TJ Walker (speaker) explains how to engage audiences by being interesting rather than just delivering facts. He argues that because people can access information online, live speaking must add value: convey what’s important, why it matters, and motivate action. Practical advice includes avoiding procedural/opening filler, not relying on jokes if you’re not a natural comedian, practicing presentations on video, and telling the story behind the most important data point instead of reciting numbers.
Chapters
So how do you really engage people when you're talking to them? The simple thing is be interesting. Duh. That's not very insightful. It does raise the question, how can you be interesting to the people you're speaking to? Whether it's one person sitting down, meeting with three people or 30 or 300 or 3,000, how can you actually be interesting? Well, the first thing you got to do is sit back a minute and ask yourself, if you could hear yourself speak, would you find yourself interesting? Chances are, in many cases, the answer is no. Because you're just delivering data. You're just giving facts. You're just giving more information. Well, newsflash. The world is awash in information. Everybody has access to all the information ever created in the world. If they have a cell phone, it's all there. Everyone has access to Wikipedia. So when you're speaking to someone, it can't just be more facts, more numbers, more data, more bullet points. Because people's eyes glaze over, they think, I didn't need to come hear this person speak right here in person, live. I could have stayed home, saved the trouble, and just read that online. So when you're speaking to someone face to face, you got to realize the stakes are higher. You've got to provide some value that isn't there just from looking it up online. Now, the beauty of spoken communication is you can give people a sense of what's important, why it's important, why you care, why they should care, and why they should be motivated to take some action. Because everybody has a million people pulling on them every single day. Buy this, do this, clean this, do this, help me, donate, volunteer. Everyone has requests all day long. So if you have an opportunity to speak to someone and they're actually paying attention, they're giving you something of tremendous value. Many people value their attention and their time a lot more than money. You can make more money. Your money can make money. You can't make more time to give to people with your attention. That's a valuable prize. So don't fritter it away. Don't waste it. So many people, when they start to speak to someone, they feel like they have to go through these boring, procedural. Good morning. Happy to be here today, as you know. And today I'm going to be talking about this. And the exits over here. Boring. Just hop right to it. Say something interesting. Now, a lot of people say, oh, I know what you're saying, tj Tell a funny joke. Well, I'm not a good comedian. No, you don't. Have to start off a speech or a presentation or a talk with a joke. If you're not naturally good at humor and storytelling, jokes don't do it. You don't have to be funny. All you have to do is say something interesting. You want someone sort of sit up and say, oh, this isn't really what I expected. I expected to be bored. Now this person talking to me is saying something interesting. Let me actually look at them. Let me really pay attention. Not just look at them to be polite. But actually, I'm thinking about, oh, I'm going to play pickleball in a couple of hours. Do I have my racket read? Do I have. You don't want them multitasking in their brain. You want them actually listening to you. The way to do that is by saying something interesting. Now, how do you know I'm not suggesting you rehearse and plan every time you have lunch with your best friend about what to say, but sometimes when you talk to people, the stakes are high. It's more important than other times. So if you're just having a casual meeting with a friend, no, don't rehearse that. But if you have to talk to your entire board of directors on Thursday, there are going to be 20 people in the room. Some of them might have an impact on your next promotion. Or three, the stakes are higher. So practice your presentation on video. Pull out your cell phone, use a webcam, record yourself and watch yourself and then scrutinize it. Ask yourself, would I find that interesting? If the answer is no, it's boring to you, guess who else? It's boring to your audience. Try again. The number one thing that gets people in trouble is just trying to go through way too much data. Oh, I'd love to be interesting. I'd love to tell good stories, but. But I can't because I've got to go through all these facts and numbers and data. You can email people data. They can find it online. If you're speaking and you want to be interesting to people, you have to tell the story behind the most important data point. That is how you can get people's attention every time you speak.
