Ep. 195 What's Your One Thing?

Hey there, Mark Brown, what's your one thing?

The one thing you need to do in every presentation? That's a good question, my friend.

Actually, it's not even that.

Anyone can give a presentation. Few deliver unforgettable presentations. What's the difference? You're about to find out. Welcome to the Unforgettable Presentations podcasts with your hosts, world champion speakers and coaches, Mark Brown.

Mark Brown, your life tells a story and there's someone out there who needs to hear it.

And Darren Lacroix. And Darren Lacroix.

Stage time, Stage time. Stage time.

Ready for some powerful presentation, Ahas. Let's dive right in.

And first, right off, I apologize to our mentor, Patricia Fripp, for using the word thing. But in this situation, I felt it was the best word to communicate our thought and get you curious.

That's right.

So this is, and I've got to also give credit as a reminder to a book called Smart Brevity that reminded me of this. Now, this is something I've been doing for years, long before I heard of this book. But I was like, oh, that's a good, good thing. I think we take it for granted. So here's the idea that in your speech, using the line, but also getting clear on what your one thing is, look, they're not going to take away everything. They're not going to remember everything that for 45 minutes you talked about. But what is the one thing that you know you'll make an impact on their life if they just get this. So even verbalizing that in your speech, look, by saying look, if you don't get anything else from me, get this, you say that line and people are gonna, you know, Scooby Doo it. Their ears will open to absorb that idea. Now, for me, depending on the presentation. And by the way, if you have different keynotes, each keynote may have a different one thing, right? But you got to get clear on what's that one idea, that one concept, that one strategy and see, thing covers all of those. Yeah, principle, principle, essential, secret, whatever it is. But what's that one thing? And you've got to get clear on it that they may not remember all the other points, but what's that one? And do you prompt them to open their ears, Scooby Doo it that they get it that there's such clarity in your presentation. And by the way, everything's built around delivering that. But we've also got to just state it. Here's what I'm saying. Aesop's moral of the story, the moral of your presentation. And for me, for my, let's say, trademark keynote, it's never turn down stage time. Stage time, Stage time, Stage time. If I can leave you with one thing, it's this Never turn down stage time. And by the way, there should be a heartbeat pause before it, a heartbeat pause after it, thus raising it up. Love the old the U2 lyrics scream without raising your voice by holding a space for it and putting it on what we call the pause pedestal to hold it up, show its importance, and then in the delivery of it, we should change our pace.

Yeah, I call it putting some air around it. Air before. Yeah, it stands out by itself. And there's one big caution here, Darren. I'm glad you mentioned this about just one, because in recent weeks, you know, I've been coaching clients for years now, and in recent weeks I've had clients who come with a presentation and towards the end they say, well, is that message clear? And we take a look at the presentation and we realize they really have two one things trying to share with the audience. And that can lead to some kind of confusion. But I applaud the client who realizes it's not really that clear. What am I really saying? So it behooves all of us to really examine our presentations. Are we completely clear on the one thing that we have to say? And to reinforce what you said earlier, Darren, it's not enough for us to believe it's implied. Well, enough for the audience to get it. They might, but don't depend on the implication, rather depend on the declaration. Don't depend on the implication, depend on the declaration. I want to write that down. Don't depend.

Nice.

The implication, rather on the declaration. Here's what. Some will get it, some will get it, but some. May I tell people, talk me like I'm five years old. Insulting you are not insulting your audience when at times you do talk to them like they're five years old. I remember when I was doing a keynote for Toastmaster some years ago, and I wanted to make sure to reinforce one clear point around the mark ism called the forgettery. And I was watching a video recently of a clip from that speech and I said, if I can leave you with one, I want to leave you with one specific idea. And it's this. I actually said one specific idea and it's this. Activate your forgettery. Wow. As Darren says, when you say just one thing, one idea, if I can leave you with anything, I'll leave you with this. And it's interesting because one of Our friends, a dear friend, great speaker, speaker named Craig Valentine was giving a presentation back in 1999. As he ended his talk, he was talking about the value of silence and reflection. And he said, more than anything else, I could leave you. I want to leave you with this. Silence. I want to leave you with this. I will give you this specific idea and I recommend not just saying it, not only saying it once. It's useful to have it repeated at some point in time. Now some people may use it twice or three times, but if you give the idea and then you say it one more time and reinforce becomes very, very clear to the five year old mind like mine exactly what that one specific idea, concept, principle, practice, strategy, procedure, choose your noun carefully. Give us grace with the word thing in this case, but declare it, don't just imply it.

Yeah, brilliant, Mark. And what we're saying too is like you bring it up during your speech, right? But then at the end you hold it up. There you go, Mark, there's another one.

Bring it up early, hold it up.

And then hold it up before your close or as part of your close. And Mark, you just reminded me of a story I remember hearing. I think it was the one minute manager, Ken Blanchard, and I think it was his wife that came up with the idea that like if you're writing a book for managers, you gotta like write a children's book and you gotta make it simple and easy. And that's what we're saying, like you've got number one, you gotta have the clarification yourself that if they leave with this one idea, it's gonna change their trajectory, it's gonna change their perspective because they, you know, when I talk about presentations, they hear techniques, techniques and try this and storytelling, all these ideas. But the biggest habit, like my license plate in Las Vegas is stage time. The one habit that brought me here, I still needed techniques, I still needed other things. But it's that experience that I was saying that my mentor said, any day you turn down stage time and is a day that you don't grow. So that was the bringing it up. But at the end I hold it up and say, look, if you get nothing else, get this Stage time, stage time, stage time. I'm known around the world because I get clarity on what's that one thing. So again, each keynote of yours or each workshop, you could have a separate one thing for each of them. But in that individual experience with that audience, not only get clear on your one thing, but then hold it up.

And the thing is, when you hold that one thing up, you give the audience time to receive it, to process it, and to write it down. You want your audience to pick a note of that, write it on a piece of paper, put it in their mobile device, whatever, whatever tool they use as a means of remembering it. And the beauty is, when you stated earlier in the presentation, it becomes a callback and a reinforcement of the single idea that you want them to adopt and even maybe adapt for their own purposes, but stated before, reinforce it as a callback. And now that one idea becomes a principle that they can begin to apply. And here's a request I have for you, Darren, for myself, and for our audience as well. Whatever that particular principle, idea, practice, that one thing may be, as far as possible, make it actionable immediately. Make it something they can begin to do today to begin to change their lives, change their circumstance, change their procedures, or to make progress and develop as they go forward. If it is a leadership principle, can they begin to apply that afternoon? Think about it. The more quickly they can apply that one thing, the more quickly they can put into practice and the more quickly it will become a, Darren says, a habit that they can begin to use day after week after month after year for the rest of their lives. So think about this carefully. Is my one thing immediately applicable to and actionable? If you can do that, then you'll have impact and begin to make a difference to the members of your audience.

And Mark, we always hear the cliche, if I could just help one person, it's worth it. Well, we're saying if you could just help every person with one thing, that would be much better than just helping one and hoping other people get your message. And Mark, I would love to go deeper and belabor the point, but I think we're pretty clear your one thing is your one thing. And this podcast is about your one thing. My one thing. If I'm talking about humor, that it's. Look, you gotta test humor. Great speeches aren't written, they're rewritten. If I can just get them to walk away. Great jokes aren't written, they're rewritten. When we see someone on the Tonight show, someone on a comedy special, we're seeing the end result of a lot of mistakes and a lot of testing. So if I can just get the idea across that they need to test it almost like in the stage time, they need to get on stage to get that experience. If I can plant that one seed, I will get them to have more experience, try more things, and then they will make more Progress.

So that's correct. Now here's the hardest part, Darren, for me and I suspect for those who are listening or perhaps watching this podcast. And it is this, it is the decision. What is the one thing for this presentation? As you know me, Darren, I often preach this line. When you are selective, you will be effective. And many of us will have a presentation with three main points around a premise or an idea. And what can happen is we get caught up in the best ideas that we can use to reinforce our premise. And sometimes without meaning to, we are giving the audience three one things. So here is the task I have for myself first and for all of us. Let's revisit our current presentations. If you're preparing a new one right now. And yes, we always say you have a premise at your main idea, get clear on that. But all too often, as we come to our conclusions, we have so much to offer the audience, we're giving them a call to action with three parts to it. That does happen. I'm asking you to distill your message down. If you as, as Fripp says, if you had only 45 seconds and not, you know, a whole hour for the keynote, keynote, what would you say? It's principle. Let's distill everything down. Everything I'm going to spend the next 48 minutes on is based on this one thing. And if my audience does not get my one thing, and clearly I'm not clear with that, if you're a Toastmaster, test it with a Toastmasters audience and do Darren Lacroix test, ask them what they think, but do not lead the witness, don't give any evidence and find out what is the one thing you derived. What's the one principle, the one idea? What's the one strategy that you got from my presentation that you know, you can begin to implement immediately if they can tell you that you're on the right track, if you get three different answers, then clearly it's not just one thing. These are practical ways for us to determine if our intent is, has been realized, if our mission and goal is successful. And much of the background work is this kind of testing and tweaking to make sure with your focus group or your test audience that you are being effective, that you are sharing with them just one thing.

All right? So without belaboring the point, it's your one thing. Get clear on your one thing and you're more likely to be unforgettable. Join us next week. Tell your friends about this podcast who are presenters, please. We love what we do and we want to help you help your audience and help the world. Next week we're going to talk about unforgettable preparation. You want to be unforgettable on stage. There's one idea, one thing about your preparation that's critical. But today your one thing is your one thing. Your one thing is our one thing. Mark Brown, take us home.

We'll see you next week. Don't forget, just tell us your one thing.

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