157: Stephy Lewis: On the Good, Bad and Ugly of Presentation Design

Hey everybody, and welcome to This Moved Me, a podcast about creating talks that move the world. With me, your host, Sally Koering Zimney. Together with some fabulous guests, we will have a casual conversation about the art of public speaking, because a good talk can move the world and it'll be fun. Yeah, I would think making alien cows meaningful. That's not a small task. I love your giggle. Wow. Oh my gosh, just waiting for everybody to figure out the alphabet. Hey movers, welcome back to another interview episode here on This Moved Me. I have been doing some super fun fun Facebook Live sessions, mini workshops that I think are full of some really great info that I'm hoping will make our lives a little bit easier, that will get us to wow a little faster, that will also help us really stay grounded in, in our purpose and what we do, but also how we can do it in, in such a way that feels really right for you, whoever you are, which is kind of my specialty, what I like to, if I were to sort of describe me, like what my focus on it, it really is authenticity. And so I've been having so much fun with it. So if you are on Facebook at all, head over, and of course you are, 'cause like a bajillion, bajillion people are, but who wants like more stuff, more stuff to think about and do, but this is worth it. So what I've been doing is on Thursdays at about noon, Central Time, which is the time I'm in. The idea being maybe this is kind of an around lunchtime thing. You can pop into my live mini workshop where I'll just be chatting about something and interacting with you, and usually I create some sort of downloadable piece that will take this to the next level for you. I try and keep it to about 10 minutes. Sometimes it's gone a little bit more than that because there's always a lot to say. So, but I would love for you to go join me over there, facebook.com/thismovedme. And if you are looking for where you can find these downloadables, I've got a spot coming on my website where you'll be able to find all that. So that's on my resources page that right now it doesn't really have much, but I'm working on it. I'm just one human, people. I'm just one human, trying to do everything that I can. Yeah, speaking of, there's like 2 days left of the school year right now as I'm sitting in my office. When you're hearing this, it'll probably be the fall, and there are some really cool things coming in the fall, like the Story Gathering that I'll be at, and I'd love for you guys to join me there. And for those of you who are listening, if you, uh, remember the Harris— Harris III podcast and Jason Jagard and Brad Montague and Hank Fortner and, oh my gosh, Lindsay O'Connor. There's so many different connections I've had with this really cool event that happens in Nashville at the end of September. Um, and because I've been lucky to be so connected and was there last year, um, and am going to be speaking there this year, they have offered a really cool discount. So if you are thinking about going, head over to StoryGatherings.com and find the annual conference. And when you're signing up to go, if you type in the discount code "thismovedme" altogether, then you'll get 10% off. That is cool! That is worth, like, I don't know, it's worth a lot. I'm pretty jazzed. It's like, can be a lot of money off. And that's useful when we're traveling to get to a conference. Man, money, love it. Okay, pretty jazzed about that. Okay, but right now, who I wanna introduce you to is the amazing Steffi Lewis. And Steffi and I got connected through the Presentation Guild, which is this online, essentially networking site, and community for those of us who are in the presentation profession. And when I say that, I mean maybe you do presentations at work, maybe you're a designer, maybe you, um, like me, are a coach, maybe you are a speaker yourself and you want to, um, continue to hone your craft. Whatever it might be, if you're connected into the profession in any way, the Guild has tons and tons of resources for you. And the woman who's sort of the brain behind this, one of the amazing people who is the brain behind this, is my guest today, Steffi Lewis. She's the director of the Presentation Guild, and she is a longtime herself presentation designer. So she has a design background, but what I learned in my conversation, she also is a scientist. How cool is that. But she sees presentations very holistically, so our conversation wasn't so much about like slide design per se, it was really about presentation design. Sort of how if you are being called to come in and help pull a presentation together, what are things that you can do to be the most effective team member but also to really raise the bar for people on what typically happens in the day-to-day, especially in the workforce. So we had a great conversation and I'm really excited to share it with you now. So here she is, Steffi Lewis. I forgot that step. Let me try that. And then— but of course it works. Well, I'm super excited to have you on the show, Steffi.

Me too. This is gonna be fun.

We've been email buddies for a while, but it's fun to actually hear your voice and talk to you.

I love it. It's so cool because now I'm getting to know all of our guild members. I'm like, we have so many cool people.

It's amazing. I know, I know. That's my favorite thing about this podcast is people become real to me in a totally fun way because I get to dig deep with them. And have great conversations, and it's been the easiest ask. Hey, do you want to be on my show?

Okay, you want to talk about this thing that we both get jazzed about?

Okay, cool. You know, it's, it's been so fun. It's one of my favorite things to do. So that's awesome. And now it's Steffi time.

So every time—

is it okay if I call—

I mean, Steffi Yeah, no, it's funny because everybody in presentation world calls me Steffi.

Okay.

It's just random. So if anyone calls me Steffi, I know they're either A, a small child related to me, or B, they're from presentation world.

Oh, funny.

Yeah.

Cool. Okay. Well, I want to dive right in because what I'd love to hear, Steffi, since we're in presentation world, what I'd love to hear is sort of your entrée into presentation world. How to step into this. You know, you're a techie person and a design person. So I want to hear more about that journey.

It's, it's really funny because I didn't step into it. I was dragged kicking and screaming into it. I did not want to. I had no desire because I've been a designer and it was, it's funny because I didn't go to design school, so I have my degree in chemistry and I was a scientist for a long time. And then I switched over to design world. And since I didn't have that design background, I kind of had to fight my way up. And, you know, to get my position, my talents, so people recognize, okay, she does know what she's talking about. And then one day my boss at the time was like, okay, you're going to be on the presentations team. You're gonna work in PowerPoint. It was like, are you kidding me? I'm like, I'm a designer now. No one's gonna take me seriously if you stick me on a presentation team and make me work in PowerPoint. So I was, yeah, I was dragged kicking and screaming into it. But the thing that really turned me around was then my boss then sent me to the Presentation Summit for the first time, and then I was like, holy crap, these people are cool. Oh, wow, this is really a cool field. And look what people are doing. And this is actually design and art and more than— I mean, this is my right brain and my left brain combined. So, so I, I made my peace and now I love it.

Isn't that funny? Because I think a lot of people battle that, that mindset that presentation design is different than other design. And yet if it's done well, you're using all the same principles. I mean, what do you think that's about? That, that for you, you were like, don't put me in there, people are gonna think I'm just like a hack.

Well, it's because when you think of a presentation and you said, okay, you're gonna work on this and make one, all you can see in your head is slides full of bullets and, oh my God, these horrible SmartArt objects. You know, you get— because so many people have access to it that aren't designers, that don't actually have that storytelling ability, the, you know, ability to pull story out of data, and then having the ability to arrange it in some beautiful, visually pleasing way. There aren't that many people out there who are really good at all of those areas, so you don't often see in corporate America anything that you actually want to sit and watch. And having to make things that no one wants to look at is just kind of kills your soul a little bit, I guess. It's a little soul-crushing, but that's when, you know, you just have to put your big girl panties on and get out there and just prove to everybody that presentation design is awesome. And this is what a good presentation is. It's like It's all of these things combined.

So do you still see yourself as a designer, or do you define kind of your work in a little different way?

Well, you know, it's funny, I just started a new job and we're creating a whole new design department, and I started with one other person, and she's currently in the kicking and screaming mindset where she's like, ah, PowerPoint, no. And she calls herself a graphic designer. And I'm like, you know, I just dropped graphic from it. I'm like, a lot of— there's so many fields of design. I just call myself a designer, period, in the general populace. Um, but depending on who I'm talking to, I'll sometimes say I'm a presentation designer, or sometimes I'll say I help tell stories. Yeah, which when I get to actually have, um, being on a project where I can help craft the story as well, it's the most fulfilling part of my job because it's not just the design, it's actually helping inform the story that goes into it and then thinking different ways to connect with the audience because it's psychology. It's, I mean, it's a performance. A presentation is a performance.

Yeah, totally.

You know, any any kind of stage theater. It's, it's got a lot of different aspects to it.

Yeah, it's, it's interesting. One of my clients, um, they used to do their presentation design, they like design their decks on their own team and then send it off kind of for approval and sort of polishing. And, um, and then I came in and I was like, okay, whoa, change that, and we'll do this differently, and blah blah blah. And then So they, then they, they were owning it all themselves for a long time. And then their corporate office eventually brought in this new brilliant team of designers and their focus was on PowerPoint. Like they were going to just, because they do so many presentations, they were like, okay, we're going to, you know, shift this to the next level and, and started designing these beautiful decks. I mean, I was like, these are awesome. Love it, love this, love that. But then we, we started, um, it started becoming a real challenge because as I was working with the speakers on the content, it would change and evolve what was happening in the deck, of course, because these two things grow and evolve together. And they wanted to write the content for the speakers. And I started saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, like this, it needs to come from the speaker and then it goes to you and then it can come back to us. Like, this is such an evolutionary process. And once we did that once, like once I kind of helped mediate that whole thing back and forth, they were like, oh, okay. Cool, okay, we can trust you to develop good content. Because I think for the most part they're working with people who are just like, they don't know how to write and develop content. And as they're trying to build the deck, they're like, well, we need a sense of where this is going, what's the story, what's the point, blah blah blah. Um, so it was a really interesting exchange because I'd never met designers who took that seriously, who took the content development as a part of their job before? Because of course it is.

Yeah.

But it can't be done in isolation.

Yeah. Designing in a vacuum is one of the most dangerous things you can do.

Hmm.

Yeah.

Say more about that. Like what, what have you seen?

Well, I mean, I've been in both worlds. I started out as a single designer wearing all of the hats. And then I went into, you know, a corporate environment. We had a giant team of designers and our whole team was designers and writers. And when you're, when you're in a vacuum, you don't get that feedback. And sometimes if you're in a vacuum and you're not directly with the client, you don't sit with them or know them well. I mean, you're just taking so much into your own hands. Even if you know the brand, even if you have that down pat, you can get something stuck in your head and no one can give you alternate points of view. You need someone to have that thing that you didn't think of, you know. Um, and that's what I loved working with a big group of designers and writers because I mean, the designers, they came up with all kinds of things you didn't think of, but since I'm a designer, you know, they didn't really— I mean, we would catch the big things sometimes, but when you got with the writers who think completely differently, they're like, well, did you think of this and this? And what about this? And you're like, oh my gosh, I know, that's a really good point. So how can we, you know, solve for that? It's just having different people people to bounce ideas off of is like one of the biggest, most important things you can have in your toolbox as a designer.

And of course that can be incredibly powerful, but also things can get messy really quickly. And all of a sudden there's so many voices that you can hear in one person's presentation. It's like, clearly this is coming from corporate and this is coming from marketing and this Coming from communications, right?

And that's why, yeah, it takes, it takes a strong but humble personality to be a really excellent, uh, not just designer, like communications designer. You have to have that filter and be confident and know what questions to ask, but also be able to put your designer ego aside and and just, you know, actually think about the feedback you're given and dig deeper and incorporate it even though it goes against maybe something that you really believe in. Design-wise, you know, this is not about me, it's about my clients.

So, yeah, and ultimately they're the ones who are standing up there and have to deliver this, and it has to support what they're saying and doing. And so I think You know, it is, it's just a really interesting challenge that I think a lot of people are dealing with and facing without a lot of guidance. Would you agree?

Yeah. Oh, completely. Completely. And I don't think a lot of, I don't think there's, um, a lot of training that is specifically targeted towards a presentation designer, storyteller. And especially when you have the presenters, they know what they have to deliver. They know what they want the audience to do, but they just don't know how to get there. You have to be able to sit with them and tease information out and suggest alternate ways to— OK, well, maybe you can connect with them like this. If this, then that.

Yeah, I mean, in a lot of ways, the corporate communications designers are a coach. Like they take the place of a coach, like somebody like me who can sometimes gets pulled in and can help sort of integrate and mediate all of these different voices so that, you know, when the time comes and the presenter stands up, they feel ready and clear and everything that's going on behind them on the screen is really supporting what they're saying and It's an evocative, emotive experience for everybody. That's— it's hard, but it's fun, right?

It is, because it's so rewarding, because it's that aha moment you get at the end. And it's not just from the audience, it's like the audience gets it and you're like so satisfied that you helped make that happen. But it's also when, when the speaker gets it, if they're having trouble with some things. So when there are two aha moments, it's like It's like the little— it's icing on the cake.

Yeah, totally. Yeah, it's very meta. There's a lot of meta transformation that happens in this, which is what I love about it. Okay, cool. Steffi, let's talk about the Guild a little bit. What are you doing? Tell me about this Guild. I know obviously I'm a Guild member and it's been really cool to just dip my feet in so far. But tell, you know, the people who are listening, such a wide range of people and varying levels of experience. Some of them speak as a part of their job, they're professionals, and then some people, they, they do some speaking but might not consider themselves speakers. So tell us about the Guild and how you service people.

The Guild, see, it's, it's my baby project. It's so— I'm so happy to be working on it. Um, it's a place where anybody who's involved with presentation creation or delivery. It's where the tribe lives. It's where our people are. Like, I know you talked to Rick already and he has the summit and we have this amazing community once a year for, you know, about a week and we get together. But the Guild is supposed to fill the, you know, we're, we're that all year round. So anybody who is part of the Guild comes in and you automatically have like experts there. You have beginners, you have, it's just a wide mix of everything. So you can ask any question and we do our best to help you out, you know, with technical or with, you know, services or clients or, you know, freelancing issues. It's, it's— but it's all presentation-based, centric. Um, and our goal is— we have a few goals. It's, it's one, we want a really great place for you to network so you have the people— you have us to come to when you have a problem. But I think our biggest thing is that we want to elevate the presentation profession. We want it to be as respected as, you know, your UX designer or your, you know, any other high-level design that you think of. We don't want people to go kicking and screaming into presentation field like I did. So we want to, you know, help people understand that presentations doesn't just mean bullets on a slide. It's this whole experience. And we want the whole industry and the whole, you know, all of the industries, whether it's corporate or nonprofit or what have you, to understand what really and truly goes into an amazing presentation. So we're trying to elevate that. We're going to do that by, you know, creating standards for designing a presentation and then creating a certificate program so you can actually earn certification to say, look, I am an amazing presentation designer. This is why you should hire me. And, and, and it's, it's sad because I think a lot of presentation designers, um, across the country are getting woefully underpaid compared to their general design counterparts. But sometimes I think that there's a lot more that goes into a presentation than goes into some other bits of design. So there's a complete imbalance there. So we want to evolve it and elevate it on many different levels. Um, and that's, you know, that's one of the hugest things that we have, right? You know, and then promoting learning. So we've got a lot of courses and stuff. So it's just kind of like We know, the ones of us who are in this niche community, we know how awesome it is and we love it. And we want everybody else to know that too.

So the people who come and join the Guild, they're— it's mostly an online community, is that right?

Yes. And for now it's, it's mostly online. And then a lot of A lot, I think a lot of the members tend to at least one point in their life go to the Presentation Summit. So we get to meet people in person as well. Right. You know, eventually, once we're all established and big, it'd be really cool if we had, you know, local chapters or things like that, meetups and things so that we can, you know, commiserate in person. Totally.

Yeah, that'd be fun.

Have you—

I know, I know, there's— it's been fun, I think, to hop in there and just hear the various backgrounds that people have. I mean, I, I will say, when I hopped on there at first, I thought, oh, am I the only non-designer here? No, there's so many people where that's, you know, the deck is sort of the, the place where everyone was born in the guild, you know, like born out of the deck, you know. And I'm— I come at it from such a different direction. I know the deck's important, but it, to me, it's such a side thing, um, that I was like, I don't know if I belong. Do I belong in the guild? Yes, you definitely belong.

Yeah. And, and we want, we want all aspects in there because that way, you know, if you are just I mean, not just, that's a bad word. If you are solely like a presentation designer and you just do the design, it's, you come in and you have this perspective from all the other aspects of that presentation you may be working on. So you, you get to hear the perspective from the speaking, from the coaches, from the speakers, from the tech people, the people running the show, you know, and We have coders in there who write the add-ins for the software you're working on. We've got, I mean, runs the gamut and all different kinds of like sectors in the field— corporate, government, education. It's, it's fascinating hearing the different ways presentations are viewed in the different sectors too. So it's a really cool, it's a really cool mix.

Yeah, it's, it's much broader than I think people assume or, right? I, you know, looking from the outside, especially given the roots, um, of, of a lot of the kind of lead people in the guild, that you're like, okay, this is like a corporate business, uh, PowerPoint kind of slide deck thing. But, but then you have a conversation with someone and say, oh no, this is a much broader— there's so much more breadth, there's so much more um, understanding of the artistry of it as a whole. And sort of like you said, how you develop the performance of it, because it all works together. You need all these different aspects. It's a way more complicated field than I think people assume, especially because so many people just do it, right? They, they give presentations as part of their work and they like whip out the, the the deck that, you know, their coworker used last week and— right, yeah, throw a few new slides in there and bam, I'm ready. It's like, oh no.

And that's— and we want everyone to realize, like, the impact you can have with a really well-done presentation. You can change people's mindsets, you can, you can affect change, you can, you can do all kinds of things if you connect with them just Right? So many cool things can happen.

Yeah, it's powerful.

Conversely, if you do it very badly, you know, a lot of bad things can happen. People will forget you or, or, you know, get angry. But we're striving for the, the top side there.

Yeah, it's funny, I've— uh, who was I talking to who was saying— oh, you know what it was? It was Leah Pika. Do you know Leah Pika?

I love her. Peace bites.

She's amazing. The conversation she and I had, she said, at every turn in my career, what kicked it off was a good presentation, a presentation I nailed that I felt super, like, proud of, and I invested a lot of time and energy in. And that's the thing that launched her to the next place. And I, I think that's just a great reminder because The expectations tend to be pretty low in the business world, um, sadly, and that allows people to kind of just get by. But when you can invest yourself and do something really powerful, then it can catapult you in a different direction.

It's— it really can. It's, it's amazing. And, and one of my favorite things to do when I'm sitting at my desk and I don't need to concentrate really hard. Um, I'll put some TED Talks on in the background and just see what kind of inspiration I can find.

Yeah, osmosis. Let it just osmosis in.

Yeah, exactly.

Sometimes I spent my entire master's degree, um, while I was working in my master's degree, like laptop, and I was super pregnant at the time with my first, like, huge And I was eating ice cream and working on my laptop.

This sounds dreamy, keep talking.

On my belly. It was amazing. And then I had The West Wing going on in the background. Just on loop. And it would be like, I can't tell you how many times I've watched it. And it would, I think, I thought it was just all that, all that writing would just seep in osmosis and brilliance would end up on in my thesis. I don't know if that happened, but we'll go with yes. Yeah, let's, let's just go with yes. Let's just say it happened. It was amazing, but the ice cream was fabulous.

It was good.

Yeah, thank you. Okay, so Steffi, before we shift to a This Moved Me moment, what I want to do is hear from you kind of your three biggest tips for people who are maybe in their day-to-day working on the design of a presentation? What are kind of your 3 go-to tips that you send off to people?

Um, my 3 biggest ones are, okay, well, always give options. So we'll get something in a slide of communication and, you know, they have a story to tell clearly, but they, they have not put it on, in, on the slide very well. So always provide options. I'll give them the cleaned up version of what they're asking for, and then I'll give them the 'I think this is really going to connect with the audience' version. Um, so always give that. If you, if you're thinking, oh my God, why did they do this? There's such a better way to do it. Um, It may, you know, I don't know, and maybe someone's never told you to go ahead and give an option, but always give them that, that option that you have, because chances are if you're working on a presentation so much, you know, it's part of your job, you kind of pick up what, what feels right and what doesn't. And you get the gist because it's hard to avoid learning what the presentation is about when you're working on them. But always give, always give that I think this is going to work a million times better for you, because chances are they're going to go with that one. Cool.

That's great.

But so that, you know, give the options. Ask questions is number 2. Actually, that should probably be number 1, but always ask questions because if you don't understand it, don't just like clean it up and design it into your corporate template or your brand or what have you. If it doesn't quite make sense, always ask the question because you know what? Chances are there's a deeper story there. It always happens. So I started mandating the sit-down with, for presenters who are, you know, doing a medium to high-level presentation. I would ask for a kickoff meeting and we'd sit down and I'd have them go through their story because, you know, it got to the point where I was constantly picking up the phone and calling. Let's just get this over with in the beginning. Because I know there's more story in there that you're letting on. So, you know, there's that one. And then, you know what, always push boundaries. Number 3, I, I push boundaries constantly because I don't, I don't like to, to sit in the boring mold and just do the same thing day after day. And I don't want the people I work with to do it either, because I think when you push boundaries, and you take the chances and the risks, you have some— I mean, it gives you such a bigger opportunity to affect change, to, to have something really amazing happen. So I constantly push and sometimes I have to pull back, but usually it works out. So, so always just go a little further, push a little harder, or, you know, if they're like, oh, I don't know, don't just give in. Just push back one more time and see what happens.

I love that. Yes. Super on board with this.

I think, yeah, if you feel really strongly about it, you know, what's the worst they can do? They can say no, right?

Yep.

Then you're like, okay, all right then. Those are my 3 tips.

Oh, I love it. Okay. Uh, always give options, ask questions, and push boundaries. I like that.

Yeah.

I think that's great. It's to me, in my mind. We don't do enough of that is that we sort of accept this is how we do it. This is the way it always goes. And the truth is that it's because nobody has created something else. And if you have another idea, you could create the new this is how we do it. Right. We could use some new this is how we do it.

I think.

Yes, I think so too. Okay, cool. So Stephanie, I just called you Steph-a-nee.

I know, it's so weird, especially when, uh, the Presentation Guild folk, they call me Stephanie. I'm like, stop that.

Okay, so it is time for a This Moved Me moment, something that has moved you recently so that we as speakers and presenters and designers and people in the field can stay inspired so we can bring that into our work?

Yes.

All right.

Oh, I found one.

Okay, go for it.

It left me weeping at my desk, and it's probably nothing anybody should ever watch at work. Um, although I find that after being a mother, I weep a lot more, you know, than I used to.

Totally. Uh, me too.

But there was, there was this talk by a young woman at an event called One Young World, and she was from North Korea, or is from North Korea. But this is— I mean, the talk was from 2014, but I just saw it last week for the first time.

Okay.

And I cried. All she talked about was her struggle to escape North Korea, um, and what it was like living there and the hell she went through getting out with her and her mother. And describing, you know, just describing in detail how she couldn't stop from crying, and she was just adamant about getting that story out so that people were aware that North Korea is— yeah, it's that country way over there and it's dark and we don't really know what's going on in there.

Yeah.

But she wanted everyone to know that people are struggling and desperate to be heard, to So everybody knows what's really going on. And I cried like a baby because, I mean, of course, now that I'm a mom, thinking if that were me with my daughter trying to escape hardship like that, oh my gosh, I can't even imagine having my child go through that. So yeah, it was so passionate and open and just her true raw story. That came out.

I love it. Yeah, passionate, open, true, raw. Those are all, gosh, the kind of descriptors that you want. Yeah, if you're gonna—

I mean, it was so powerful. I mean, I don't, I don't know who wouldn't connect with that or who wouldn't have a little glimmer of flutter of feeling in their chest just listening to her, um, describe her reality is. Wow.

Oh, I can't wait to—

I can't wait to hear it.

Would you send me the link and I'll put it on our show notes?

I will send it. Uh, yeah, because I think just the way she told her story, no matter what your political beliefs are, what your background is, it's just how her story came out just makes you feel things. And makes you kind of awaken a little bit like, oh, okay, I need to get out of my bubble. I need to help my fellow human being, even if I can't help this girl, you know?

Right. Right. Oh, man. So it really moved you to action. I love that.

Yeah. So now I'm going to try and get my kids to do some community service now because they need to be aware, too.

So I know. I know that's our— I think a big challenge of us here in the United States is just to keep our, our eyes and our kids' eyes on the bigger picture because they think they have it so rough sometimes. I know, you know, I'm hearing echoes of like my parents with me when I was little, you know, just There are kids in Ethiopia who don't have anything to eat.

Eat your peas.

It's so abstract, right, though? That's so such an abstract thing. And so how do we, like, a talk like this or giving people an experience, a face-to-face experience so that they can understand?

Well, and that's what the world is. I think that's why I'm such a technophile, because And I know I have some friends who are like, you know, technology is horrible, it's ruining the world. And I'm like, while I agree that some of it isn't so good, yeah, and it's being put to poor use, it's also opened up so many doors. And would I have ever seen this North Korean young woman give this talk? Never. I never in a million years would have had access to that. So being able to get those powerful stories out to anybody, thank you to the internet and technology.

Yeah.

It's amazing. Now I can watch all those powerful talks and everything can move me. It's, you know, thank you, tech.

Totally.

Yeah.

I've never seen it from that perspective. You're right. Thank you, technology. Yeah. Cool. Okay. Well, my This Moved Me moment is a little, well, I have to admit that I watch America's Got Talent.

Oh, I, yeah, I do too. Okay, good.

I don't watch it consistently, but every once in a while I'll get sort of sucked into a different story or a different person and kind of follow them along. And there was a woman on the other night who is a musician and she's also deaf.

Yes, I saw it.

Did you see this?

It was amazing.

Oh my gosh. I was so— it made me cry too at the end because I just kept trying to imagine what it's like for her to stand up there singing, and she's playing the ukulele, and she's singing, and she cannot hear. Yeah, and she sounded beautiful.

She blew my mind. My jaw was open the whole time.

I know, I just, I thought, oh my gosh, what the American spirit can do, or the human spirit, not just the American spirit, but the human spirit. Like, she And then her song was called Try, and it was about essentially her own journey that she, after she went deaf at like age 20 or 19, I think, she gave up on music because she was like, I can't hear it. How am I supposed to, you know, I'm sort of imagining her thinking this, but like, how do I do this if I can't hear? And then she worked her way back into it and just found a way. She was determined. She was, you know, I'm just in awe of that because, you know, things happen in life and then what do we do? What do we do with that? It is really so much more up to us than I think we realize, rather than just throwing up our hands and being like, well, I guess I'll never do that again, you know. And it's— I'm sure it's totally different and not the what she wants it to be, and yet she's finding a way. I don't know. Yeah, I can't wait to hear more about her story. I cannot wait to sort of watch her and see what else, um, she has to bring to the world. I just think it's—

yeah, I'll buy her album.

Totally.

Just needs to get it out.

Oh, she will. She's got Simon in her corner. I know. Oh my gosh, Steffi, this has been really fun, and I have to go because in like 10 minutes I'm hopping on Facebook Live and doing one of my mini workshops over on Facebook Live.

Oh sweet, that's awesome.

Yeah, so When we scheduled this, I was like, I can do that. I can do that. I can hop right over. No problem. I got this. Now I'm like, oh my gosh, I gotta go. Hey, movers. It's Sally. That was so fun, huh? Steffi, Steffi Lewis. She's great. Luke, what did you think of Steffi?

Meh.

Harper, how about you?

Meep.

Meep. Met and meep. Oh, rave reviews, Steffi. You don't know this, but those are rave reviews from my children who are with me here this morning as I am quickly recording a little, um, closing to Steffi's show because I had one recorded when Steffi and I did this, but then we have a discount for you listeners of This Moved Me so that you can, if you want, take advantage of the Presentation Guild membership with 10% off, la la la la la, which is awesome. So if you go to presentationguild.org and use the code TMM2017special, then you can get 10% off of a Presentation Guild membership, which is so cool. It's a really amazing community of people There's tons of resources, and in terms of being in the industry, there's lots of great reasons in order to be a part of it. So I would love for you to be a part of it and for you to see me, to see you there, right? What do you think, guys? Cool. Meep, meep, meep, and cool. Once again, rave reviews. From the Zimney children here at 7:45 in the morning. You can hear I've got a little bit of a cold, but I'm getting over it. This is the best I've sounded in a week after I came home from the Presentation Summit, which was a blast. If you haven't heard that episode, hear me talk about all the great stuff happening there. It was amazing, but then my body fell apart. Well, first I gave a TEDx Next talk, and then my body fell apart. My son's looking for Kleenex. There's some right about 5 feet in front of you. Go! Kids, they're the best, aren't they? So funny. Okay, that's it for me. So many more, we've got some amazing people coming down the pipe that I'm really excited to share with you so that we can keep this inspiration and insight going. And if you have not yet checked out, I did some cool stuff on my website. I'd love for you to check it out. There's a quiz that you can take called What Kind of Speaker Are You? Because I do think that there's a really broad range as I've done this work over the last few decades. There's such a broad range of who we are as speakers and the different roles that we play and how we can really utilize our strengths as speakers and what we need, the kind of support that we need. And so I've really thought about the different buckets of people that I work with and what is most helpful for you. So if you're curious about for yourself, what bucket do I sit in and what are some things that would be most helpful for me on my journey, well, go check it out. It's over at thismoveme.com. I would love to see you over there. All right, thanks friends. Oh my gosh, there's so loud too. Kids love them. You want to say goodbye, Harper?

Meep.

Meep.