Ep. 238 Your Stage Plan?

Hey there, it's Darren Lacroix. No Mark Brown. This week he again is on the road in the air, serving kids at schools and bless him. This is about you. This is about you having to internalize and also at the same time clarifying your message to the audience, helping them fully absorb what you have to say. What I love about this idea is it came from out of the blue when Mark and I were working with these CEOs who you're going to hear from in the next few episodes and their stories and how they told a brand new story they've never told before. Well, one of the challenges that I heard in talking to them was they had a very short time frame when they got selected and they were to give this presentation in front of a huge group of CEO peers. They only had a limited timeline to not only create the story, refine the story, but then deliver the story. So I thought back to when I was working on the championship speech for myself. What helped me and the stage plan was critical.

Anyone can give a presentation. Few deliver unforgettable presentations. What's the difference? 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.

So the challenge is how do you memorize? And if you've heard us talk before, we say don't memorize. Internalize. How do you do that? So I remember back to when I had to internalize this speech that I had never given before. Ouch was the title of it. It ended up beginning by don't chop down your cherry tree. And it evolved into ouch. But how do I tell this story in how do I use the stage? One of the biggest challenges, Mark, me and every other coach at the world class level that I've ever met sees the challenge of a lot of people think there's one side of the stage, the left side of the stage, the right side of the stage and center stage. And then the key to keep it interesting is to go back and forth between those three spots. But that's not enough. And as far as internalizing my presentation, that's not going to help me. So what can you do? So when it came up from One of the CEOs, Jody, about her challenges, how do I memorize this? I remembered back to doing just that with Ouch. If you're watching the YouTube version, you'll see the visuals. If you're listening to the audio version, I'm going to describe the visuals as best I can. But we want to learn how to internalize your plan, your internalization plan. How do you get it into your body? Well, we say block it out. Block it out. Take your presentation, look at the stage, and where does it make sense to tell your story from? Each time there's an emotional shift in your story, there should be a physical shift on the stage. It may be a step. It may be a couple steps forward, it may be a few steps back. Whoa, wait a minute. It should emotionally follow the structure of your presentation. Think about that. Have you ever created a stage plan? Where do you go? When do you go? And why do you go? Why do you move when you move? Because of the emotional shift. Now, if you've been around stages for a while or theater, you know, front and center is the power spot. Well, that's a great place to close, but how is that different from other places on the stage? And if you use front and center the whole time, it dilutes its power. So if you've seen my championship speech, which is on YouTube, if you haven't seen it, the camera follows me, so it's harder to see the moves that I make and why. But after my opening, my opening, I start out by talking about the depths of the stage, the depths of my mind. So wouldn't it make sense that if I'm talking about the depths of my mind, that I move to the depths of the stage? Most people don't use. Even seasoned pros don't use the stage as effectively as they could to make their point clear, but also to help internalize their presentation. So here's what I did. If you're following along, boom. I created large yellow cardstock highlights. Each of the different vignettes I put on yellow cardstock, and I put a note to myself so I could remember it. So when I would move to that portion on the stage, once I laid out my stage plan on the physical stage, I literally put the yellow cards in different spots. There was a reason and a structure to this plan, but also, if you're familiar with NLP neuro linguistic programming, it allowed me to anchor the different places on the stage to make my points. So what I did is I put my cheat notes for each section of the speech on. On the yellow card. So this is yellow card stock printed out with my highlight notes so I could go and Stand in that position. And if I forgot what I was going to say, I would look at my bullet points. Now, I didn't write out the whole speech on these, not at all. However, One of the CEOs did that and then she placed up each piece of the script in front of that position, which I thought was brilliant. But in my case, I like to use bullet points because I don't want to get caught up in reading something word for word and being stuck in my head. So I used these different card stocks and I laid them out purposefully where I would be. Now, there are many different ways to use the stage. This is just one idea. You could take the stage and block it into three sections. If you followed along with us, you know that we use the FRIPP speech model and we talk about point of wisdom 1, point of wisdom 2, and point of wisdom 3. On occasion you might have a fourth point, but let's stick with three. You could divide the stage into three sections so you're fully aware and you bring point of wisdom one up from your right. Audience left. See, we have to think like an aerobics instructor because they, they, they read from left to right, so our right, their left, that is the past tense. Or if you're going to use three different sections, point of wisdom one would go from that area. You don't have to stand in that exact spot, but that area. And then when you physically transition, as you verbally transition from one to two, let's say my first point is a stage time. Never turn down stage time. I give all the supportive evidence from that section of the stage, I wrap it up. So remember, never turn down stage time. The second idea, the second strategy, the second key, whatever your second is, to be unforgettable on stage is unforgettable stories. If you want to be unforgettable on stage, you need unforgettable stories. So then the middle section would be where I talk about the supporting evidence for point two. And then when I wrap that up. So we need stage time. Never turn it down. Number two, we need unforgettable stories. But make no mistake, the last key point, the last strategy, the last pillar to be unforgettable is feedback from a world class coach. So I'm physically saying that as I verbally say that. So I physically transition as I verbally transition to section 3. Now this parallels my slides. Every time I go to a new section, I have reverse slides, I have white slides with blue font. But when I create a new section, a new point of wisdom I do blue slides with white font so the structure is clear to the audience. The structure parallels the stage and the slides. Think about it. This becomes so much more powerful. 99% of what Mark and I coach on is clarity, clarity, clarity. So you could divide it into those three sections. And then when you close, then you come out front and center and you review your points of wisdom. Now, in the case of ouch, what I did was I clearly laid down my notes, my highlights. So one story was about, or one vignette was about. Strangers are going to tell you you're crazy, you're stupid, your dream is ridiculous. Strangers. So one block was about strangers. I used the example of Dr. Goddard's first flight with his rocket. How the New York Times had a headline that mocked him and said 238,799 and a half miles missed its target by 238,799 and a half miles. They were teasing him because 238,800 miles is how far the moon is away. So on the audience left speaker, right corner of the stage, I had that little card stock, that yellow card stock with my reminder on it. So I would literally go there and stand there. And if I needed my cheat notes, I just looked down, I said it again, I said it again. But now I'm anchoring that section of the stage as strangers will make fun of you, strangers will mock you. Then I go to my famous mom and dad story. But I'm physically moving as I go to my next card stock. Friends and family that love us, that care about us, are also not going to be supportive at times. So I tell my famous mom and dad story. Then I go to the hand gestures story where the woman is standing behind me and covers my mouth. And then finally I use the far speaker, Left audience right VNI. And I just had big three red letters, VNI, valuable negative information. Dr. Goddard talked about that, that he needed VNI, valuable negative information to get each step getting closer to the moon. So I literally had these on the stage. And in fact, as I practiced it and internalized it, whether I was in my home office, okay, home, bedroom. I was still a kid living at home. I would do it in my bedroom. But then I even had and I worked with my dad. I went to a big stage at church. And now I could spread them out more. Now I'm extrapolating, which is a big word for me. I'm extrapolating the same positions, but now there's a little more space between them. So I can vary it more, use the stage more strategically and effectively to my audience, so they know strangers. I did that story, I told that story, and then I used a gesture to my audience. But that's just part of your journey. And then I go, friends and family who love us may not be supportive. So I move to that next section. So we've got to think again, like an aerobics instructor. Audience left is speaker right. Presenter's left is audience right. So we want to do this again. Internalization for you, clarity for your audience. And each time I would verbally transition, I would physically transition, end to the next story and then to the next story. Now, when I worked with these CEOs, they each had their own plan because there's different emotional shifts, as opposed to front, back, what should be front in a different position, which should be maybe back a few steps because of the emotional feeling behind that. What I also had my dad do was randomly point at different places on the stage, different yellow card stocks, let's just call them point of 1, 2, 3, and 4 in that situation from Ouch. So they weren't separate points. They were separate places on the stage. So he would randomly point at them. And now what I'm doing is if I do everything in order, that's memorization. Now I'm anchoring a place on the stage. In next few weeks, when we sit down with these CEOs, you'll hear how it helped them. So I hope you tune into those episodes. I think they're going to be exciting. We haven't even recorded them yet, but I'm very excited about them because watching their journeys was just amazing. So, Jodi, One of the CEOs that we'll talk to probably next week, she came out from one side of the stage, and then she talked about after one of the runs that she had, it was a beautiful day in Chicago. And then she took this position on the stage, and that was stage right, audience left. And then about what happened after that. Then there was emotional shift after a big trauma in her life. And then we go to a business situation. So each time there is a emotional shift, we move to a different position on stage. Now, hers was very logical. We start left, point one, then point two goes a little to the right, point three in the center, point four to the right of that, point five to the right of that. What was next for her? And then she comes for her clothes. So center stage, right up front. So when she was on point three, which is also in the center, she was back a Few steps. There's an emotional shift in the feeling between back a few steps and right up front. Smoke, which is his name, was a CEO. He was a phenomenal story. His was much more complicated. But there was a reason for this. And if you saw his speech, you would see and it would make perfect sense to the audience. And then George had almost a circle because of the timeline and how we looked at his speech. And he started off with a poem, front and center, only back a few steps. And when he closed center, he was right up front. But there was a point where he talked about when his daughter was 15 years old. And then he said, now I got to be fully transparent with you. Here are my real thoughts. That needed a different position on stage because there was a different feeling. Again, physical shift, while there's an emotional shift. Linda, hers was almost like a figure 8 and how we work this out with her. She also had some points that she wanted to emphasize. So she was born in China and she went back to her village when she was growing up, when she was a young woman. And something that happened in her village. But then the wisdom she got from that, she stepped forward, directly forward from that place. Later on we learned about this happening with a mentor of hers and what happened. And then the wisdom when she remembered back to the village and young Linda, or little Linda. So she stepped forward in that same position, but it was emphasizing and taking us from the story and stepping forward to deliver the wisdom of that moment. So each of them had a different stage plan. But this is about your stage plan. Look at your presentation. When do things shift? When do we make different points? What would your stage plan look like if you mapped it out? This is going to help give your audience clarity. It's also going to give you confidence and most importantly, help you internalize your presentation. Because again, I've seen even world class speakers use left, right and center and just going back and forth and moving during some of their key lines. Never move on a key line. That line that you know needs to land in the hearts and the minds of your audience. Stay centered, have your energy directed out to the audience. I hope this is a new concept or maybe a concept you heard of, but it's time to implement it. Why? Because we want to help you internalize your presentation or while making it super clear to your audience, create a stage plan. If you have different presentations, then they would require different stage plans because there will be different shifts physically while you shift emotionally and have that structure not only fit your stage plan, but also echo your slides. Thanks for tuning in. Join Mark and me next week when we start sitting down with these CEOs and and we follow their journey with them from Idea Story to the stage where they each got standing ovations. We'll see you next week.

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