionally between her anger and her embarrassment and shame. And I knew that she would not remember anything we talked about because of her short term memory loss and the same behavioral dynamic would likely be there again the next day or minute.

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Today I was coaching two separate clients who were both plagued by concern that their audiences were not responsive and it reminded me of my mother's frustration. What do you do when you are sharing your great ideas with your audience and they look like they could not care less?

One way to look at it this: your audience members are individuals who are all in their own dreams - whether affected by dementia or not. They have their own universes, networks, agendas, cares, concerns, wishes, frustrations, lists, etc., and you have absolutely no control over any of it.

What you can do is research and analyze your audience carefully prior to your presentation so that you can tailor your offering to their interests, needs and issues. Create relationships with them, invite them to participate with you, inspire them to share their ideas with each other, empower them to take action, and be inclusive in your language and manner.

But you cannot assume that they will be interested or respond in any way. You must take the responsibility for the relationship, using a combination of your personal enthusiasm in your subject, interest in them and empathy. You can do all the preparation, but unlike my Ma, you do have the ability to let go of any thoughts of control over the outcome.

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If you would like to learn how to create a rewarding relationship with your audience, join us for the last in our Great Women Speakers Program's series workshop: Spontaneous Speaking on May 24th, in Seattle. For more information check here.

Maya Angelou

UNFORGETTABLE YOU

Poet Maya Angelou was quoted as saying, "I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

How DO you make your audiences feel?  They came to be transformed.  They want to leave different and better than when they arrived.  How do you make that emotional connection for them?

What anger, despair, joy, enthusiasm, pleasure, sadness are an integral part of your stories?  When you are preparing your presentation, identify the feelings inherent in your material.  Once you know where these are be sure to give them plenty of space. 

Rather than bulldozing through those moments, STOP when you come to the point of emotion.  Take a deep breath from low in your belly and FEEL the emotion. Pause. Then take another breath and with this new energy go on.  By taking your time through the emotional moments, your audience will be able to experience their own feelings in response, and this will give them that precious sense of something really important happening. 

They will not forget how you made them feel and these feelings are the vehicle for your message, affecting them deeply and making it stick.

If you would like to practice these moves, developing comfort, confidence and proficiency as a presenter, check out the workshop schedule for August 27th and 28th  HERE

GET YOUR MOJO WORKING!

Isn't MOJO is a great word!  Energy, dynamism, magic, power, finesse, excitement, charisma - all of these are part of the meaning of that word. Originally related to a Voodo or Hoodo spiritual practice, it has come to mean a kind of personal charm that is mesmerizing. Muddy Watters, the great blues man made a song about MOJO famous.

Look at the guy in this picture.  See how much energy is in his gaze?  See how expectant he is to get a response from you?  See how engaging he is?  He's got his MOJO working.

You, too, can discover your own brand of MOJO.  I say discover because we all have a seed of it and it is up to us to find it, to nurture it, to exercise it, develop it so that we can use it to help us communicate our messages to our audiences.  Each of us is unique and so is our potential MOJO  It is related to pleasure and the joys of sharing it with others.  It is the fire in our belly. It is part of our branding.  It might be a particular way we like to begin and/or end our presentations.  It might be the level and style of interaction that you plan into each presentation.  It might be the kind of humor you use or the stories you tell. 

The very next time you make a presentation, see where you can express your MOJO.  GET IT WORKING FOR YOU!

This coming weekend we will be doing a workshop that will teach you how to identify you MOJO - check it out here.

What's in your Treasure Chest?

The words "treasure chest" conjure up all kinds of exciting and valuable images: pieces of gold, gold coins, precious jewels, chalices, notes, fabulous jewelry, silver and gold ware, maps of hidden treasure and so on.  When we think of having a treasure chest of our own - it's likely a place we store jewelry, family photos, coin or stamp collections and mementos that mean a lot to us.

When I begin to work on a presentation, I create a special presentation treasure chest, to fill with all of the sensory and action-filled elements that I might like to use.  My intention is to make my presentation so enjoyable, so compelling, so sticky that they will remember my core message and take it back to their office or home and communicate accurately to others. 

First I analyze my audience and get very clear about what my core message is - the exact words I'd like my audience to remember after the presentation is over.  I put these in my treasure chest first.  Next I add the 2-3 main points that will support the core message.

And then the real fun begins.  I look at all of my points and sub-points and think of visual images that each of these stimulates in my imagination.  I do not edit them at all.  I do not question whether I have the means, the exact technology to manifest them - rather I just write them down or sketch them.  I add as many as I can think of - no editing allowed.

Next I add to my treasure chest kinesthetic elements for each point and sub-point.: words of action, scenes of action, active verbs, gestures, spacial relationships and feelings.

Now I put as many stories as I can think of for each of the main points and sub-points.  Stories illuminate and connect us with the content and affect us on many levels.  Personal stories, case stories, media stories, statistical stories, and future "what if" stories.

And last and most important, I add interactive elements for each main and sub-point: questions, rhetorical questions, activities, brainstorming, list-making, discussion groups - whatever is appropriate for the audience, core message, and time available. These invite participation and stimulate interaction between the audience members.

Now my treasure chest is full and I can begin the process of choosing which of all of these I finally want to use in this particular presentation.  The process has stimulated my imagination, and helped me to create a colorful, lively, and engaging experience for my audience - and for me as the presenter.  I feel bountiful and look forward to sharing my treasures with my audience.

If you want to create richer and more exciting presentations using the Treasure Chest approach, register for the Saturday workshop on July 17th: Speaking with Clarity.  Or register for the full weekend series and really increase your professional value!  More info or registration, check here.

STEP INTO IT!

What makes us avoid speaking opportunities?  

Why do we delegate presentations to others on our teams?  Dread?  High anxiety?

Professionals who embrace the opportunity to speak are quickly promoted and given many more opportunities than those who try to delegate others to do the speaking for them.

But if you regularly feel anxiety in the pit of your stomach, lose your place in the middle of a speech because you suddenly cannot remember that great phrase you were going to use - if you get that feeling when you are on your way to a presentation that you are a lamb going to slaughter - how about making the decision to STEP INTO IT, instead of shying away?

Instead of mistakenly thinking that you are the only one who tends to suffer from stage fright, realize that as herding animals our brains change function when separated from the group.  We lose full use of our neo-cortex and are left with our survival brain that sees the audience as predators.  Sound familiar?

However you need not shy away from speaking because there are techniques that will give you your wits back.  These will help you regain your balance and allow you to focus on your audience members and sharing your message with them.

Speaking well to groups is a practice and practice makes perfect.

If you change your habit and speak whenever the opportunity arises, if you look for speaking opportunities rather than practicing avoidance, your skill will increase and soon you will find yourself looking forward to the chance to engage your audiences, trying new speaking techniques, and much more at ease at the podium.

There are many opportunities to learn speaking skills: Toastmasters, in-house training programs, and through our Pivotal Presentations workshops, 1-1 coaching and our on-going program: Great Women Speakers.  

So, stop avoiding and STEP INTO IT!

New Summer Great Women Speakers program beginning on June 25th and Summer Workshop Series from July 16-18 !  check these out HERE

TRUST!

My sister met a woman at a business function who was very appealing - successful, smart and generous.  She told my sister that God wants us to be happy.  She said the universe is so perfectly designed that the instant we ask for something God gives it to us. 
 
But the problem is we don't believe that we are worthy enough to receive, or it doesn't look like we imagined it, or we think it must be for someone else.  We don't trust ourselves - and so we don't realize that we have received just what we were looking for or something even better.
 
Sometimes when we are making a presentation we feel stuck.  Though many thoughts of what to say in that moment to that audience come to us, we waste time trying to decide whether these words will be good enough.  We panic instead of trusting that the right words are the words we have been given in that moment.
 
We stop and stumble, searching for other words, ruminating - looking for the words we planned to say or "better" words.  This habit of distrusting ourselves breaks the flow of our communication and the relationship we have with our audience.  We become self-conscious and self-critical rather than open and sharing.
 
We must learn to trust that the perfect words will come to us when we need them, perfect for this moment with this audience, accepting the gift of these words as a blessing. Only then can we be free to be fully present with our audiences.
 
And then we will flow, we will shine, and our audiences will experience that truly divine feeling of presence. 

TRUST!

A new series of workshops designed to give you lots of practice with TRUST: Speaking with Ease, Speaking with Clarity & Speaking with Power will be held on April 2nd, 3rd & 4th in Seattle. JOIN US!  For more information

SMILE

Whether it is a full out enthusiastic smile or a subtler "Buddha smile," or even a Mona Lisa smile, your smile radiates pleasure, joy, enthusiasm, contentment, engagement, excitement, energy, delight, connectedness, passion or desire.

Just for a moment, think of one of your presentation topics, and then notice whether your own face moves into a smile in the process.

No?  Then think through the 2-3 main points you use to support your core message.  Any smiles there?

No?  Is your subject too dry, too data driven, too much someone else's idea, too serious a subject to warrant a smile?

But what is your purpose in making the presentation?  To create a relationship with your audience?  Or to inform them?  Or to teach them a skill?  Or to change their attitude?  Or some or all of these?  Certainly.

Yet if you are not demonstrating your own pleasure, joy, enthusiasm, contentment, engagement, excitement, energy, delight, connectedness, passion, and/or desire related to the subject, why should they pay attention?

Smiles are infectious and provide on an emotional level, a reason to pay attention.  Several years ago I was making a radio commercial.  The director prompted me to smile as I was talking about the product - even though my audience could not see me.  He said the audience could hear a smile and it added energy to the sell.  And it did!

Now, look at a presentation that you did recently or one you are preparing and see where you feel passion, enthusiasm or pleasure.  Use that feeling as an emotional vehicle for the whole presentation.  It will carry you far and help your presentation to be more persuasive and more memorable.

Go ahead!  Seduce and delight your audience with your passion for sharing your topic with them.

Smile! 

If you are a woman and you want to be taken seriously, want to be promoted, want to dazzle an audience - find out about the Great Women Speakers program that begins on February 26th.  For information and to see if this is a good fit for you, contact Connie here 

Grace


At this time of year we can get so wrapped up in our doings and goings that we lose sight of the essential.  We rush from one appointment to another, one email to another, one call to another, one gift to another, trying to fit it all in, get it all done, satisfy all of the demands.

The same thing happens when we are making presentations.  Wanting to get it right, get all of the info into it, we rush from one idea to another, making so many points, providing so much data, we drown our audiences in content, knock them over with our bulldozing energy, and then suddenly end before they know what happened to them.

Grace is a quality that is worth cultivating in both situations:
 

Grace means having a close relationship with your breath, breathing from your diaphragm rather than from your collarbone. 


Grace means crisp beginnings and endings.
 

Grace means coming from stillness, starting from silence and calmness.  


Grace means not rushing through emotional changes, rather taking the time to feel the feeling in your body and thereby allowing the audience to feel it as well.
 

Grace means listening deeply.  


Grace means noticing when you sigh, that it is the deepest part of you that sighs, a true song of the soul.
 

Grace means knowing that presenting gives you the opportunity to connect with people on a very deep level.  


Grace means the courage to step into it, rather than avoiding it by rushing.
 

Grace means feeling gratitude for the special opportunity to connect with others in this way.




I am so very grateful for your attention, your connection with me and all you have shared with me during the last year.  I am truly looking forward to our New Year together. 


New Speaking with Ease workshop on January 29th (1-6) Seattle.  For more info or to register

GIVING & RECEIVING


· Would you give someone a gift
and walk away without staying there a moment while they receive it?

· Would you throw a ball
and not keep your attention on the receiver to see if the ball was caught?

· Would you prepare the soil,
put a plant or seed in the ground and then just leave it there?


When we are making a presentation we often feel compelled to fill the room with words, a kind of out-pouring, full of nervous chatter rather than intentioned communication. We feel it is our job to provide, that the direction of the dynamic energy in the room moves only from us to them. "Get it out and get it over!" our little monkey-mind voice whispers in our ear.

However, the easiest and most effective way for us to have a true communication experience with our audience is to pay attention to them, to "receive" their presence, to converse with one person at a time, to treat each one as a very important person, to care for them and make sure they understand and feel comfortable participating in the conversation.

While a massage therapist gives energy to the body by stimulating the nerves and muscles she or he also receives information from the body as well, noticing the differences between the sides of the body, the patterns of tightness and reactions to touch. The therapist then responds and adjusts to this information.

In much the same way, our job as presenters is to gather information while we are presenting - watching and listening to see how we are being received by our audiences, noticing the patterns of response, what moves them, amuses them, when they need more information and when they have had enough.

The rhythm of this giving and receiving is determined by the natural breath - the inhalation and exhalation. The breath relaxes and calms the body, mind and spirit. Our brains are fueled by the oxygen of the breath. But when we hold ourselves tightly due to anxiety or when we race to get all of the planned agenda accomplished, we forget to breathe sufficiently for our brain to function properly, causing a temporary loss of focus.

We suddenly wonder who we are, where we are and what we were supposed to be saying. We lose our way. We lose our place. We feel ashamed. We hope nobody noticed. We fear that we have exposed ourselves as incompetent.

But there is an antidote: take a big breath, and re-engage with your audience members, one person at a time, with receptive soft focus, to give them a moment or two of your attention.

In sum, to engage our audiences we speak with one person at a time as if we were tossing a ball to them, carefully planting an idea in them or giving a gift to them. We keep breathing as we do this, and in this way we and our audiences both give and receive - we engage, we exchange and we communicate!

Happy Holidays!

If you would like to learn to give and receive when making presentations, come to our Speaking from the Heart workshop in Seattle on Friday, January 29th, 1-6.  Small supportive group, lots of practice, video feedback, coaching. See details

Appreciation 

Here we are once again in the season of Giving & Receiving and of Thanksgiving.  Few of us slow down and stop long enough to pay attention to the meaning beneath these old rituals.  We are too busy with our agendas and goals and bills and shopping and should-dos and ought-tos - sometimes going through the motions of celebrating these holidays without actually taking the time to appreciate the enormous value inherent in them.

We cook and share meals paying careful attention to the gourmet recipes and the correct serving dish while avoiding paying real attention to each other.  All of these holidays are really based in the spirit of appreciation, and yet it seems so difficult sometimes to take the opportunities they provide. To fully celebrate these holidays we need to stop and pay close attention to the deeper gifts we can give each other such as truly listening, hanging out with someone without agenda, making ourselves available to help out a friend or stranger in need.

When we are making a presentation, we are sharing our gifts - of ideas, research, skills, behaviors, attitudes, decisions.  And sometimes we forget that our audiences, too, are sharing their gifts - their attentiveness, their willingness to participate, their creative ideas, their time, their sense of humor, their difficult questions.  They are huge contributors to our presentations. 

Take the time at the end of your presentation to speak from the heart, to reflect back to your audience the great value you have experienced as a result of their participation.  Reach down into your heart and tell them just how you feel.  Appreciate them!

And have a Happy Thanksgiving!   

If you would like to learn to speak from the heart, come to our Speaking from the Heart workshop in Seattle on Friday, December 4th, 1-6.  Small supportive group, lots of practice, video feedback, coaching. Other workshops and ongoing programs are also available.  See details HERE