When we watch TED talks, such as Rory Sutherland’s on the power of advertising, or Hans Rosling’s on the power of data, we are watching two men who know their way around the presentation platform.

Both speak without notes, use pictures and graphics as visuals (without a bulletpoint in sight), demonstrate that they have internalized their content, and in fact have memorized some verbal “riffs” that delight their listeners.

But what if they had used notes?  Would that have damaged the appeal of their presentations? 

I think it depends on how they used them.

If they had stood, hands in-front, head down, clutching a deck of 3×5 cards, yes—they would have damaged their appeal.

But if they had had, at their disposal, a lectern or a table, where they could have gone to glance down at an outline, would that have hurt their appeal?  I doubt it, as long as each of them maintained their liveliness and engagement with their listeners.

Audiences crave intimacy with a speaker.  In addition to getting the pleasure of a new thought from a speaker, (or having an old idea buffed and polished) they want the speaker to be good company—entertaining, bright, and well-informed. 

When we use notes in such a way that we devote the bulk of our attention to the audience, and not to the documents in front of us, we are in the zone of peak performance. 

After all, the presence of notes indicates that we have prepared, that we strive to be organized, and that we are respectful of the gift that our listeners give us—the gift of their attention.

Sims Wyeth is an executive speech coach in Montclair, NJ specializing in presentation skills and public speaking training in order to give accomplished people the knowledge and skill they need to become accomplished speakers. Learn more public speaking tips at www.SimsWyeth.com.

Empathy is our ability to understand the thoughts and feelings of others.  It enables us to build rapport, listen, and take an interest in how others see the issues.

Many leaders get into trouble by getting too far ahead of their constituencies without taking the time to connect with those they lead.

Two examples come to mind.  The first is Paul Wolfowitz, who moved from the Bush II Administration to be head of the World Bank.  It was widely reported that he failed in that position because he was unable to “win the building” before he tried to conquer the global challenges he was hired to address.

The other is Laurence Summers, the former President of Harvard University and now special advisor to President Obama.  In his dealings with the faculty, he lost their support and was forced to resign.

Just as leaders need to “win the building” in order to move the organization in a chosen direction, a presenter needs to connect with the audience before he takes them on a deep dive into his content.

A presentation is a micro-moment of leadership, a potentially defining one.  How can we connect before we drill down into the details of our message?

Display your civility
Civility is a formal expression of empathy.  It is good manners.  It predisposes your audience to like you.  Civility shows respect for the occasion and for the audience, and in return, encourages them to be civil to you.

Display self-effacing humor
All humor is inherently persuasive, but self-effacing humor is particularly winning.  It shows the audience that you don’t take yourself too seriously, that you have a degree of humility and self-awareness, and that you are likely to be good company as you lead them through your content.

It’s all about them
As I have mentioned in other blog postings, make your content “all about them.” So many sales presentations could be titled, “My product is cool,” or “My Company is the best.”  It’s more effective to demonstrate an understanding of their situation and then introduce your product/service/company/idea as a solution to their problems.

Display similarity with your audience
People are likely to listen to those they perceive to be similar to them.  At the start of a talk, it’s a good idea to try to link yourself to what they are familiar with.   However, if it’s too much a stretch, it’s pandering.

I once spoke to a group of anesthesiologists, and pointed out that we were in opposite professions.  They knew they were in trouble if their clients were awake, and I knew I was in trouble if my clients were asleep.

It seemed to work.  Being honest about differences must help with credibility.

Act as if you heard they love you
Many great plays dramatize the fact that if we think somebody likes us, we like them back, and are much more likely to display gestures and expressions that communicate a sense of closeness.  (I am thinking particularly of Malvolio in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.)  Radiate your delight at being in the presence of your “loving” audience, and they will reciprocate.

Display your curiosity
One of the easiest presentations to give is to report research about the audience to the audience.  All audiences are fascinated with themselves.  If you can tell them things you’ve learned about them, or about individual members of the audience, and express real interest in what they do and how they do it, you stand a better chance of building rapport.

Remember this:  if you’re a speaker and you lack empathy, you’re like a sled dog who has slipped out of his harness.  You’re not connected, and you’re moving nobody forward.

Sims Wyeth is a speech coach in Montclair, NJ specializing in presentation skills and public speaking training in order to give accomplished people the knowledge and skill they need to become accomplished speakers. Learn more public speaking tips at www.SimsWyeth.com.

In financial services, every firm has a process for making decisions about investments. The process is usually designed to ensure that there is due deliberation about decisions, and that no money manager is allowed to invest without periodic oversight from a board or committee.

This is sensible, since one person, left to his own devices, might occasionally make an error that could be caught if only a group of experienced people looked over his shoulder.

The Investment Committee, as they might be called, serve as editors to prune and shape the creative ideas of the money managers, whether they might have a tendency to swing for the fences, be too cautious, or drift too far from the declared strategy.

The problem arises when a board, a family, or an individual goes shopping for a money manager, and has to listen to the five potential firms describe their investment process. They all sound the same.

Those making the pitch try hard to differentiate their process, but as the old saying goes, most of us are interested in sausage, but few want to know how it’s made.  Let’s face it, process can be boring.

Nevertheless, the financial professional has to have a process, and she has to demonstrate to a prospect how it works and why it’s good. After all, if she doesn’t mention it, the prospect might assume that she doesn’t have one, and exclude her as a preferred candidate.

So how can a financial services presenter make the investment process interesting and a source of differentiation?

The first step is to answer the question, “Why should they care about the process?” This is often the most forgotten component of informal, sit down meetings conducted using a pitch book.

One way to bring an investment process to life is to lead the prospect through a series of questions to determine what he knows about the process, and why he thinks it’s important.   If he knows little, and if he’s unclear about its value, you have opened what psychologists call a “knowledge gap”  which creates curiosity. 

Another approach is to confess aloud that everyone has a process, for good reason, and then paint the picture of what can happen without it. Given the recent collapse of several well-known firms due to lack of oversight, it should not be hard to tell a story that will capture the prospect’s attention.

You may fear bringing fear into the conversation, but fear not. Your brief depiction of what happens when money is invested without due diligence can make your process all the more attractive and interesting.

Another way to draw attention to your process is to FLAG it. FLAGGING is a verbal technique that professors use when they say, “What I’m about to present to you will be on the test.” Students wake up and take notes at that moment.

You can use the same technique to encourage prospects to focus on what otherwise might be a dry recitation of a complex diagram or set of bullet points.

For example, you could say, “What I’m about to tell you may seem boring and routine–you may think you’ve heard it all before–but it is the most important and powerful thing we do to protect your assets and ultimately your purchasing power.”

And then off you go, with the prospect leaning forward intent on understanding how you protect and preserve his hard-earned wealth.