Ep. 20 What's the Most Important Component of Your Presentation?

Hey, Darren, I had a talk with a client last week and I asked them a simple question. I said, what do you think is the most important part of your presentation? Can you guess what they said?

I love that question, but I'm guessing they were incorrect. I have been asking that question since 2001 to my audiences. And I hear you're opening, you're closing. Oh, no, no, no, no. Your message, no. The audience. And they're always wrong. These aren't bad things. They're just not important. Mark, do you know what the most important part of the presentation is?

Let me guess.

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 us 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.

I'm going to guess that you're going to tell us.

Good guess. Nice job. Lean in if you're listening. If you give presentations, if you're a pastor, if you're a corporate presenter, if you're a professional speaker, we've got to understand this. The most important part of the presentation is the thought process in the listener's mind.

Mi like the thought process in the listener's mind. Now that sounds almost crazy and very mental and very cerebral. How in the world can I possibly know what's on the minds of 500 or 1,000 or 5,000 people? Darren, come on.

Well, we always know what we're thinking and what we're trying to say. But what we need to learn through feedback, through qualified feedback, through thought and felt feedback, is what are they thinking when we say this? What do they think when we ask this? What goes on in their mind? We've got to understand that's the reason we're there.

So you said the thought process in the listener's mind. What you're saying, therefore, Darren, is when we deliver our messages, we are hoping to inspire thought, to get the audience to think, to change their feeling, to get new ideas, to adopt new ideas and concepts. So when that process takes place, we have to give them room to allow that process to come to maturity, so to speak. How do we do that, Darren?

Do you know how to do that?

Well, you tell me.

I am. I just did the one thing you don't do on a podcast. Or on the radio is dead air. But in that world, it's dead air. In our world, it's the opportunity for gold. It's the pause. So we're not saying the pause is the most important, but we need to do the pause, allow the audience to think. Think. If they're not processing, if they're not reflecting on what we said, if we're not actively engaging their brain, then we are, in fact, letting them down. And we're not doing what we came to do, which is deliver our message, deliver our perspective, the thought or the idea that you're selling. We need to let them think. And it's really hard because we as presenters think we're failing sometimes if there's silence.

Yeah, it's funny you mentioned dead air. I was at an NSA event in Minnesota last week. I was doing some training on platform skills, and there were two individuals in the room who had a background in radio. And I used the term dead air, which in radio means the pause. The silence between the words, the music and the commentary. And I could see one guy, he shook his head like, no, no, no, no, no, no. You can't have. You cannot have dad.

Not allowed.

Yeah, you can't do that. But. But I have to go back to the wisdom shared with me and with us by one of our great mentors, Patricia Fripp, the first woman president of the nsa, and she made a comment about the way our listeners can hear and learn. And I can't do a Fripp accent as well as you can, Darren, so please share with us Allah Fripp, her wisdom regarding learning during the pause.

She says true learning happens in moments of reflection. Ah.

And the reflection happens if you give the audience time to reflect. That's one reason why a pause is so important. Some people think you pause to catch a breath, you pause to compose your next thought, and that may be true. But in service to your audience, you want to pause to give them time to reflect on what you have said. And one of our problems as presenters is sometimes, Darren, we have this great zeal. We want to give the audience the benefit of everything we have done. We want to share our message. We want the audience to get it. And we've worked so hard to prepare all these wonderful points and illustrations and examples and stories, and it's wonderful. And we can. And toss it out there like word vomit, and we want them to get it.

Word vomit. I'm telling you, man, not a term we hear from you often. I love it, though. It's got a visual that goes along with it. For those of you listening to the audio version of the podcast and those.

Over 50, just think the Exorcist, you'll get the idea. If you're a parent of a young child under one year old or under three, you might get the idea as well. But, you know, similarly, I was also teaching at an NSA chapter in Texas recently, in Houston, and I was doing live coaching as part of my program, which Aaron and I love to do. And one of the presenters got up and opened with a. But she was just barreling through that story. So we do our normal. Stop. What's going on here? She said to me, well, I only have so much time. I want to tell the story, and I want to get to my main point first. Wait a second. The story will elicit emotion and get the audience connected to you. You need to take a breath. Breathe. It's okay. You don't need to be the world's fastest and most prolific talker. And surprisingly, for an NSA professional, that was an aha for her, because we know we have worked so hard. Darren, I want the audience to get this. The irony is they get it when you get quiet and allow them to get it. I understand there's a term in Boston for that. What is that, Darren?

Yes. Those of you listening, I am a native of the Boston area, grew up there until I was 35. And we have this phrase that we're known for. So I'm gonna for forgiveness here, but it's very direct, and it makes the point. In order to let the audience reflect, you and I need to shut up, Shut up, shut up. My mentor, David Stroud used to say, how do you do that? You stop moving your lips. I'm overly logical. But the truth of the matter is, it's challenging. And Mark and I get that. We understand it. We had to learn this the hard way ourselves. It's not easy to have the confidence to. To let silence resonate. We've got to have the confidence. There's a keeper for you, Mark. We've got to have the confidence to let the silence resonate. That was the theme of Craig Valentine's semifinal speech was about just that. Silence.

Oh, no. Final in 99. It was final.

Finals in 99.

Confidence to let the silence resonate.

Ooh.

Darren said resonate. I'm loving this.

I had to look it up quickly. But no, I mean, if they're not thinking, then we're not connecting. And we've got to let them have that opportunity to reflect, almost absorb that point and Then we go to our next point and we even have to force ourselves. We need. As the presenter, we need to know when they need to absorb. We need to know when they need to absorb. When you get people going, mm, that should be an indicator. Okay, That's a place we gotta make sure everybody gets it. A few people got it, but we. When you're getting that audible, mmm, that's an indicator of. You just transferred a new perspective. You just gave an aha. We call them keepers as well. You just gave a keeper. So let everybody get it. And if we know what we're doing, if we're the experts, we have to have the ability to stand on stage in silence and let them get it. That's why we're there.

Well, Darren, you made a really great point. You said we need to know when they need to absorb is the thing for us to know that. It means we need to be paying attention to our audiences. Because, friends, when you present, your audience is communicating with you, maybe tacitly, in that they aren't telling you, hey, Darren, stop for a second. I need to really ruminate. I need to think about that. They won't verbally tell it to you, but as you watch, your audiences don't just look for laughs and how they're gonna hi fi their friends. So you wanna look at how their minds are responding. They'll give you nods. You'll see a few chin strokes. You see a pen, go to a paper, they'll get their phone and make a note. In a conference setting, they have notepads and pencils. You see them writing down, they're telling you, we've got a keeper here. And when the audience tells you, I want to make note of this, as Darren says, shut up. Allow them to process and don't forget. Now, different learning styles. Some hear it, they absorb it, others need to write it down. Watch your audience. If 75% are writing, they're telling you, I want to take note of this. Please be quiet while I make a notation on my recording device. Thank you very much. In our language, that's called pause. Let them learn, let them absorb, and let them write it down. If they're doing that, we have to be aware and be vigilant. Which speaks, Darren, to one more thing. What can we do during a pause to make sure the impact is maximized? I mean, I heard one time we were talking about this and you said, many of us are so quick to rush through the pause, when in fact we ought to elevate the pause and the term you used was. We need to put the point on the pause pedestal.

Yeah.

That came in, you know, delicate, holding the tray up. Where did it come from?

It also. It came from. It was working with you and Dave McElhenney, my other coach at the time, rest his soul. Amazing man. I wouldn't be here today with you if it wasn't for him. He suggested. It's almost like if there's that one line that you want to show its importance, like, never turn down stage time. If we want to show its importance, what we do. And listen to the words. He said, put a three heartbeat pause before the word or phrase and a three heartbeat pause after it. The reason he uses the word heartbeat is it's our feeling, our connection. Just feel the three seconds. Don't go. Okay, 1001, 1002, 1003. Okay, go. Or one Mississippi, two Mississippi. Rush the passer. No, we've got to feel it. And I love the lyrics of the song from U2. It's Scream without raising your voice. Mmm. Scream without raising your voice. You're showing that this is what I want you to get. So, for example, instead of just saying so, the one most important thing I want you to walk away with is stage time. Stage time. Stage time. Okay, that's not bad. That's okay. That's a thought. That's an important thought. But we make it feel to our audience more important when we say, but if you remember nothing else, remember this. Never turn down stage time. That's what I want you to leave with. You know, because we're so tempted to write right before it almost elevates it. And then right after, it lets them absorb it. And so look at your key phrases. Now. You don't want to do this with every phrase. Then it's not important. It becomes cliche in your speech. Oh, that's just their style. You need to understand I need this phrase and I want them to walk away with this phrase and this phrase. Okay, let's give a three heartbeat pause before it and a three heartbeat pause after it. And you may even repeat it.

I forget what movie it was. I don't think it was Ferris Bueller's Day off, but you mentioned pausing after each word. Is a teacher who would. Who would say he would ask a question in what way? And he would pause after every word. That's a bit of.

That's annoying.

Yeah, but the beauty of what you just told us, Darren, is this. With the pause pedestal, you actually isolate the one most important message you want the audience to hear. I just said the three heartbeat pause.

On isolate and elevate.

Ooh, ooh, you're gonna wax eloquent today, Darren.

Oh, my.

He. Surely he does wax eloquent. But yeah, having the three heartbeat paws on either side, they're not bookends. They actually give you room to isolate and elevate that key point. And you dramatically, I dare say exponentially increase the potential for that line, that phrase, that nugget, that pearl of wisdom to resonate with your audience. Because that pause before and after tells me, never turn down stage time. And the words you use, the never is an effective word. So you want to combine the pause with use of language to reinforce the power and the relevance and significance of what you say. The business of the pause pedestal is no smaller, insignificant thing. Friends, you need to grab this, get hold of this, and apply. You might see some significant changes in the way your audience responds to what you have to say.

And also, here's the challenge with not pausing or not pausing long enough. We know. Everyone knows, oh, you must pause. You must pause. You must pause. But they're thinking, and it's erroneously taught at the beginning level of speaking, they're thinking, pause for effect instead of pause for affect. Pause to reflect, Pause to let them reflect. So it's a different intention. And so we've got to look at our speech and say, okay, this is an important point. Here's where I need to let them reflect. Okay, here's where I'm summing it up. And maybe after a foundational phrase or another key indicator is the you focused question. Whenever you asked a you focused question, it should be followed by. By a pause. Why? Because if you're asking a you question and it's rhetorical and you want them to answer in their minds, you're stepping on their thoughts. Don't step on their thoughts. So, for example, Mark, you know the little exercise we do sometimes where we coaching people and we stand behind them and we let the audience, let them hear what the audience is thinking so they can see the idea of stepping on thought. So, Mark, let's just do that real quick. So I'll ask a question mark. Not a question mark, a question comma, mark.

Okay, got it, got it, got it. I got it.

Question mark, question mark. I'll ask you a question. So I'm going to be presenting to the audience, okay? And I am going to not pause and mark, you be the voice of the minds of the audience, okay? So everyone listening, we're going to give you a part, a what to do and what not to do. So let's do what not to do first. So here's. If you don't pause, remember the most important part of the presentation is the thought process in the listener's mind. By the way, if this is resonating with you or, you know, some people who don't pause at all, please forward them this episode. Please let your friends know. All right, so here's what not to do. So question one. And this is the wrong way. And then we'll show you the right way. Okay. I know it's Christmas time. I got my present early soundboard. All right, so here's me on stage. Mark is going to represent the little voice inside the audience's head. So here we are. If you remember nothing else for me, remember the importance of stage time. Stage time. Stage time. Never forget that. Does that make sense to you? So what we're saying here is the.

Yeah.

Hey, hey, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. I got something else important to say.

Where? Oh, I was thinking about your question. I didn't get to answer it in my mind yet.

It was just a simple question. Does that make sense? But the audience. We want to let the audience agree or disagree. Yeah, that makes sense.

That does make sense.

But if I need more stage time. Yeah, if I'm continuing to.

Exactly, exactly what happens. I'm thinking.

Well played.

That makes sense. Really, friends, that is what happens in the audience's mind when you keep talking. They're trying to process and they're trying to come back to you. And at some point you create a disconnect in their brain. I shouldn't use that word as a noun, but there's a disconnection that takes place because they want to answer the question. Feel confident, and then follow along to your next point. If you do not pause, you completely disrupt what's going on in their brain. Now I'm going to pause and let Darren continue.

And they can't hear your next words. If they're trying to think, they can't hear the next words that you're saying. So those just erase them. You might as well pause because they ain't going to hear them anyway. If it's a good question. You mean.

Shut up.

Shut up. If it's a good question. If it's not a good question, then they're not that engaged. But if you have good questions, which we want you to have them, if you're gonna be unforgettable, they're essential to getting the audience to reflect so they can absorb your new perspective. So let's just say, let's take a scenario, forget speaking for a second. So let's just say Mark. So, Mark, I, brand new, never met you. I heard about you. I run into you at Starbucks. How rude would this be if I said so, Mark, just play with me. So you speak out loud like we're having a conversation. All right. It's Mark Brown. Hey, Mark Brown. How are you? Well, me, I'm doing good. I'm a big fan of yours and I'm so thrilled to be able to meet you. Oh, my gosh, Darren Lacroix talks so much about you.

Hey, what is your.

Sorry, what is your favorite mentor? Who did you learn the most from? You know who mine was. Patricia Fripp and Craig Valentine. They're awesome. And Mark, what's your favorite movie?

Oh, you know, I love Rudy. Rudy's a movie called.

Okay.

I couldn't get a word in edgewise.

Exactly.

Sideways. What's up, dude?

And your audience can't get a thought in sideways.

Darren, you need to repeat. That's a keeper.

Your audience can't get a thought in sideways. Front ways, forwards ways if you continue to talk. So if you want to get us to reflect, which is the most important part, again, you've got to let us think. And a truly unforgettable presenter knows that. So, Mark, in my normal keynote, I will go tell my first opening story. I show the video of my introduction. We talked about that on a different episode. Definitely. Check out that podcast. And then it brings me up and I start into my story and then I fade right into my stitches story and go backwards. Use the stage, go backwards. I tell the stitches story, I show the stitches video and then I ask the question. So my whole, let's say 12 and a half minutes is all geared up for this one pause. Now this is me when I'm talking to, say, emerging presenters who may be putting me too high on a pedestal and have a lot of self doubt. So after I show my video of my first time on stage and how bad it was, I turn to the audience and I ask if I can go from that to speaking around the world to doing what I love to do for a living. What can you do? What can you do? Sometimes, depending on the size of the audience, I feel it out. I'll go even longer. But we know this is a podcast and people don't like dead space. Suck it up, buttercup. It's a teaching point. But. But the point is that my whole 12 and a half minutes to lead up to that Is so they answer that question. Wow, I'm already ahead of where he was when he started to get rid of that doubt. And later on at the end, I'll even ask what was the longest pause I had? And no one can identify it. No one. Unless they've heard my program before, no one can identify it. And here's why. They were thinking they were noticing the. They didn't notice the pause because they were deep in thought answering that question in their head. And when I hold that up and point that out, they're like, whoa, well, I gotta know where's the seeds that I need to plant deeply and set it up with a pause. And I use we brought this up earlier. But to go back a little deeper on it. Mark you I said, what do we do during the pause if we're uncomfortable? And I love what Ed Tate taught and teaches is the Ed Tate scan, where if we can be actively doing something, it will help us to be a little more peaceful in that moment. So I'll look and find somebody in the right and make eye contact with them. I'll slowly go over to someone in the middle and make a brief eye contact with them. And then I'll look over to my left and pick one person and make eye contact with them. Now we want to make eye contact with somebody and in your head say, you know, don't say this out loud, but does that make sense? Did you get this? And that way, even my little head shake or head bob, they'll get that I'm. Does that make sense? They'll get the message, but I'm not stepping on the other people who are processing. And everyone processes at a different rate. So we've got to let the people who process more slowly to be able to absorb it too. Otherwise we're making them feel left out. And if we go too quickly, we'll just skim over the point. It could be a brilliant point, but it's not gonna land.

Mark something else. I totally agree. I also saw something else to go a little deeper on that is you may ask either an open ended or a closed ended question. Sometimes your question requires a simple yes, no, an agree, a head shake or a head nod. What Darren just said was his question required them to process an answer. What can you do? The answer isn't a yes or a no. What can you do? Could be I could take the mainstay. Someday I could really build my own business. I could repair my relationship. I really can get that promotion. Whatever the answer may be, they're now Thinking of an answer, not just one word. So be mindful, as Darren says, you can't just say okay for the answer being a yes or a no. I'll give them three heartbeats. Does that make sense? One, two, three. They will say yes or no. But when you ask an open ended question that requires thought and a verbalized sentence answer, you need to give them time to process that, to answer it. And by applying the Ed Tait scan and looking at your audience, communicating with your audience, with your eyes, with your smile, with your face, they're telling you, I'm getting this. And they're telling you, yeah, I got it. Now feel free to continue. We have to fight the urge to fill dead air immediately. It's not about a dead air. It's about the process in their mind and the impact you can have if you allow the process to take its course. It's significant. It may not seem obvious, but oh, it is so important.

And if you're speaking in Jamaica, they're thinking, yeah, man, it's a different thought process.

You had to get to my roots, everything Iron man, don't worry, no problem, man. We can laugh about that. But I can remember when you had a bit of a physical pause when you were competing and you were on face and on the floor during your presentation, and you knew that that particular motion could make your audience uncomfortable. Which brings up a different point here, Darren.

Yeah. If you go ahead, if you go and watch my video on YouTube, watch my winning speech, pay particular attention because this is like a great example of exactly what we're talking about and the fact that I felt it too, and proof I felt it. And it's going to be super subtle, but I want you to see what was going on in my head when I fell on my face at the very beginning in my opening. And I stay down and I'm asking the audience questions and I'm letting them think. And I realize on the last question, right before I deliver My big Mr. Toastmaster line, if you watch my left, I think it's my left foot. Yeah, it shakes. Twitches. It twitches. It's subtle, it twitches. But inside my head, my brain is screaming, get, get up. They're gonna see your bald spot.

Too late.

Yeah. As I'm laying on the stage, face forward towards 2,000 people, and I have Dave McElhenney in my head, and he said, no, Darren, not yet, not yet, not yet. And in that case, full disclosure. In that case, I had to say, 1, 1,000, 2, 1,000, because my heartbeat Was going about a mile a minute. So heartbeats would have been a lot quicker. A lot quicker than seconds. So I was saying, 1, 1, 1,000, 2, 1,000, 3, 1,000. Okay, deliver the line and then bam. But I had to know when the pause was necessary to set up my next line and to allow them to absorb and feel it. Because that set up my line where I said, did you feel I stayed down too long? Well, if I didn't pause long enough, they wouldn't have felt the thought. There would have been a disconnect with that question later on. So go check out on YouTube. Just put in Darren Lacroix winning speech and just watch the first. I think it's 30 seconds or something while I'm lying there and just pay particular close attention to my foot twitch.

Well, Darren, the reason I raise that is because we have to be honest. Sometimes the question you ask and the statement you make can lead to an uncomfortable pause. That's okay, too. That's okay, too, because I'll be very blunt here. Your role as a presenter isn't just to make the audience comfortable. There are times you want to make them uncomfortable because when they're uncomfortable, then they are inspired to change something in their life, something in their process, something in the way they do what they do. So the pause after a pointed question, maybe a startling question or a disturbing statistic, and you pause, you let them really reflect on that, you connect with them, and now they're in a place where either A, you've opened their minds to a new way of thinking, they never seen that before, or B, they're going, huh, that's really interesting. Maybe. Do I do that? Did I not do that? Have I missed something? All these kinds of thoughts go through the audience's mind, and sometimes the pause can seem uncomfortable. But trust me, sometimes discomfort can be a good thing. Sometimes discomfort in the right context can be a good thing because that can be the catalyst for change. That can be the way the audience reflects in a new way. That can be the way the audience, based upon your words and your pause to give them time to reflect on it in a brand new perspective in an area of their life that could literally revolutionize their thinking and their behavior. It's just no small thing, my friends.

I think my whole transformation on seeing the pause was because of the contest, the speech contest at the highest level.

Really?

Okay, Yeah. I never studied it because it's a timed contest and I knew I would get some laughs. And so I was trying to strategize and I Think it was David Brooks who told me, go watch different videos and time the laughs. Because we can type out our speech and we can deliver our speech, and we can time how long it takes to deliver, and we can pause where we think we need to pause. But are you looking at the laughs and how long you'll need to pause during the laughs and time them? I was like, time a laugh because we always just think, oh, it's a second or two. Well, it was amazing. Like, Willie Jones had one of the longest laughs in the history of the contest. I want to say it was like six or seven seconds, or maybe even eight seconds. It's been a while since I looked at that stat. But what it also got me to do. Yeah. What it also got me to do is realize, when do I ask a question? How long of a pause does it require? So if I'm asking a simple yes or no question, have you ever been to Las Vegas or have you ever stayed at the Stratosphere? Like, that's yes or no. And so a short pause, but a pause. We still need to let them even reflect if it's simple. But if I ask them to go back to one of their favorite childhood memories, I've just asked a bigger task in my question, requiring a longer pause for them to connect.

Reflect and connect.

Reflect.

That's goal.

To connect.

Yeah, that's goal.

Connect to reflect. You're the wordsmith. You'll work it out. I started realizing and seeing that. How long do you pause? Well, it depends on the audience size and the feeling in the audience. When you're connected, you'll feel how long they need. And it's usually longer than you're comfortable pausing. But if it's a simple question, how long would it take to answer? So what I was doing was I would. When I'm coaching somebody, I would actually ask them, okay, what's the question? And then answer it out loud and time it. Answer your own question out loud and time it, knowing that you've got to almost take your time with your own answer because you're thinking, you know what you're going to answer to that question. So that's not reality in the audience's mind. So we've got to, you know, have you ever been to Las Vegas? Yeah. Have you ever stayed at the Stratosphere? Well, we went in here one year. No, no, no, I never stayed there. That requires a little more time. And then a deeper question is going to require more time. So our pause needs to allow the reflection. We're not Stepping on the thoughts in the audience's mind, that little voice in their head.

The line, therefore, is this. The length of our pause should be commensurate with the time it takes for the audience members to answer the question in their minds. Should be commensurate.

Darren, I go on and look it up on Google right now. Hold on.

Here's a practical thought as well. You know, we often say, you know, rehearse with our phones and record ourselves and with our stopwatch. But, hey, you can practice this. You can test this out with your family and friends. We're recording this right now in the Christmas season and you have family coming over. I always tell people, look, you're a toastmaster. Test on your Toastmasters Club members at the office party, Talk to people there. July 4th, or any kind of celebration in your country where people get together. You know, in the usa, we have Thanksgiving. It could be whatever event you have. Or sometimes at home with your family, you're going to work on a speech. Ask your spouse, your partner, your kids, your parents, and see how long they take to answer the question. And generally, what will happen is you'll get an average length of time that pretty much tells you what your audience is going to, how long it will take them to respond to the question. And the more you do this, you develop a familiarity. You almost get a feel for it. You become so good at this. The idea of a pause no longer in your mind is it a pause. It's simply a part of your presentation as you get more skilled and more expertise. And you'll be amazed at how you see the difference in how you view the pause and how the audience responds. Remember what Darren said? He asked the audience, what was my longest pause? And they couldn't answer because in their minds, there was never a pause. It was simply an interaction and a chance for them to reflect on the words he had said. They never saw the word pause. They simply experienced a presentation that made them think and made them reflect on what they need to do going forward. When you get to that level, you will see the difference.

Well done. And Mark, whenever we coach people, whether it's in Stage Time University, on one of our weekly live calls for where members get coached, or when we do it at a convention or conference, I've rarely had anyone remember we did this at nsa, who paused long enough at the right time, like everyone. Yeah. And they're pros. Everyone thinks they are, but it's not nearly long enough if you don't take into consideration the thought process in the Listener's mind, and that's gold.

The most important part of your presentation is a thought process that goes on in the audience's mind. And I hope these ideas are making you think a little bit differently about the impact you can have if you incorporate the effective pause, the purposeful pause in your presentation. Again, not just as a pause, but as an opportunity for your thoughts, your teaching to go deeper in their minds, for them to embrace it and then hopefully apply going forward. Because that's how deeply you can reach their hearts and minds if you use this tip technique effectively.

So, Mark, I love this idea. I love this concept. I think this is a powerful episode. What are our keepers?

Oh, man.

Wow.

Keepers. You're gonna love some of these. Okay.

You're the keeper of keepers.

Let the silence resonate, right? You need to have the confidence. Have the confidence to let the silence resonate. Number two, if they aren't thinking, we aren't connecting. If they aren't thinking, we aren't connecting. Number three, we need to know when they need to absorb. We need to know when they need to absorb. And you can isolate your key points with three heartbeats on either side of your most poignant points. Remember, not only does your audience want to get a word in edgewise, your audience needs to get a thought in edgewise. Okay? Don't pause for effect. Pause to reflect. Don't pause for effect. Pause to reflect. Thanks, Darren.

And those are this week's keeper. Welcome to W. Pause, Mark, pause.

I got that.

Thank you. Very good. Thank you. Thank you very much. I'll be here all week, Mark. I love that. That cracks you up. Yeah, just my final thoughts is just going back to what Patricia says, and that is that true learning happens in moments of reflection. And if we truly want to deliver our message, we've got to allow them to absorb it. Mark, your final thoughts.

Do not think of the pause as a pause. Think of your pause as the opportunity for your audience to reflect and for you to connect.

Well said, Mark. We'll see you next week. And what happens, Mark?

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