Ep 74 Learning the Ins and Outs of TV Earpieces March 14

Uh oh. What happens when you have earpiece troubles during a television interview?

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

So, folks, sooner or later, if you do enough TV interviews, you'll be asked to do what's called a remote interview, where the reporter is in another city, another building. Sometimes you could even be in the same building, but they're not right next to you. So you're hearing the reporter talk to you through an earpiece. Now, forgive me, for those of you who are listening on the podcast, I'm now going to hold up one for those watching on or TV show, just a little earpiece, put it in your ear, it wraps around behind you, and then it clips on the back of your jacket, typically, so it's not particularly visible. And this way you can hear it and it's not noticeable. Now, there are problems with this. In the news recently, Donald Trump claims that his earpiece wasn't working well. So when he was asked to disavow the racist former KKK leader David Duke's endorsement, he said, I haven't heard of him. I don't really know about that. And later, when shown clips that he didn't in fact know who David Duke was and had denounced him in the past, he claimed that it was a bad earpiece, that CNN had given him a bad earpiece, and he simply didn't hear. I'll leave it to others to judge whether or not Trump is telling the truth, but I do want to talk about the ins and outs of earpieces. By the way, this is, this is an earpiece. Again, for those of you listening on audio, I'm holding up a very simple earpiece that I purchased on Amazon for it had to have been less than $25. The reason I use this is I do TV interviews in this studio. But even for doing a podcast interview, a webcast, by putting the earpiece in and then having a microphone, in this case my lav mic here, none of the feedback of the person speaking to me goes through my microphone and it creates better quality audio. That's why if you've seen people doing podcasts or webcast and they're wearing the Apple earbuds, that creates better sound and it eliminates the feedback, the echo. The problem is it kind of looks silly. It makes it look amateurish. So that's why I would advise you, if you're doing any TV interviews through a Skype setup, even to improve your own Skype video calls, you'll look better. And you'll sound better if you put an earpiece in again. You can just go to Amazon and folks, I'm not an affiliate. I'm not selling these. I'm not getting any kickbacks from anyone. But you just plug it into your computer for the headset and you'll look much, much better. Now, let's talk specifically about the problems. And that reminds me, we'll just set this up properly.

Technology insights.

There are some technical things you need to know about the earpiece. The IFP and I used to know what it stood for, and I forgot. It doesn't really matter. But what you need to know is sometimes they don't work. So if you go to a TV studio and they put one in your ear, quite often the producer will say, okay, can you hear us? Can you count to 10? Certainly you want to be as responsive as possible. But here's what has happened to me on national TV broadcast. This has happened on msnbc. It's happened to me on cnn, maybe on Fox once, where I'm a part of a panel discussion, everything is going well, and all of a sudden I just don't hear anything. So it might be that you're in a commercial and there's nothing to hear. Don't worry about it. But if you see people talking on screen and it's the same segment you're in, if you see the host on a screen or it just cuts out mid sentence, there is a chance that your earpiece is simply gone bad. Somebody pulled a plug out somewhere. Here's what I recommend. First of all, don't curse. Don't say some obscenity like, I can't believe this doesn't work. Who are these clowns? Because even though you can't hear the host or reporter interviewing you, you might actually be live on air. So assume that you are on, and that's a safe bet. Now, I wouldn't panic. I wouldn't scream, oh, my God, I can't hear. Don't do that. What I recommend is just a calm, normal tone of voice. If it happens to me, I say something like this, this is TJ Walker in New York. I've lost audio contact. I can no longer hear. Wait a few seconds and I'd say it again. So that way, people back in the control booth, if they can still hear me, they realize someone has flipped a switch so I can't hear them. They can make adjustments. If they see me talking on their video feed and they're not hearing anything, then they realize something has gone wrong. And this avoids a lot of problems. Now, here is allegedly where Donald Trump got into problems. Again, I'll leave it to others to figure out if you think he's telling the truth or not. But Donald Trump claims he couldn't really hear the question, but he didn't say, I can't hear that. So if you follow his line of reasoning, he guessed. If you cannot hear the reporter's question or the host's question or comment, when you're doing a TV interview and you have your earpiece in, then my recommendation, don't guess. Because you could guess the reporters asking one question. And when people hear the actual question, your answer, it could paint you as lying or saying something, pandering to racist. There's all sorts of opportunities for confusion and offenses. So my recommendation is do not guess. If you can't absolutely hear the question clearly and understand it, just tell the host and say, could you please restate the question? I didn't hear that properly. That way no one can be offended, nothing can be taken out of context. The only other option is, is for you to say, I'm not sure I heard that properly. I think what you said was. And then ask yourself a question that you think is related to what the host asked for and then answer the question. Now, there's one other problem that occasionally does crop up with earpieces, and that is all of a sudden tremendously loud feedback. And it's loud, it's jarring, you feel like it's going to hurt your ear. What I would recommend is just pull the earplug out of your ear for a few seconds, see if it's coming back, and then put it back in. The other problem with earpieces, and this has happened to me many times, and I don't think it's because I have particularly odd shaped ears, is they will just pop out when you are on air and that could be distracting. My recommendation is when you are not talking and you feel the earpiece is a little bit loose, then place it back in your ear, try to get it, you know, don't cram it in and hurt yourself, but try to get it in as tightly as possible so that it's snug and it doesn't fall out. If it does fall out, then try to put it back in when you're not talking. Now, if it falls out while you are speaking, I wouldn't stop mid sentence. Oh my gosh, my earpiece fell out. I would just finish your thought, finish the sentence. And now you know, either the host or Another panelist is speaking and they can talk. Camera's probably not on you, so when you're not talking, put the earpiece back in. The same lesson really applies. If you have to scratch your face or nose or you think something's on it, don't do it while you're talking. Wait till you stop talking. And then if you have to do a scratch, an itch, it's much less likely to be on camera and it's less likely to be noticeable and you'll be in good shape. So these are tips for how to use earpieces more effectively and why you, in fact, would want to.

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Question posed on Twitter earlier today, should lecterns be banned now? Lecterns are the things you speakers stand behind. People call them podiums. They're not actually podiums. The podium is the riser, the platform you stand on. But I realize most people think of that as podium, the lectern. The question is, should lecterns be banned now? Most professional speakers, members of the National Speakers association, motivational speakers, really look down their noses at lecterns. It's seen as kind of the training wheel, the training wheels of speakers. And I have to confess, I share that view as well. When you get behind a lectern as a speaker, several things happen instantly with the audience. Right away, they assume you're going to be like most boring, awful corporate or political speakers, where you're standing in one spot, your hands are down, you're probably reading a boring speech someone wrote. So my first question to anyone who is thinking of using a lectern is, why would you want to position yourself to look like and feel like awful speakers? It's perfectly fine to use notes, but don't get behind the lectern. When you get behind a lectern, you feel obligated to stay there. You can't walk around the room. Therefore, there's a barrier. It's a wall between you and the audience. Why would you want to have a wall between you and the audience? That's why you see all great speakers and professional speakers walking around on stage and maybe around the audience through the aisles and back. They want to interact. They don't want that barrier. And that's the real problem with elekturn is it basically stifles mobility. It creates a barrier between you and the audience. It's something to lean on, which makes you even more frozen. It destroys your body language. It just makes everything less interesting. People associated with all of the worst speakers they've ever heard in their entire life. Who just have their head down. So my recommendation is you might not be able to ban lecterns in your corporation or your organization or your governmental body. But you don't have to get behind them. Now, there is one secret I do want to recommend when it comes to lecterns. Because I use lecterns. But hear me out. You're going to say, well, wait a minute, T.J. you're a hypocrite. You just said lecterns are horrible. Depends on how you use them. I use lecterns all the time if they happen to be in a room. Especially if they're really big and heavy. And can't easily be moved. But I never literally stand behind the lectern. I'm walking in front of it, around it, all over the room as I present. But I will put notes, a single sheet of notes on top of the lectern. But turned in a catacorned way. So that I don't have to stand behind it. So I can walk in front of it, to the side of it. But I don't ever have to stand right behind it. And that's the position people assume. The typical speaker does if he's going to read a boring speech. Or she's going to read a boring speech. So perfectly fine to use the lectern as a placeholder for notes. This only works, by the way, if you follow my rules on notes. Which means it's got to be on one single sheet of paper. And the font has to be large enough that you don't have to bend over and look at it or pick it up. You don't ever want to touch your notes. The other thing I use a lectern for is a placeholder for a glass of water or a bottle of water. I actually have a lectern in front of me right now. That I use to keep my computer screen, microphones, the keyboard, and water. So I'm using a lectern right now. But I'm doing it in a way where you don't see it. Now, this isn't a public speech. I'm not moving around as much. But the basic principle applies. Use the tools you have to, number one, help you. But number two, help your audience feel more comfortable with you. Feel that they can relate to you. Feel like they. They have someone there who cares about them. And that's why I'm not a big fan at all of standing behind the lectern. In the traditional way. When you are speaking in front of an audience, you want to be focused on them. You want to be conversational, which means your hands have to move, your face has to move, your body has to move, you don't have to walk all over the room. But it sure is a lot harder for your audience to focus on fade out, go to sleep, or check their email if there's a chance you might be right near them, a couple of feet away from them at any point in the speech. So that's why, if you're in a position to ban lecterns from your corporation, your organization, please do so. If you're not the ultimate decision maker in your organization, then I ask you use the lecterns judiciously, meaning never stand behind it, the traditional position, but use it as a placeholder, a place to stick your one page of notes or your glass of water. I'm TJ Walker. As always, may all of your presentations in life be a huge success.

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