145: How to Be the Best Virtual Presenter Anyone Has Ever Seen with Karin Reed

In spring of 2020. The shift to virtual meetings was sudden as it was traumatic for many people working in businesses across all industries as they scrambled to keep operations running during a global pandemic. Rather than focusing on what worked best, many of us focused on what worked, period. The term zoom firmly took hold in the lexicon and suddenly every meeting was was virtual. Now here we are, well over a year later and most of us have a hang of the virtual meeting, don't we? Welcome to the Confident Communications podcast. Helping communicators find the right response at the right time and delivering it in the right place. Many people have nailed the virtual meeting, but many still have a ways to go. But there are many too who feel that virtual might just be on its way out. I feel otherwise and so does my guest, Karen Reed. Karen Reed is an Emmy Award winning broadcast journalist and on camera spokesperson. She is the CEO and Chief confidence creator of Speaker Dynamics, a corporate communications training firm teaching business professionals how to be effective on camera communicators. She has been quoted as a thought leader by various prestigious publications including including Inc. Magazine, Fast Company, Investors, Business Daily, and Tech Republic. Her most recent book, Suddenly Making Remote Meetings Work, written with meeting scientist Dr. Joseph Allen, was adopted in the curriculum of the Graduate School of Business at Stanford. And it's also the basis of our interview. Take a listen, Karen. I feel as if I should have had this interview about a year ago in April 2020, you know, the summer of 2020. But I'm happy about our timing because I did ask this question to myself. I posed to myself, are virtual meetings here to stay or are they going away? What is your take on that?

Well, first of all, I've had many people say the same thing to me. Molly, I wish I talked to you a year ago, but people weren't ready to hear it a year ago. Very hon. Because I think everybody was thinking this is going to be something that is a band Aid. This is temporary. We're just going to have to deal with these virtual meetings until we can get back to face to face interactions. But what we're seeing now is a great transition to hybrid work. And if you can envision having a meeting with all these people working in various places, you know, say you've got some people who come back to the brick and mortar office, some people who decide to stay home, some who decide to work, you know, in different location, all of these folks still need to be talking to each other at the same time. And the only way to do that is through a virtual meeting platform. So I would say yes, virtual meetings are going to be an important part of our corporate communication DNA from here on out. Because Hybrid, I think, is here to stay. At least that's what we're postulating right now. My co author, Dr. Joseph Allen, and I.

Well, Karen, if it means anything, I agree with you. I think they're here to stay as well. I think people are growing somewhat weary of having all of their meetings be virtual. But certainly I feel that they have found that there is. There's certain immense benefits to using them. And one of the things, back before you and I started recording, I was asking you about your television journalism career because you were. You were in New England at WJR and I was in Boston. So I was quite familiar when you worked at that station. But I had heard from someone who I had worked with at NBC News that she believes that virtual interviews are here to stay as well. So if you could put your reporter hat back on for a moment, your anchor hat. How do you think it impacted the news industry and what do you think is going to happen there?

What I found most interesting was how people who are in the business, you know, that I was in for many, many years, were also equally as flummox by this environment as those who never appeared on camera. I remember one of the first interviews I did, Molly, after the book came out, was with a local TV station. It was actually a local NBC affiliate. And in the lead up to the interview, before we went live, the anchor said, I'm so glad I'm talking to you because I just have no idea what to do. Whenever I'm, you know, reporting from home. With my background, I'm like, what do you mean you don't know what to do? You've lived in this. But, you know, we have all in the TV news business relied upon a big production crew that has helped us to have perfect lighting, perfect background, perfect audio. We haven't had to think about this stuff because it's been taken care of for us by others. But now we're all on camera and we all have to be our own production crews without the professional expertise. So one of the things that I've been helping people to do is just understand how to what I call elevate your personal production value. And that's just how you show up on webcam, because it's really important. Not only is it protecting your personal brand, it's also protecting your corporate brand. But more than anything else, it's showing respect for your conversation partner. Because if you show up with Your face in shadow and with really bad crackly audio. That's kind of rude. And it also impacts your ability to convey your message effectively. So if you would have talked to me a year ago, Molly, you probably wouldn't have said, hey, let's talk a little bit about lighting. You probably would have had different questions at that time because you wouldn't have realized just how pivotal something like that is. But now people are being more strategic.

Your book suddenly Virtual Making Remote Meetings Work. The timing of it is amazing because as we've both established, they are here to stay. It's not going to be all of our communication, certainly, but I agree with you that this idea of presenting virtually not only is going to be here for quite some time, but it certainly shapes a person's reputation and how they appear on camera and, you know, in a virtual environment. So let me ask you this first question. What problem are you hoping to solve with the book that you wrote?

Well, a lot of people are realizing that the skill set required to run a meeting in person is very different from the skill set required to run an effective meeting. Virtually communicating through a webcam is very different than, you know, meeting with somebody face to face. You know, and there are a couple of barriers to your communication. First of all, when we're talking to people face to face, we're usually trying to read how our message is being greeted. You know, maybe somebody's nodding along like you are right now, Molly, or somebody's nodding off and you change your delivery based upon the feedback that you're receiving. But if you're talking to a camera, you don't get that feedback. And even if you're in a virtual meeting where both people have their cameras on, you still are limited in your ability to read that non verbal feedback. So that creates a barrier to our effectiveness. Secondly, for the first time, most of us are seeing ourselves communicate in real time for the first time, as mentioned, and that can be disconcerting and distracting. So whenever you see yourself on the screen, oftentimes I see folks who are monitoring their performance and they are hypercritical of their physical selves. They see things that no one else sees. So for example, I always work with people in on camera communication doing like a baseline presentation at the beginning and then a post training presentation at the end where you see the big growth that they've made. And I was working with a client who had made huge strides. I'm watching her video. We were in person at the time. My back is to her and I'm just so Excited by what I'm seeing. And I turned around and said, what did you think? And she said, my right eyebrow is higher than my left eyebrow. And I was like, what are you talking about? No one is noticing that, but she did. So we have to take away this inner critic that has a tendency to speak very loudly but not accurately. And then the last thing is just understanding that when you talk to a camera, you're not performing. It's not a performance, it's actually just a conversation. But when you bring a camera into the equation, sometimes people just feel like, oh, I'm performing. And they go into this presenter mode where they lose their true selves. And what works whenever you're communicating through a webcam is just being authentic. Just being. You don't seek perfection. If you seek perfection, it's an unattainable goal. So just try to be yourself because that's what's going to feel really good to your audience.

On the other side, authentic communications always comes out on video and you could see that. And Karen, it's so funny that you had mentioned someone worrying about their eyebrow because yesterday I delivered a webinar. It was a 90 minute webinar. And webinars are. It's just you and a black screen. You're not even on a zoom box with anything. And it is absolutely exhausting. And you don't see anyone there. So that that lack of feedback is discerning. So all I could do is see myself and I was focusing the fact that I feel as if my teeth are slightly moving in my age, you know, that maybe I grind my teeth because I'm noticing. Do I need a retainer? I like you. Do you get fixated? It's one of the challenges of webinars. So. So your book Suddenly virtual. Does that appeal to people who, as I just mentioned, presenting on camera, either in a keynote or a webinar environment, or for people who are simply organizing or facilitating a meeting?

I would say both, because, you know, virtual presentations can be just talking to one person or it can be managing, you know, a large, you know, all hands meeting. It really has cross pollination between both roles. And I would say that it also is valuable for people who are just attending because there is a lot of virtual meeting etiquette that is not understood and can take away from the overall experience. And you know, one of the things that I always push is understanding that participation is key. And whenever we are in this environment, a lot of times we have a reliance upon the default position of passive observer because we have been conditioned to engage with screens as watchers, as observers. We watch tv, we watch a movie. But now we're being asked to be active participants through a screen. And it can be really difficult to get people off of that default passive observer position. So it requires you, as a leader, to constantly be thinking about ways to get people to do stuff and then as an attendee, to actually step up and, you know, hold yourself accountable by participating whenever it's being asked of you.

Karen, here's a question, and I am almost certain that you did not address this in your book, because I feel as if this issue has only come up recently, like we needed some time and attrition to happen for this to. For this quandary to present itself, at least for me, when maybe it's a matter of semantics. You have presentations, you have workshops, and you have webinars. If you have a webinar where you do not see people, it's almost one way, in a sense, you're just seeing one person on camera. Is it expected that you need to engage, or is that the environment where the participant is allowed to stand down and just watch?

It depends on what they want you to provide. So, you know, I do webinars all the time, and there are some who want me to just basically provide information. I am educating folks. But even in that situation, Molly, I would say that it's important still to at least seek indirect engagement. So, for example, asking a rhetorical question, you know, imagine that you are in this scenario. Think back to a time when this happened to you, because then that gets them at least engaged and involved in your content. It is very difficult to maintain full attention on somebody who's just talking at you, especially for an hour and a half. So I would still be looking for ways to bring them in, even if they can't do the direct participation, which would be like, for example, putting questions in chat or actually being able to speak up and ask a question. Polls are something that I use a lot as well, just because it's getting people to do things. And also it gives me a snack snapshot, you know, into how people are feeling about something. But you have to be really mindful of the timing, I would say, of anything you do virtually. So, you know, Dr. Allen is my co author. He's a meeting scientist, and even he experienced the shift in his classroom. He is a professor at the University of Utah, and he went from doing 45 minute lectures, which would be kind of standard, to seven minute lecturettes. And he would do the seven minute.

Lecturer eds, lecturettes, that's what he called them.

I can't take credit for that. I do too. And then Andy, seven minutes, he would do this really deep discussion with his students and he found that people stayed so much more engaged. So, you know, for example, I do a three hour workshop typically on effective virtual video communication. If you tell people they have to be there for three hours straight, they start to freak out. But time and time again people say, oh my gosh, the three hours went so fast. And that's because I have it chunked so that there is something that is changing up every five to seven minutes. So it's not a matter of me sitting there and talking at them for that long. It's a matter of I'm going to deliver content and then we're going to play with it and you're going to be expected to like play with it with me. And I think it's really critical. And that's why it requires so much more intention and preparation for anything virtual versus if you do it in person when you're in a virtual meeting in but any sort of missteps will be exaggerated and you can't make up for them as easily in a virtual environment. So that means, for example, if you get down to basics on virtual meetings, you've got to have an agenda. You've got to let people know what is going to be discussed, timestamps for the agenda, even better, because then they know how it's going to move along. Start and end on time, make sure that you have the right people in the room. This is not a time to bring people just to kind of be flies on the wall. Because if you're looking for a sweet spot for virtual meeting size, you're talking five to seven people, right? If you get beyond that, it becomes very unwieldy. So it's getting back to best practices for meetings in general, but then adding some on top of that just to make sure that you're getting what you want out of those meetings.

Well, so then let's go to some practical tips for video meeting participants, people who are facilitating and what you might be asking for your participants. Let's just start with the most basic, which should be the first thing that you, that you need to focus on.

Well, and I'm going to think kind of linearly on this. So the first thing you want to do is make sure that you put the time in in advance to plan out how you're going to run your meeting. Don't just try to wing it because frankly we're all dealing with back to back to back meetings all day. A lot of them are video oriented and that's exhausting. You know, we've all heard about Zoom fatigue, about WebEx weariness, and it's not the platforms to fault at all. It's, it's user error is what I would say. Because we have this over reliance upon video touch points. Not every interaction needs to be a video meeting. Oftentimes it can be, you know, a text, it can be a phone call, it can be a message in a slack channel, or it can be asynchronous video, which I think is something that's really interesting to watch. Develop asynchronous videos where you record yourself and you send off a little video snippet. You know, that I think is going to be the new thing that's really going to grow over the next year or two. But put the time in advance, make sure that it needs to be a meeting. If you're going to have the meeting, you want it to be shorter and purpose driven. So rather than having 10 agenda items, you know, have two and then actually get through them and get stuff done and then make sure that they know the purpose of the meeting and that and what the intended goal is. If it's to make a decision on something, make sure people are aware of that. And then if it's with an external stakeholder, you probably want to encourage them to turn your, their webcam on. You can't make people turn their webcam on. You know, that's not a good policy.

I know it is. That is to me one of the most frustrating parts about facilitating a meeting is when you do not. When you have someone who chooses, it's like the equivalent to me if you're in a room delivering a workshop is if someone took their chair and turned around.

Yeah, yeah. And honestly what it does is it diminishes their presence and presence like with a capital P, because there is an on camera bias. And you probably know this as a facilitator where you're probably going to call on the people who have their cameras on or you end up engaging with them more. And so by turning your webcam off, and I would put this in the category of like a smaller environment, you're missing out on a chance to really get the most out of that meeting. Now if you're on one of those giant calls where people are just, just basically sharing information and you've got like a hundred boxes, I don't see a whole lot of value in Having your video on at that point because you're just receiving information. What I think would be interesting and what I'm kind of playing with right now is the idea of having like designated on camera people for those situations where maybe you have, you know, five people who are willing to have their camera on during your presentation so that you can get some of that non verbal feedback. Because as you know, like those nods really help you as a presenter. So that is something that I think might be coming into play.

Oh, I like that idea. I might be swiping that from you right now. I see the benefit of that because you're not, you're not relying on the small core people who have to be on for the entire training, but they know that there's a carousel, if you will, of when they need to be on. That's a great idea, Karen. I like that.

Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So, you know, if, but if we're talking about like having your, your camera on in that small setting, that's really critical. It's critical for the presenter obviously to have their camera on because we communicate not just with our words, with our tone of voice, we communicate with our whole bodies. And if you have your camera off, your body language is silent, makes it really difficult to understand the intent of your message. And if people don't have the camera on in the audience, then you can't read the impact of your message as well. So what I suggest are two ways to try to get people to turn their webcams on right in the calendar invite. You can let them know, hey, I plan on using my video. I find it valuable because xyz, maybe you say, I like to be able to put a name with a face. Or I find that it makes for a richer meeting experience for everybody. Whatever your reason is, what that does is it starts them thinking, huh, that might be, you know, a reason for me to turn my video on. And maybe they'll reciprocate. But say you get into the meeting, they don't have their camera on. What you can try is making a small ask. So at the top of the meeting you can say, hey, you know, one of the things that I really miss in our pandemic, you know, Covid world is just seeing people's faces. So would you mind just turning on your camera briefly just so I can see your face? And then if you don't feel comfortable, feel free to turn it back off. Oftentimes people will keep their camera on from that point on because it is like ripping off the band aid, once you get them through the process of turning it on, they're more likely to keep it on. So those two suggestions to encourage webcam.

Very, very, very soft. It's almost like a southern genteel way of, you know, appealing to them. Good graces. Okay, so then let's talk about the on camera position. What do you need to consider for a camera position?

You want to have your camera at eye level. And oftentimes this doesn't happen because people are using the webcams embedded in their laptops and they keep it down on their desks so they look like they are looking down on their conversation partner because the camera is lower than their eye level. The other thing I see happening is people have, have gotten external webcams and then they perch it on the top of their monitors and then they're looking up. But when you look up, in some ways you are undercutting your authority because you look like a little kid asking a parent for permission. So you want to figure out a way to get your camera at eye level. So two ways you can do this. If you are using your webcam that's in your laptop, simply raise the laptop. You can stick it on a stack of books on a box. I had one client use their kid's lunchbox. So whatever it takes. The other thing that you can try is if you have an external webcam, put it on a desktop tripod and then situate it so that it is at eye level. And the key is if you're navigating between a screen and between the camera itself, you want to have as little space between those two as possible because the difference in eyeline can be vast. Appear vast from an audience perspective if you don't.

I saw a television interview just this week. They were interviewing a superintendent from a school and he was presenting his case on a laptop on his desk. And all we could see was the top of his head event on the ceiling. I thought, isn't there some person in an outer room that is watching this? Just come in and say, put your laptop up. Okay, so we've talked about the presence. Let's move on to the lighting.

Okay, so you want to make sure you focus on front lighting. So your ability to convey information via body language is limited by the size of your screen. So you want to ensure that what you can convey through non verbals is easily read. And the best way to do that is to ensure that your face is well lit. So don't rely just upon overhead lighting because you're likely to get shadows around your eyes, it impedes your ability to make good eye contact, which is the best way to build trust. Trust and believability. You want to make sure that your face is well lit from the front. So that can be as simple as facing a window. Do not have a window behind you. Backlighting is bad. Typically, you'll end up looking like you're in silhouette in the witness protection program. But if you are facing a window that's usually very even. It is sometimes filtered, depending, like, as long as it's not, like, streaming in at you. Having, you know, just natural light from outside is very flattering. But if you are meeting with somebody in the evening, you know, or early morning, then you probably need some sort of artificial light source. So grab a lamp or two from your home and situate it with one on either side of your camera so that you don't have any shadows on either side of your face.

Is there any from your years working as an anchor in television news? Is there any type of makeup tip or any type of present, Any tip from those days that still apply today in a virtual environment environment?

It definitely does, but I. I think I want to caution people about thinking that they have to go and. And, you know, learn how to be an. A makeup artist. You don't need to. I mean, the key is, is just to make sure, for one thing, that you take away the shine, because that can be distracting. So, you know, a good facial powder works great. I want to share with you a tip for guys, because most of them will be like, I'm not gonna wear powder on my face. But there's. There's actually a matte gel that you can get. It's made by Mac Mac. That is a little sponge, and you dab it on. It is clear, and it absorbs the light rather than reflecting it. And it's actually a French name, and I cannot pronounce it accurately, so I'm not even going to attempt. But it is this matte gel that you can apply. Nobody will know you're wearing it. There's no color to it, but it takes away the shine. And I was working with a client yesterday who has. Well, he doesn't have a whole lot of hair.

Okay.

He has the similar hairstyle to my husband, and he was worried because his light was really reflecting off his head. And I told him about it. He's like, I think that's fantastic. So he's excited about it. So I thought I would share it with you as well. You know, if you do want to focus on, you know, certain, you know, makeup tricks that are kind of tried and true? I'd say focus on your eyes. Sometimes our eyes tend to disappear when we're on camera and probably focus on your lips.

Oh, those are fantastic tips. Well, I am going to investigate. I'm going to find that Mac gel, and I'm going to include a link in the show notes, because now I'm interested in.

Okay, I'll send it to you so you don't even have to search it. I have it. I just can't pronounce it.

Oh, good. All right. All right. Thanks, Karen. So anyone who wants that, especially guys out there, I'll have a link in the show notes. And then finally, what about your voice, your tone, how you use it? And then we can also get into audio as well.

Well, vocal variety is one of the core tenants of my methodology, which is the MVPs of on camera success, which is the mental mindset, vocal variety, and physical factors. So vocal variety takes on an even greater importance in a virtual setting because, as mentioned, you can convey information through your body language, but it's limited. So the way you deliver your message vocally takes on even greater importance. So there are three tools at your disposal. They are pitch, pace, and pausing. So pitch is all about your vocal range, how high your voice goes and how low your voice goes. And it's not like one is better than the other. We just all have our individual ranges. Ranges. But you have to hit the highs and lows of your own individual vocal range to vocally highlight what is important for your audience to hear. Because if you just speak in a monotone and you don't change your pitch whatsoever, it'll just go in one ear and out the other, because that becomes white noise. So you want to think about highlighting certain keywords in order for your audience to pull it out, because otherwise it just, you know, will not resonate with your audience. So you can do that by, say, you're using notes. Underline those keywords, keywords in your notes. And whenever you refer to them, that visual cue, that underlining, will probably prompt you to emphasize it. And often we emphasize by raising our pitch pacing. You have to be really deliberate in your pacing and remember what it feels like to receive your message. Sometimes when we present in this environment, we focus on just getting through our own agenda, our own content, and we're like a runaway train. But by the time we get to the end of our presentation, we may have lost all of our passengers. You have to take a Breath, you have to deliver it, deliver slowly enough that they are able to hear it once and digest it the first time through. Because maybe somebody will ask you to repeat yourself. They probably will not. And then pausing, so critical, so difficult to do in this environment because you feel like you're presenting in a vacuum. Sometimes you don't have the ambient noise you normally have if you are in an in person, face to face setting. You don't have the murmur of conversation, you don't have the big H vac system kicking on off. And sometimes we forget to take a breath. But those pauses are so important for comprehension. So what I suggest is if you want a key takeaway to resonate, count 1001, 1002 in your head before moving on to the next thing that you're going to say because it's critical for them to be able to hear it and ruminate upon what you just said and let it sink in.

Okay, so just two seconds, two Mississippis is what you need after you speak. So your MVP philosophy that is a part of your speaker dynamics series that you have.

It is. So the first book I wrote was On Camera Coach and it was all about helping business professionals to be better on camera communicators. And you know, the reason why that came to be is when I left TV news, I became an on camera spokesperson. And oftentimes I would have somebody who was not an on camera professional, but rather like a, a CEO or even a software developer appear on camera alongside of me. And they were expected to perform at the same level of skill and that often did not go well. So I recognized that business opportunity because I actually had a C level executive say, hey, I really need help with this. Do you think you can help me be better on camera? And I thought, I think I can. And so that was a decade ago. And I came up with a curriculum that I have honed over time. It really has resonated quite well with my clients. And one of my clients said, hey, you really should write a book. And you know, I said, huh, okay. And then I actually went to the publisher. They were excited about it. So that was the beginning of my, I guess, writing career, which I had not anticipated. So On Camera Coach came first. That's where you find the MVPs of on camera success. And then the second book is kind of taking those video communication skills and putting it even more into that corporate use case of virtual media meetings.

Oh, Karen, I have enjoyed this conversation because you offered so many snackable insights that people can easily remember when they are in a virtual environment. I'm going to ask you one last question. Is there any speaking meeting facilitator hack that you provide to people if they're. If they need to know one thing like what is that one hack that.

Can help you them, I would encourage you to engage with the lens. So a lot of times people want to look at the people on the screen because they think that they're making eye contact by doing so, but you are doing the exact opposite. If you want to speak with impact, you need to not only be looking at the camera, but focusing your energy through the camera because the camera is the conduit to your conversation partner.

I love that last line. That's very good. That's a good subtitle of a book. So, speaking of so Suddenly Virtual Making Remote Meetings Work by Karen Reed and also your co author Joseph Allen as well. I will have a link in the show notes to the book. Karen, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me. I feel like I will need to speak. I'll need to check in with you again when we go down the road a bit and. And because I'm sure that this virtual environment will pro transform into, you know, another. Another type of communication channel that people will need to master. And something tells me that you will be the just the person who will know how to do that.

Well, we're working on the next book, Molly, which is about hybrid meetings.

No, you're already doing it.

We're already doing it. So you can look for that. I'd love to come back and talk to you about that at a different time, Karen.

Done and done. Do you have a title yet?

We do.

Oh, you're not suddenly.

No, I will tell you suddenly Hybrid Managing the Modern Media.

Oh, I love that.

Thank you.

Congratulations. What a wonderful idea. Okay, when is that book released?

Well, it's being written right now, so, you know, everything is sort of tentative, but the idea is to have it released in January 2022.

Oh, Karen. All right, well then we will be speaking with you again. Thank you so much for sharing your tips on how to make these remote mix meetings work in 2021. And then in 2022 we will speak to you about hybrids. So thank you so much.

Sounds great, Molly. Thank you.

My thanks to guest Karen Reed for giving us this indestructible tip about virtual meetings. It's that quality matters. Now that we are over a year beyond the initial days of the pandemic, people exclude polish with both sound and visual virtual in some capacity. Is here to stay. For more information about Karen, you can find her@speakerdynamics.com you can also find her on Twitter at Speaker Dynamic. That's all for this week on the podcast. Thanks for listening. Bye for now.