The best communicators love what they are talking about more than they love talking about it.
In his creative short book on communication, Kirk Byron Jones observes, “With all due respect to my affection for preaching, it is the story as opposed to the act of preaching that keeps me preaching. If I ever get over the story, I think I will stop preaching, maybe” (The Jazz of Preaching). Think about it, history’s most compelling communicators moved people not so much by their words, but by the sheer love which fueled their words. Who could forget Sojourner Truth’s classic, “Ain’t I a Woman,” where her love for women’s rights and freedom urged her to rail against the abuses of misogyny and racism; or President Franklin Roosevelt’s love for America when he reminded his nation they had nothing to fear but fear itself? You couldn’t listen to Winston Churchill talk for more than five minutes without being struck by his deep affection for England. It’s not so much what these communicators are saying, as much as it is the love they have for what they are saying that drives us to action.
The Greeks understood this principle that the best communicators love what they are talking about more than they love talking about it. These ancient lovers of oratory said all great speakers possess a quality they called pathos. In a nutshell, pathos is passion, but remember these are the Greeks who are talking, so they cannot mean animation- you know the kind of energetic, sweat inducing presentation where the speaker is in a frenzy (though there certainly is more than enough room for that). I mean, how could the Greeks mean animation when they were the nation which gave us the Stoics? Instead, when they spoke of pathos, what they meant was speaking from one’s gut, and not just from one’s mind. When you listen to a compelling communicator there’s this sense they really feel and love their subject. And you can also tell when they don’t.
You want to grow as a communicator? Love what you are talking about more than talking about it. Keep throwing wood on the flames of your passion.
Here’s some helpful tips:
Take inventory of your pain, because many times it is our pain which will feed our passion which drives our communication. Frederick Douglass and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., knew the pain of being discriminated against, and they harnessed this energy in their communication. Used positively, wounds can turn into words which ultimately turn people for the good.
Spend time with people. Sometimes we struggle with pathos because we spend more time with content than the people we are communicating to. Yes, communicators deal with content on some level, but that content is useless unless it’s connected to people. Coming out from behind the computer and immersing yourself in the lives of others is essential for nurturing passion. If you are an educator, when you speak it should be obvious you love students. If you are a pastor who spends significant time with the people you serve, you should not only be able to see faces as you prepare your weekly messages, but your love for these people will leak through in your communication.
Guard your heart. There’s an ancient proverb which says, “Above all else, guard your heart for everything you do flows from it” (Proverbs 4:23, NLT). As communicators we bring more than our minds to the presentation, we bring our hearts as well. Nothing kills pathos more than a distracted or divided heart. On the way to a presentation I don’t need to hear the air conditioning just went out, bats have been discovered in our attic (really did happen once, by the way) and my wife wants a fourth kid (never will happen by the way- her words). The hours before a talk are prime moments for me to get focused, and do the work of getting whatever junk out of my heart that needs to be removed.
Find something else to do. If you just can’t get to a place where you love what you are talking about; if you are only doing it for the money or notoriety, then find something else to do. People’s time is too precious for them to listen to a speaker whose not all in on what they are attempting to get you to do. I know that’s a bit abrupt, but…Happy new year!
What I’m reading:
Be on the lookout for a resource I am going to give free to you, as my way of saying thanks for subscribing to this weekly newsletter. And as always, help me get the word out by encouraging people to subscribe here.
Three Things Next Level Communicators Listen to While they Talk
Next level communicators leave room for improvisation. They understand a great talk holds the tension between science and art, structure and spontaneity. Because of this, the truly great speakers “play a little jazz” when they communicate.
When you played with Miles Davis, the famed trumpeter, he was known to give you little scraps of paper which outlined a minimal structure to follow. This was necessary because it provided a sense of direction and cohesiveness to his band. But the “minimal structure,” also encouraged great freedom for musicians to express their art through the distinctive feature of jazz- improvisation. Miles understood for jazz to be truly jazz an artist needed both direction and freedom. In fact, the more one was secure in the struction, the more free they were to drift away from the structure, because they always knew how to get back.
Like any musician, when you get up to speak as a communicator there are three key things happening all at once:
The communicator. There is you, the communicator. When you are presenting you are bringing all of your gifts, passions, experiences, lack of experiences, good days and bad days into the moment.
The content. Like a musician with his “scrap of paper,” you are also standing with some sort of content you have memorized, or brought with you. This content represents the direction you are trying to persuade your audience.
The context. At the same time, you are presenting your content in a very real context. What I mean by this is you are talking to a specific group of people, in a specific place, who all have specific needs and things going on in their lives at that very moment.
The content is the science of your talk. But the fluidity of your context necessitates the art dimension of your message. The best communicators are aware of all three of these things at once, and utilize the improvisational gift of jazz to tweak their content to fit the needs of their context in the moment. And the best communicators have mastered the skill of listening to themselves, their content and context all at once.
And why do great communicators do this? Because they understand that at its core, communication is all about connection. If you fail to hold all three in tension (you the communicator, the content and the context), you will not connect with your audience, guaranteeing your message will fall flat.
Here’s a couple of tips to help you “play jazz” better in your talks:
Leave a little dirt under your fingers. The great jazz composer and musician, Duke Ellington, was known to say this. What he meant was to make room for improvisation (ironic, coming from a composer). This is important because we cannot manufacture improvisation, we can only make room for it. So leave some space in your talks which allow for it to happen.
Internalize your content. The irony of jazz musicians is what emboldens them to drift off the page is they know their content so well they know how to get back. The best communicators always know their next thought, so in the moment of speaking when they sense an opportunity to drift off the page they’re not frightened, because they always know how to get back.
What works once does not mean it will work again. Some of you are pastors who speak at multiple services, and you probably know the feeling of an improvisational moment that killed in the first service, but fell flat at the second (or vice versa). Why? Your context is different. People are different. So be careful of forcing an improvisational moment.
Listen while you talk. Now this takes seasoning, but the main way you will know to improvise is to listen to your context, because they will always tell you where they are and what is required of you as a communicator. You’ve heard this already, but MLK’s famous, I Have a Dream speech was a dud at first; that is until a woman behind him told Martin to tell the people about his dream (she had heard a version of this some months before in Detroit). King listened, played a little jazz, and the rest is history. If your audience is leaning in on a particular point, jazz may require you lingering longer there. If they’re checked out, jazz may mean go to your next point quicker than you anticipated. But learn to listen to your audience while you talk.
Prepare your spirit. It’s not just the audience who talks to you, it’s your spirit as well. I know this sounds mystical to some of you, but it really is something I’ve experienced. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve changed my message at the last minute, or ended a message early and moved to a response time, because I just sensed this is what needed to happen. Keeping my heart pure, and preparing my spirit, only gives me the confidence in those moments.
I just gave a talk on grief, as part of our series, When it Doesn’t Feel Like Christmas. You can listen here.
And I just finished the final round of edits for my new book, which you can preorder here.
What I’m reading:
3 Shades of Blue, James Kaplan (And I’m pretty sure it will make my next top 10 books list).
Communicating Well During Advent
Next level communicators utilize checklists to get the most out of their speaking, and this is especially true during seasons like Advent.
Award winning author, Atul Gawande, argues in his book, The Checklist Manifesto, the more complex something becomes, the more it needs to be simplified, and the way to do this is through checklists. Industries like aviation and the medical profession (to name a few) have utilized checklists, saving countless lives and hundreds of millions of dollars annually. As communicators we are well aware of the complexities involved in our field. Likewise, to be effective we need to have a checklist we employ in preparing our talks which will set us up for success. Nowhere is this more true than this time of year when many communicators will speak at religious services, around the theme of Advent.
Now I more than understand not all of you who subscribe to this weekly newsletter are pastors or will be asked to speak at a religious service; but I do want to take a few moments to address those of us who will, and offer a nine point checklist that will help to set the stage for a meaningful holiday presentation:
Speak like I believe it. One of the challenges with seasonal messages like the Christmas story, is we communicators have heard and given it so many times it can feel stale. Unless we fight this sense of redundancy, our presentation will come off the exact way we feel it- old hat. So speak like you really believe what you are saying is true and fresh.
Have I been creative, not innovative. I’m all for coming up with fresh ways to tell the old familiar story. Having the right prop, or finding the perfect illustration to accent the timeless principle is something we should all be on the lookout for. But…if in your quest for newness, you actually tell something about the story that no one has heard before, there’s a strong likelihood you are wrong.
Don’t be shy. Many churches are so uber aware of unchurched people attending, they overcompensate by attempting to do all they can so it doesn’t feel like church. I’ve got a newsflash for you: When an unchurched person comes to, well, church, they expect it to feel like, well, church. So don’t be shy about who you are and what you believe.
Be mindful. One of the things I always appreciate when I walk into a retail store is when the sales associate who welcomes me, asks if they can help (To which I almost always say no.) and then stays out of the way giving me space to sort through things. This is what I mean by mindful communication during high guest seasons like Advent. When you say things during your talk like, “Many of you are here today for the first time, or the first time in a long time, and I want you to know how happy we are you’re here. At the end of our service some of our leaders will be down front to talk or pray with you,” this is mindful communication that acknowledges the presence of the guest, and gives them space to process.
Remember the hurting. Christmas time can be tough, as this festive season is a reminder of loved one’s who have died, or people walking the road of divorce and having to sort through the family complexities which comes with that, along with a host of other reasons. People will inevitably be in the audience who are grieving. It’s always good to point this out in your talk, and to thank them for simply summoning up the courage to come to church.
Does the feel of my message reflect the feel of this season? Christmas time is not Good Friday. If you are speaking at a Good Friday service where the focus is on the death of Christ, you should be somber and reflective. Good Friday feels like a funeral, and that’s more than appropriate. Christmas is not that. It’s a time of joy, and hope and your message must strike these chords. Give people hope, because that’s what Advent is all about.
Befriend Clarity. When you stand to speak, chances are there will be plenty of people who did not grow up in church, along with others who haven’t been to church in forever. And mixed in among them may be plenty of kids. What this means is you will need to work especially hard to be clear with your language, getting rid of insider language (“you know the story”) and “Christianese.” Keep your communication as simple as possible.
Watch your time. Remember there will be a substantial amount of people in the audience who aren’t used to listening to a weekly sermon, so their listening threshold doesn’t match what regular attendees of your church have developed over time. Add to this some extra programming elements like extended music, and maybe even some dramatic pieces, means you will need to aim for a lesser amount of time than normal when you speak.
Be intentional with what you wear. I don’t know what it is, but in the various churches I have led over the years, long time attenders, along with most first time guests dressed up for our Advent services, and not once did we say to do so. While not a hard and fast rule, there’s wisdom in at least matching what the audience will wear, without overdoing things. I more than understand there are plenty of communities and churches where this is not the case, but the larger point is to be intentional and careful about what you wear.
What I’m reading:
The Challenge of Acts, by NT Wright
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Top 10 Books I read in 2024
It was the Nobel prize winning poet and essayist, Joseph Brodsky, who once observed, “There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.”
Ooof. Kind of harsh, Joe. But while I would not go so far as to say a failure to read is a crime, a great communicator who doesn’t read is like a talented football player who doesn’t study film: At some point it’s going to catch up with you.
As we are now days away from the close of another year (so hard to believe), I thought I’d share with you the ten best books I have read in 2024:
#10: Black Fundamentalist’s, by Daniel R. Bare
Many in the black church of the Jim Crow era harbored well deserved reservations when it came to being labeled “fundamentalist’s,” because their white counterparts, while having sound theology in some doctrines, did not engage in racial equality, which ironically, is poor doctrine. But on the other hand, there were many black pastors and preachers who did not want to abandon the rich biblical teachings of the faith in a quest for racial equality. There was a way to do both, they correctly argued. Daniel Bare, through sound scholarship, gives us their story.
#9: Dinners with Ruth, by Nina Totenberg
Nina Totenberg chronicles her decades-long unlikely friendship with Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg. It’s not often you see a journalist (Nina) getting close with a member of the highest court, but that’s exactly what happened. I found myself tearing up as these two women dropped everything to help each other through divorces, cancer and all that life tends to throw at us. In an era of division, this book gave me hope that our differences don’t have to unnecessarily divide.
#8: The Miracle of St. Anthony, by Adrian Wojnarowski
I was playing golf this past spring when my random playing partner recommended this gem to me, and I’m so glad he did. This book is about one of the greatest high school basketball coaches of all time- Bobby Hurley, Sr.- and the school he loved, right in the middle of impoverished Jersey City. While it’s non-fiction, it reads like a novel, taking you through all the highs and lows of life, both on and off the court.
#7: Truman, by David McCullough
Okay, this one’s been on my list for awhile, but it took me several years to get up the strength to read a book that’s well over a thousand pages. But hey, it’s by one of my favorite historical authors, so I did it, and boy am I glad. If your image of Truman is an awe shucks country boy from Missouri, who just lucked his way into office, and held on for dear life, you would be dead wrong. While he had no college degree, he made up for it in spades with leadership. And while I’m thankful for his strides in desegregating the military and government, I was also grieved to read about his deep racism. But isn’t that the point of all biography? Who isn’t profoundly complicated?
#6: On Speaking Well, by Peggy Noonan
I’m always trying to get better as a communicator, and this is one of the best books I’ve read on the subject in years. Punchy, to the point and littered with stories, Peggy does not disappoint.
#5: John Wesley: A Brand from the Burning, by Roy Hattersley
John Wesley is one of my favorite people in world history. Founder of the Methodist Church, and a committed man of faith, Wesley is also one of the most complicated people you’ll ever come across. He was a vegetarian, who loved his work so much that he told his wife on their wedding night she shouldn’t expect to see him much. He was great with the Scriptures, but terrible with people. And he was full of passion. Passion for God. Passionate against slavery. And passionate for other women, leading him to do very silly things that raised more than a few eyebrows. I found myself inspired, and shaking my head in disbelief all at once.
#4: Equiano, the African, by Vincent Carretta
In the late 1700s, the abolitionist movement in England was growing stale. The only voices were from whites like William Wilberforce (and a host of others), who had not really experienced slavery. What was needed was an insider's view….someone who had actually lived it. Enter Olaudah Equiano, a formerly enslaved African, who experienced the horrors of that “peculiar institution,” came to faith in Christ, and wrote a bestselling biography of his travails. A well read man, he engaged in debates with white pro-slavery advocates in the newspapers, gaining him quite the following. I’m kind of mad I’m just now hearing about him.
#3: Estranged Pioneers, by Korie Edwards and Rebecca Kim
I’ve spent my life championing the multiethnic church, and have long looked to Dr. Korie Edwards as a guide for how to go about this. Along with Dr. Rebecca Kim, these two scholars spent years studying the multiethnic church and have concluded those best fit to lead them are people of color, because they have what’s called “bridging capital”. I just about underlined the whole book. Maybe that’s why it took me over a month to read some two hundred plus pages- it’s that rich.
#2: Where the Light Fell, Philip Yancey
Without a doubt, Yancey is my favorite modern author. He writes prolifically on matters of grace, forgiveness and reconciliation. This book- his memoir- tells us why. He grew up in a spiritually abusive home, where his self righteous mother, who once confessed she had not sinned in twelve years, berated Philip and his brother for the least little offenses. The effect was broken young men whose image of God was one who was impossible to please. While I wouldn’t classify this as some fun little beach read, it will stir you, and if you are a person of faith, maybe even inspire you to live a life of grace.
#1: A Gentleman in Moscow, by Amor Towles
I do read fiction after all? You happy? LOL. So I came into this year with the goal of having my wife (who reads way more than me, but only fiction) give me four of the best works of fiction she’s read recently so we can have more to talk about. Well, I devoured this one while sitting next to her by the pool on vacation. You know the book is great when it gets turned into a television show.
Looking back on this list it’s amazing how much biography I read this year. I think the reason why is related to something F. Scott Fitzgerald once said: “That is part of the beauty of all literature. You discover that your longings are universal longings, that you’re not lonely and isolated from anyone. You belong.”
Sorry for the long post. If you’ve read something really good that you think I would benefit from, please email me back with your recommendation. Until next week…
Next Level Communicators Use Crockpots
If you want to get better as a communicator consider using a crockpot approach to preparation instead of a microwave. Now I know I may have lost some of you, especially if you are a young millennial or GenZ, so give me a moment. When I was a kid, my mother would get up early on Sunday, pull out the trusted crockpot, and put a whole bunch of ingredients, like chicken, mushrooms, some potatoes, and other goodness, inside. We’d then head out the door where for the next several hours while we sat in church (Yes, it was that long.), our Sunday dinner was slowly being prepared, as it simmered under a glass lid, plugged into an outlet, with the heat turned on low. Later that afternoon, somewhere between the end of the first NFL game and the start of the second, mama would pull the lid off the crockpot and the whole house would erupt in the most enticing smells. Moments later, our family would have dinner where the chicken just fell off the bone and melted in your mouth. A few Christmases into my teenage years, dad bought my mom this new thing called a microwave, where we kids had our minds blown when we discovered that in a few minutes you could have a meal prepared. Unfortunately, with the passage of time, and the loss of getting up-early-on-Sunday-morning energy, mom let the microwave replace the crockpot. And while I understand the efficiency behind this decision, microwaves just can never replicate the quality of a meal prepared in a crockpot.
Over the years I’ve asked many communicators how they go about preparing their messages? Their responses can be whittled down to either the microwave or crockpot approach. Some communicators allocate a half day to a day to get the talk done. Their thinking behind this is one of efficiency. They have other things to do, like leading, administrating and organizing. So for efficiency sake, they can’t let this one part of their job dominate all of what they do. And I completely agree. You should also hear me say, some of the best communicators I know use the microwave method of quick intense preparation in a short amount of time. I am not saying you can’t be a great communicator with this method. I am saying you will get even better if you use the crockpot method.
While the microwave method of preparation centers around efficiency allocating a shorter period of focused time, the crockpot method allots a longer period of time for the communicator to put together the message. For me, what this looks like is I spend about two hours a day over the span of a week in study.
In my years as a communicator I have found the following advantages to crockpot preparation:
Your message gets in your bones. I don’t know what it is about crockpots, but when you bite into a piece of meat it’s not just the meat that’s seasoned and tender, it seems as if the bones are tasty too. I’ve never had this experience with something that comes out of a microwave. The longer the meat has sat in the crockpot and simmered, the better it is. The same holds true for communicators who slowly, and methodically take their time to prepare. When you finally get up to speak, you’re not just talking from your head, but communicating from your bones. The message is truly in you.
Poise. When I was in college I had a communications professor who gave this simple law to giving talks: Less scared when prepared. If you are a newer communicator who crams her message into one day (and especially if it's close to the time when you have to give the talk), you will not be as poised as if you used the crockpot method. When a communicator allows themselves consistent, methodical time, well in advance of their message, they will find one of the residual benefits to be poise and confidence when they do get up to speak, because they have allowed the message to travel from their head to their heart to their bones.
Thoughtfulness. I have some friends of mine who are great communicators who use the microwave approach to preparation. They block off one day a week for intense study, and when they are done the material is really good, and for the most part at the end of that day they are done. Crockpot communicators are different. While microwaves demand we hover and do nothing else as we focus on the clock, crockpots allow us to step away. And I have found that some of my best thoughts for the message come when I’ve left the study and am driving down some street a few hours later, or am in the shower the next day. As I allow the message to simmer in my mind, thoughts begin to emerge. In fact, some of my best sermon material has come to me when I least expected it.
Christmas is around the corner. If you are looking for material to help prepare a talk on Advent, go here to read the best Advent resource I’ve ever come across.
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What Next Level Communicators Understand about Time
Time is the most valuable resource we have. Next level communicators understand this, and leverage time to their advantage.
I was once asked to speak at a Presbyterian church. I don’t know how much you know about these kinds of churches, but Presbyterian’s can be pretty buttoned up when it comes to time. So right before the eleven o’clock service, I asked the pastor how much time did I have for the sermon? He grinned and said, “Oh dear brother, time means nothing here. You speak as long as you like. I want you to feel completely unrestrained. Be you. Be free. But the people leave at noon.” While we shared a good laugh, I could tell there was a kernel of truth to be gleaned from his words.
Not long after the humor died down, I stood up to speak, and things went really well. I’ve been invited back several times, where people have greeted me afterwards with kind whispers of, “You’re my favorite guest speaker.” What’s my secret? I’m determined to speak shorter than what they are used to. That’s it.
The challenge of guest speakers
Most guest speakers don’t realize that when they stand up to address an audience who are used to one primary communicator, they are being met with smiling faces, and disappointed hearts. Which means before you say a single word, you as a guest speaker or a fill in staff pastor, are working from a deficit. Want to close the gap quickly, and move people from disappointed to excited? End your talk earlier than what the people are accustomed to. I know you don’t like what I’m saying, especially if you are a preacher, because preachers love to blame everything on the Lord and the Holy Spirit, especially when it comes to why they spoke so long. But sometimes I think God shrugs his shoulders and says, “That was all you bro. All. You.”
Over the years I have found the following cheat codes helpful for leveraging time:
Ask the question. Always ask how long you have to speak? I don’t care how good you get as a communicator, ask this question, because it first expresses honor and value to your hosts. But the other reason you ask this question is because you understand the audience you are about to address has a certain listening threshold. It’s sort of like a physical trainer working out with a client for the first time. They are going to ask this client a lot of questions, many of them centered around workout history. Why? Because they need to know how hard to push, what their threshold is? And in the same way a physical trainer would never workout a novice and a college athlete the same, so next level communicators get that audiences are different, with different thresholds, and they use the question of time as a great cheat code setting them up for success.
Give them some change back. What this means is if the answer to your question is they are used to listening for 35 minutes, make up your mind to speak for 25-30 minutes. This is especially true for staff speakers, interns, and new communicators in general. I know it's flattering to hear people tell you how great you are, but remember they are always leaving out the most important part: “...for a new speaker”. It’s always better leaving people wanting more, instead of people wishing you were done.
Remember, less is more. Speaking in a shorter amount of time for what the gathering is used to is not only good for them, it’s actually good for you and your growth as a communicator. Cutting down a presentation by ten to twenty percent, is like taking a ten to twenty percent reduction in pay- it forces the person to be way more economical with their words, which is a good thing. Less really is more.
What I’m reading:
Olaudah Equiano: The Interesting Narrative and Other Writings
Find out about my new, forthcoming book, here (Filled with illustrations you should find helpful as a speaker).
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The secret sauce of great communication...
Great communicators never take their audience for granted. They understand their job is to answer two burning questions every person in the room has: 1. Am I going to listen? 2. Why should I listen?
People fundamentally want to know what is it about what you are going to say that has to do with them? If they don’t get an answer to that question quickly, you will lose them. Nail this, and people will be ready to buy your product, vote for you, follow your leadership or make a life altering decision.
When you stand up to speak, it is your job to connect the felt need of your audience to the core message of your talk. While your introduction answers the question of, “Am I going to listen,” the next thing you have to do is to move to the felt need, which centers around the question of, “Why should I listen.” (Note to preachers: When Paul tells Timothy that all Scripture is useful, he is saying every text of the Bible connects in some way to the universal need of humanity. Your job is to find what that universal need is.) This is exactly what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., did in his iconic, “I Have a Dream,” speech. Speaking to a largely black audience, King said these words in just the second paragraph of his talk:
“But 100 years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land. And so we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition. In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check.”
Can’t you just see their heads nodding as King is speaking to their felt need of freedom in the midst of segregation? What made King’s dream so compelling is he first stopped to address their present nightmare. His audience did not feel free. Many knew what it was to be poor. And every black person in his audience knew the inhumanity of being treated as a second class citizen. The reason why the crowd was so moved by his dream, is he first spent sufficient time making them feel the horrors of their reality.
How do I connect the audience to the felt need of my message?
Take inventory of your experiences. There are two reasons why you will get better as a communicator. One is the reps you will get speaking. But the other reason why you are guaranteed to grow as a speaker is life experience. The more you live, the more you will be able to connect with the felt needs of others. You will know what it’s like to be betrayed, hurt or feel the joy of forgiveness. You’ll be able to speak to people who are battling loneliness and despair, or the euphoria of having a thriving relationship. Unlike athletes, communicators get better with age, because we can repurpose our life experiences to connect with the soul of our audience.
Make them feel it. I have a record producer friend of mine who worked with a very talented artist. When I found out about it, I asked him what this person was like? He said some nice things, but then concluded she wouldn’t last long, because as talented as she was, she didn’t know how to emotionally connect with the listener, through her songs. “She’s gifted, but she just can’t make us feel it,” he said. Sure enough he was right. After one hit she was pretty much done. Great communication is far more than talent, the ability to turn a phrase or tell a nice story. We have to make our audience feel it. The, “Why Should I Listen,” section of our talk, is our time to emotionally connect with the crowd. We do this by being vulnerable and drawing from our own experiences around the felt need. So if I’m talking about keys to a healthy marriage, it would really connect with the audience to talk about a time in my own marriage where things were not going well, and how we were able to come out of it.
Ask questions. Remember, the body of your talk will give the answers to the problem you have surfaced in the, “Why should I listen,” section. As you are exposing the felt need, it’s helpful to raise questions, and even underscore them with pauses. Ever found yourself in debt? Ever been betrayed by a friend? Ever found yourself with the dream house, bank full of money, and still felt empty all at once? These kinds of questions, centered around the felt need of your audience, will not only cause them to nod their heads, but will also create a healthy tension, as they lean in wanting to hear your solutions.
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What the best communicators know about the first 120 seconds...
The first two minutes of your talk is the most important part of what you will have to say…by far.
Next level communicators understand the moment they get up the audience is asking themselves, “Will I listen to what he has to say, or will I fiddle with my phone for the next however many minutes he talks?” Because of this, the first thing you must do as a communicator is to arrest their attention. If your first one hundred and twenty seconds does not grab them by the collar, they won’t engage long enough to hear the meat and potatoes of your talk. The truly great speakers know the value of an effective intro.
I want you to think of your introduction as the landscaping to a house. Let’s say you are in the market to buy a new home, and you pull up to one where the yard is overgrown, the bushes have not been trimmed, and there seems to be way more weeds than grass, and chances are you will hesitate to even go inside and see the rest. I don’t care how valuable the home is, bad curb appeal can actually work against people hanging around long enough for the tour. I know you’ve worked for hours on your sales pitch, and have pieced together a pretty convincing argument as to why a person should choose a certain path, but none of that matters if they're not drawn in by the curb appeal of your message. It’s on us as communicators to get the people to lean in, put down the phone and engage.
At no point in history is the need to grab people’s attention more important than now. Unless they are some kind of student, when you stand to speak it will be one of the few times in the week where they are being asked to sit still for a prolonged period of time and listen. Social media, smart phones and soundbites have served to diminish our focus. This is why communication experts say we only have about two minutes tops to hook them.
So what are some practical ways we can use this precious two minute window to capture the room?
An engaging story which ties either directly to your overall theme, or feeds into your first point. The story should be short, and create good tension among your audience where they wonder where you are going with this.
Humor. This could tie into the first point, where the story has an element of humor to it, or it could be a joke you tell which may not have anything to do with what you are talking about, but could refer to the city you are in. Remember the rule when it comes to humor- it should singe and not burn.
Startling statement. I was once asked to give a talk on the importance of engaging senior citizens within a multigenerational club (interesting subject I know). I began the talk by saying, “The problem with our world today is we have way too many old people…” I let the statement dangle for about three seconds while everyone’s blood pressure spiked, and then finished with, “and not enough patriarchs.” I went on to define patriarchs as older people who leverage the odometer of their lives to invest in the next generation. While their blood pressure returned to normal, I had them hooked for the rest of the talk.
What I’m reading:
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What Next Level Communicator's Understand About Their Feet
The greatest communicators talk way more with their feet than with their mouths.
It was the Greeks who said one of the three traits of a great communicator is ethos, from which we get the word ethics. What they meant by this, is when you listen to a next level speaker there is just this sense she is actually living what she is talking about.
Or to say it another way, the most important part of a communicator’s anatomy is not their mouth or mind, it’s their feet. The truly great speakers embody the message they are seeking to convey.
On February 3, 1994, a small, slightly hunched over woman wearing a habit, emerged from behind a curtain in Washington D.C., to speak to over three thousand of the most influential people in our country at the National Prayer Breakfast. On the stage, a few feet away from her was President Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary. Scattered throughout the audience were congressmen, senators and Supreme Court Justices, who for the next twenty-five minutes listened as she read her speech in a matter of fact kind of way, rarely looking up, while pretty much breaking all the rules of great communication. Oh, and as if that wasn’t enough, she decided to spend significant time chastising America on the evils of abortion, saying, “Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love one another but to use any violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love and peace is abortion”. Now you would think her words would be met with the divided partisan response a president gets during his state of the union address. But this is not what happened. Just about everyone rose to their feet and applauded (President Clinton, his wife and cabinet held on tight to their seats, visibly uncomfortable).
Mother Teresa was not done. She took things a lot further, going from abortion to contraception: “That’s why I never give a child to a family that has used contraception,” she said, “because if the mother has destroyed the power of loving, how will she love my child?” A few minutes later she finished her speech, and shuffled off the stage while the audience, once again, rose to their feet and gave her a standing ovation.
Just to be clear, this post is neither about abortion or contraception, nor an attempt to get you to speak on such leg crossing and uncrossing subjects on the occasion you get to address a room full of people with very different perspectives on these matters. Instead, I’m curious as to how in the world Mother Teresa got away with talking about abortion and contraceptives while reading her speech and breaking just about every law of effective communication?
The great speech writer, Peggy Noonan, was in the room that day and also wondered how Mother Teresa got a standing ovation from many who had worked hard to establish the very policies she railed against? Peggy concluded, “She could do this, of course, because she had and has a natural and known authority. She has the standing of a saint.” No, this doesn’t mean we have to achieve saint status in order to talk about certain matters. What Peggy is helping us to see is what made Mother Teresa’s speech work that day, is the audience knew she was buying what she was selling. Mother Teresa had given her life to care for children whose parents had thrown away, and that gave her a kind of currency as a speaker sheer oratory can never give- credibility, or what the Greeks called ethos.
It bears repeating: The greatest communicators talk way more with their feet than with their mouths.
Remember, every communicator brings more than their mouth to the speaking moment.
For some, the most important thing they communicate with is their pockets. I’ve met many communicators over the years whose primary motivation is money. You can spot them a mile away. They typically give a canned presentation that’s both impressive, and heartless all at once.
Others speak mainly out of their ego. These types tend to be more into platform building, than truly inspiring an audience in an intended direction. They’re in it for their own sense of significance, rather than helping others.
The best bring their feet. It’s the sales person who hits his mark every quarter, even breaking records, because when they pitch their product the person on the other side of the table gets the eerie sense that the salesman actually uses and believes in the product they are selling. It’s Winston Churchill, the great Prime Minister of England, whose audience knew loved his country to the core. And it's Mother Teresa who gave herself fully to the abandoned children of Calcutta.
Want to get better as a communicator? Practice what you preach. Buy what you sell. Have ethos.
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"What Next Level Communicators Understand about Pace"
A speaker's pace is like the score to a movie: Understated, but powerful, having the ability to emotionally move audiences from laughter one moment to tears the next. The best communicators are aware of the power of pace, and they use it intentionally to inspire their listeners.
Pace is the rate we speak, and when it comes to effective communication our pace must be varied to match critical moments in our presentation.
Next time you go to the movies, pay careful attention to the music (the score) played in the background of key scenes. Car chases will be accompanied by an up tempo song. Romantic scenes will be underscored by a slower tempo love song. And then there will be dramatic pauses, where there is no music or words, so the audience can digest what has just taken place. Can you imagine a movie where the whole thing is scored by a fast tempo or slow tempo song? That would be miserable, and it would actually work against the intended effect of the film.
And so it is with speakers who do not vary their pace. A communicator who talks at the same rate the whole message, is like the boy who cried wolf. At some point the message will not move the audience in the communicator's intended direction. But speed up over here, and slow down over there, and locate the right pause at just the right moment so your audience can take in what you want them to, and you have set the stage for a presentation that truly moves people.
So how do I know when to speed up, slow down or pause? Broadly speaking, I have found the following to be helpful:
Introductions should be slow to normal pace, as you are taking the strategic first few moments of your talk to connect with your audience, while you are allowing them to warm up to you. In most cases you don’t want to come out hot like a “car chase” scene. That will wear you out, and make it difficult to “rev” back up in key moments later on in your talk.
Humor, broadly speaking, should move at a faster pace (and when I say “fast” don’t hear that as not understandable).
Moments of application are strategic times to slow down and eventually pause. Newer speakers tend to not do well with pauses, thinking they have to fill the air at all times with words; but an appropriate pause at a moment of application is the perfect tool to allow your audience to soak in what you want them to receive.
Where the message calls for the right use of passion, feel free to “step on the gas” with your pace. If you’re talking about the cross of Jesus Christ, this is a great place to let it rip. If you’re moving towards the grand finale of your talk, this too, is a good place to speed up.
If your talk calls for a time where you want the audience to make a decision, this is normally the place to “ease up on the gas,” and slow down.
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