Ep 170 How to Make a Speech in a Business Setting - Public Speaking June 18, 2016

How do you make a speech or presentation in a business setting?

Speaking the show about effective speaking in public, to the media, at work and in life. Speaking with TJ Walker.

Truth be told, almost all the advice you hear or see on this podcast is applicable to presentations in business settings. But for whatever reason, a lot of people just feel like it's completely different. They may be used to giving a speech at a county commission meeting, a political setting with friends, family, but now they're in a business situation and it just feels completely different. There are some differences, but the similarities between any other good speech and how you can speak effectively in a business presentation far outweigh the differences. Now here's one thing I do find that hits my clients all over the world. Doesn't matter if they're big companies, small companies, private sector, public sector is for a lot of people. When they tell themselves, oh, I'm now going from talking to my own colleagues in a Monday morning staff meeting to a business presentation to outside customers, clients, they tell themselves it's completely different. So even though this person may be great talking to six colleagues at a staff meeting, engaging, conversational, full of examples, case studies, stories, now they're giving in their mind a serious business presentation. So they completely change themselves. They stiffen up, they feel the need to read a script or read bullet points off of a slide, and they've changed themselves. Have they made themselves more serious and businesslike? I guess. But here's the thing. I've never once met a business person, which, by the way, business people are human beings. I've never once heard a business person after a boring stiff business presentation say, wow, I sure am happy that speaker was serious and businesslike. No, that's not something you'll ever hear. Business people in some ways are no different than a two year old or three year old child. If you say something really interesting to them, they'll pay attention. If not, they will ignore you. They'll walk away. Now, unlike a two or three year old child, they might not start screaming, but they will pull out a cell phone and start typing or reading email or doing something like that. So the biggest thing you've got to focus on for a business presentation is are you saying something interesting and relevant and memorable to your audience? Now of course, the topics can change how you talk to friends, family, colleagues, or how you talk in a church or a religious organization or a philosophical organization. The topic is going to be different from what you say in a business presentation. You have to make certain assumptions. One of the assumptions is it's none of your business what people think about when it comes to religion, politics. For the most part, you want to stay away from that. So you need to stay focused on the business issue at hand and you need to assume a wide variety of opinions, ideals about gender, stereotypes and all of that. You need to just assume not everyone is like you and have a narrower focus on the business topic at hand. More tips in just a moment.

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Of course, I am struck by the overwhelming similarities between preparing for a business presentation versus any other presentation. But that doesn't mean that other people see it the same way. If you get up and flub a presentation to family members, friends, or a civic group where you're just hoping to get a new stop sign, you don't really care. You could say the stakes are lower. Might not matter. But if you are in a business presentation and you are giving a pitch for a new piece of business, a new client, and it could make or break the future of your company, the stakes are much, much higher. Therefore, I would argue you need to take it even more seriously. And some of you will say, well tj, this sounds like a broken record, but I will stress this. Never give a business presentation unless you have practiced your presentation on video and watched it to the point where you love every aspect of how you look, sound, your substance, and your style. Now that's a rule that I think applies to any presentation, a wedding presentation, anything. But it especially applies to a business presentation. Now regarding the point a moment ago about not assuming people share your beliefs about politics or religion. This certainly applies to humor too. I'm not saying you have to be humorless and boring and dry, but you cannot assume that people in the business audience are going to find your humor the same as working on them as it does for you. Because what you find funny might be wildly offensive to certain members of your business audience. So check that. The safest form of humor in most business situations is gentle, self deprecating humor. But even that, you got to be careful because if you're pitching a new client and they don't really know you and you're making a joke showing you're not a stuffed shirt, they may think you're cutting yourself down and saying you're not very good. And they may think why are we hiring this person? He just said, she just said they're not very good. So even self deprecating humor can be risky. If the audience doesn't have a very, very firm, solid, positive sense of who you are already. It can be risky. And that is why in a lot of business presentations, you don't see nearly as much humor. A lot of great business communicators do use humor. It comes naturally to them and it doesn't get them in trouble. But if you're not a natural humorist, don't start in a business presentation just because you think I'm supposed to start with humor. There is no hard and fast rule about how to structure a business presentation other than this. Make sure what you're saying is interesting and relevant and memorable to your audience. Whether it's your short speech, a long speech, a day long pitch, make sure every word counts. And by that, I don't mean sit there with a stopwatch practicing and memorizing and scratching and reading off a list quickly. It's not about how quick you are. I work with business audiences from six continents, and I can tell you if you're interesting, if you're providing a business person with interesting information that's relevant to their business, relevant to how they can either make more money or do things more efficiently or help their end user more, they will listen to you. They'll listen to you for five hours if you continue to give them information that's useful and relevant. But if you start off with, good morning, ladies and gentlemen, I'm so happy to be here today. Thank you for that wonderful introduction. And before we start, let me tell you about the boring history of my company that you don't care about. And let me tell you about all the cities I'm in where we have divisions that you don't care about because you're in this city. That's how most business presentations start. And if you do it that way, you're really asking for trouble because you're asking people to switch off their brain. They might still be looking at you. They might even nod occasionally. But trust me, they are a million miles away. Their mind is far away because you have bored them. And business people want respect. If they're granting you their time, they want to make the most of it. And that's the biggest problem most business presentations make. It's not that they are too long, although some of them are. It's not that their slides aren't professional, although some of them aren't. It's not that the business speaker is nervous or shakes his or her hands or says too many of's. Those are not the problems with most business presentations. The biggest problem is the audience is sitting there scratching their head saying, so what? Why should I care about what this person is saying? So if you really want to test your presentation, practice it on video and then sit and watch it. And every 10 or 20 seconds say to yourself, try to put yourself in the mindset of a typical audience member and just say so what? And then listen to what you're saying. And if it doesn't satisfy you, it's probably not going to satisfy the real business audience. Go back and retool your presentation until it's interesting, useful and memorable throughout. Do that and you will be not a competent business speaker, but you'll be an excellent business presenter. I'm T.J. walker. Thanks for joining me. As always, may all of your presentations in life be a huge success.

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