Why Speakers Need Improv

Speakers need to have grace under pressure, confidence when things don’t go as expected, and the ability to remain calm when things don’t go as planned. As a speaker at the front of the room, you instantly become a role model and the audience is trading their time and possibly money for what you have to offer them.

As experienced speakers will tell you, things can go horribly wrong in the middle of your presentation and without notice. How you react to the sudden chaos can build your credibility with your audience or destroy it. The audience looks to the speaker as a leader in the event.

 

Welcome to Bill Corbett’s video podcast, from the soapbox to the stage. Created from his bestselling book and his experience as a professional speaker, you’ll learn quick tips that can set you apart from your competition and leave your audiences inviting you back for more.

 

In the middle of one speakers’ talk, a man in the audience near the front row passed out and died! He keeled over and fell onto the floor. The audience directly around that man knelt by his side and the speaker looking frazzled, took out her phone and dialed 911. The audience automatically looks to the speaker to take charge in any unusual situation.

 

The experience of going through an improvisational class won’t fix a sudden bad situation but it will give a speaker the sense of feeling comfortable and confident enough to react quickly in the best interest of the audience, in the face of chaos. He or she will feel calm enough to be able to think clearly on what to do next.

To get the most out of an improv class, stay out of your head and leave your perfection behind. Avoid trying to second guess what will happen next and know that each activity will not have predictable outcomes. Focus more on what others are doing and saying, and quiet the voice in your own head.

If you’re a perfectionist, this experience could be uncomfortable because you won’t have full control of the outcome of each exercise and you have to embrace looking silly. No one is judging you in an improve class so be prepared to let you hair down, as they say. You’ll be more successful. Let your playful child out to play and you’ll be more successful.

I hope this inspires you to take a different step toward personal growth as a speaker or even a manager. Take the plunge and find an improve or acting class and do something for yourself that will move you to the next level as a professional. Do it today.

Thanks for watching this video podcast and if you made it this far, an extra thank you. If you want more tips to help you grow as a speaker, check out one of Bills latest books on professional speaking. I hope you’ll subscribe to this blog, like it and share it with others.

What is Your Communication LifeStyle?

By Carolyn Finch

As I waited at the stop sign for the children to
get off the bus, I noticed a mother with a stroller and a sleeping baby waiting at the bus stop. I was only about 15 feet from the front of the bus and could see parents standing around. This mother was holding her smart phone with her head bent downward and at times would stop and then text  or enter a number and then the phone went back up to her ear. I never saw her check on the baby in the stroller nor did she look up. Soon a cute little light skinned boy with curly brown hair about 5 or 6 years old jumped off the bus and waved a paper with a painting at his mother. Mom paid no attention to the boy so he grabbed her leg and shouted "look mom look mom"
She looked down at him and shouted "I told you not to talk to me when I'm on the phone."

My heart sank and I wanted to cry as I'm sure that the little boy wanted to do. What an ideal time for communication. This amazing transition time when a child is enthusiastic about something he has created and at the same time happy to be getting home from school. Was this a dysfunctional communication moment?  It certainly appeared that way. Would this be the base to poor communication for the next few minutes, hours and maybe even days?

The  one major aspect of being a human being is that we are able to communicate orally. Have we forgotten to be thankful for this gift of true conversation? With the advent of smart phones we have a new addiction. Research shows that the average person with a smartphone texts an average of 100 time a day wow! This type of communication determines our lifestyle and our lifestyle determines our communication.

If we have an addiction of any kind such as shopping, drinking, drugs, sickness, foods whatever,
our typical conversation will include words, phrases and stories related to our addiction. Doesn't sound like a learning listener and quality conversation to me. Therefore my challenge to you as a Blog reader is to look at everyone you speak with, eye to eye and belly to belly. This way you will be listening to the other person and as a reward you will learn something from what they say. So add to your communication lifestyle the ability to listen with your eyes.

You can improve your communication by helping yourself become more enlightened after hearing me speak at your next conference. Call now for more information or for  a one on one Speech Coaching session.203 405 3972.

Carolyn Finch Body Language and Communication LifeStyle Expert TM
Professional Speaker who will put a SPARK in your next meeting!       carolyn@carolynfinch.com

Understanding the Energy in the Room; Part 1

"I'm only happy when I'm on stage. I just feed off the energy of the audience. That's what I'm all   about- people and laughter." Larry David

Among the many hats a speaker wears is one that reads “Energy Manager.” We know, as do the planners who hire us, that the attendees at a program experience one of two energy flow states. At just about any moment, they're either being energized or they are being drained of their liveliness.

Whether or not the participants remain alert and interested depends on many things, not the least of which is how we understand and direct the flow of their energy, particularly that energy which flows between the audience and ourselves up on the platform. When we say we “connect” with our audience, we are referring to the energy stream flowing between them and us. The quality of this connection with the speaker determines the level of our own success, because the state these attendees find themselves in often determines the level of success the meeting achieves. When the audience is charged by our presence and the attention is directed toward us, we are where we want to be and they are where we want them! This is what is meant by “holding the audience’s attention.”

Understanding the Energy in a Room

The energy level of the audience defines the emotional state of the group in the same way lighting sets the tone in a theater production, where changing lights indicate a shift in mood. In the theater, the illumination fills in the holes and occupies the spaces between characters, events and sets. During a speech in front of an audience, which consists of sets of human relationships (between us and the audience, among the audience members themselves, and between the audience members and the people that are on their minds), the energy illuminates the dynamics of the group. Energy is what fills in the psychic space linking the people who are present in the room.

So it stands to reason that the way we orchestrate the energy in a room essentially has the effect of working like a thermostat, controlling the emotional climate among the attendees. We wouldn’t let the room get too hot or too cold because we need to keep the participants alert and interested in order to make the meeting successful from the point of view of the meeting organizer. Our platform poise serves a purpose similar to that of a thermostat. We are managing many different relationships and people to make a program successful. In essence, we are directing the audience without them knowing it.

The Value of “Authenticity”                                                                                                   The proficiency in developing the ability to “hold the audience” comes from developing that ubiquitous presenters’   buzzword: authenticity. Common wisdom at workshops, conventions and business meetings holds that if you are authentic, the audience will be interested in you. Indeed, authenticity is like a dose of caffeine for the attention span. Being authentic on the platform has the effect of holding the audience’s attention as surely as a magician’s hands do as he weaves the set-up story before the trick. With a magician as with a speaker, we use laser-like intensity to try and find something we know we won’t see. We don’t see how it’s done; yet we enjoy it anyway.

The 3 Components of  Platform Authenticity                                                               Therefore, it makes sense that many a hard-earned speaker dollar is spent on becoming authentic. But what exactly are we buying? After all, being “authentic” means being true to one's own personality, spirit or character. Is that something we need to purchase? Isn’t our source of genuineness always within us? Developing authenticity is a matter of understanding what makes us real on the platform. We can break authenticity down into three elements. We can then nurture the three elements that help make us real, the three fundamental aspects of authenticity that make us attractive to the audience: vulnerability, presence and spontaneity.                                                                                                         

“Understanding the Energy of Attraction, Part 2: The 3 Essentials of Attraction” will be our next months post.

Izzy Gesell (Izzy's website) is an organizational alchemist who helps individuals and organizations transform their thinking from commonplace to extraordinary. Through his keynotes, trainings, coaching and facilitated sessions, Izzy offers imaginative, intuitive and immediately useful insights and programs. He is skilled at delivering meaningful material in a way that makes participants enjoy their time with him.

Izzy was one of the first to use Improv Theater concepts as tools for personal and organizational learning. He is the author of Playing Along: Group Learning Activities Borrowed From Improvisation Theater, a co-author of Cancer & the Healing Power of Play, a co-author of Humor Me: America’s Funniest Humorists on the Power of Laughter, and a contributor of a chapter on Improvisation as a facilitation tool in the IAF Group Facilitators Handbook. "His video course  on Applied Improv for Leadership" for Lynda.com was their first  course shot before a live audience. A second Lynda.com course, "Humor in the Workplace" was recently rele

Leverage the Power of Groups to Grow Your Six and Seven-Figure Business

Michelle Demers, Co-Founder
More Clients in Less Time

For coaches and consultants the key to getting and serving more clients in less time, and therefore making a lot more money in less time, is to decrease one-to-one clients and utilize groups for all aspects of your business: marketing, sales, and the delivery of programs, products, and services.

We can also expand the word "groups" to include "places where people gather with common interests", audiences, communities, and associations.

The first thing to do to immediately increase your income is to create (or buy/license from someone else) a program or other services that can be delivered and managed in a group format. This ideally should be the center of your business, the spoke of the wheel, that everything else you do feeds into.  When done successfully, this becomes your biggest, wealth-building income stream. It's also your most sustainable and long-term income stream that can continue growing, even if you decide to pull back your personal investment of time.

Once you have a group program established, then use the power of groups for marketing and sales to fill it!

You can use networking and referral groups like BNI (Business Network International) or eWomenNetwork.  You can use Meetup.com to create your own Meetup group or join others.  Online groups include public and private Facebook communities and LinkedIn groups, and more.

Speaking (especially seminars and workshops) is naturally a group activity as you have a built-in audience.  Speaking falls into all categories: marketing, sales, and delivery of programs, products, and services.  That's why speaking is so powerful to grow your business.

Yet if you are a speaker who doesn't have anything but speaking to sell -- no programs, products, or services that extend beyond your speaking -- then you are leaving massive amounts of money on the table unclaimed ... And when the speaking stops, the money stops.

If you are a coach, consultant, speaker or other kind of "expert" service-driven entrepreneur, leveraging the power of groups is the key to growing a 6 and 7-figure business. To learn more, go to www.MoreClientsLessTime.com.

Michelle Demers has worked with hundreds of coaches and consultants over the past 15 years on sales, branding, online and offline marketing, and product and service development. She is the co-founder of “More Clients in Less Time” specifically helping coaches and consultants to get out of the exhausting grind of one-on-one clients and into the limitless financial potential of group coaching and training programs.  

Michelle lives and works just outside of Boston and can be reached at michelle (@) resonateinc.net and 203.623.1564. She works with clients anywhere and everywhere across the world.

To Breathe or Not To Breathe? That is the question!

Breathe

Of course you know the answer.  If you don’t breathe you die.  We can live without food for weeks. We can live without water for several days but we can only live without air for about 6 minutes. Then the brain cells start to die.  If you are in a profession where you depend on your voice to sell a  product, ideas and benefits then a quick survey of your skills of breathing need to be assessed.

One of the ways I check breathing in my presentations and Speeches is to have audience members stand with the back of their legs against their chairs. Go ahead, stand up now and feel that chair behind your legs. That’s because when you breath gets thin you will want to sit down immediately, we don’t want any fainting! Your breath is your life and your vitality yet most people never think about breath as a reflection of their health. Here’s the test! While standing you will exhale all that “used air.” Let it make a noise as it escapes through the little round hole as you blow out the carbon dioxide. Then open your mouth and breathe in the oxygen filled air and let it make a noise across your vocal folds. Silently count as the air rushes in. When you can no longer breathe in, sit down and release your air.

 If you are breathing well your count would be 20 or more counts during the inhale. The average person has a count between 7 and 10. If you were in this range than remember to go outside every day and breathe outdoor air. Indoor air contains other peoples used air, pollutants including: paint and plastic fumes, chemicals, smoke, animal and people odors, cooking odors and 100 other substances that you can think of if you want to. IF your breath is on the weaker side practice diaphragmatic breathing

Almost anyone can learn to breathe with diaphragm muscle support. It does take practice. When you breathe deeply, you breathe automatically through your nose.  A good way to start developing the diaphragm, the largest muscle in the body, is to lie on the floor and pile books on your diaphragm.  Close your mouth and breathe deeply through your nose.  Watch carefully as the books rise and fall.  Continue until you feel the diaphragm pulling and strengthening.  When you are outside walking, keep your mouth closed as you inhale nasally on a count of – one, two, three then exhale on a count of one, two, and three. Remember when you are presenting information to others if you are nervous or tense breathe! Now doesn’t this help you breathe more easily?

Carolyn Finch                                                                  carolyn@carolynfinch.com 

Communication LifeStyle Expert™ Speaker                               WWW.carolynfinch.com

Conventions-Conferences-Corporate and Community functions           203 725 3133

                     Isn't it time to change your communication so you can change your life?

How Do You Adjust Your Style to Your Audience?

Today I'm in Oklahoma City, and spent the day in a dog food factory.

No joke.  My client is a giant producer of dog food, and I was working with the factory workers teaching them how to be more innovative in their jobs.

I spent the good part of an hour taking a tour of the plant.  To see this operation in full swing is a marvel in modern manufacturing.  Working in shifts round the clock, 300 people produce 72,000 pallets of dog food every month.    That's a lot of chow.

Making dog food is tough stuff.  These folks work for a living.  The plant environment is dimly lit, loud and reeks of slurry (a stew like smell of fish and meat).   

In the last two weeks, I worked with bank executives, project managers at a high-tech firm, and oil and gas engineers.  Collectively, you could call them "knowledge workers".  Most are highly educated in a traditional sense.

These guys today make pet food.  Most didn't plan on ending up in these jobs, but they're there.  Some have been doing this for more than 30 years. 

They are a different audience.   They don't spend a lot of time in meetings and in training. 

When I spoke to them, I made sure to change my style:

• Keep it simple.
• Avoid jargon.
• Be more direct.

In "keeping it simple", I didn't treat them like they were stupid.   A good rule of leadership:  never talk down to people.  They choose to follow you out of respect, not threat.   It's just as important to connect with these folks as anyone else.

These guys (I say guys because 95% were men) are not stupid.   You should see the complexity of their operation.  

It's just different.  The key to succeed is to adjust to the differences, and build rapport.  Find the connections, the common ground, and to speak their language.

I had a great time with them.

Today, the differences from my "usual" audiences were vivid. 

What different audiences do you address?  How do you adjust your style?

The Four Elements of an Engaging & Impactful Story

Storytelling is a necessary ingredient in a speaker’s recipe for success. Stories work because they are able to connect a speaker’s unique experience to an audience’s universal truth. What starts as a personal recollection transforms itself on the way to the audience and is received as a shared perspective. This creates empathy for the speaker and gives validity to his/her concepts.

When developing a story, keep in mind the 4 features that combine to  create interesting and relate-able anecdotes:

The Set Up: Who is the main character and what is the situation they are in?

The Challenge: What is the problem/conflict the main character in finds him/herself in?

The Resolution: How does the story turn out? How is the problem solved?

The Relevance: How do you answer the audience’s main question, which is “So What?”?

Let me illustrate with a story….

              A few years ago I was on a small plane that was bouncing along through extreme turbulence like it was a rock skipping over a pond. I was so frightened that every time the plane hit a bump, I’d grip the sides of my seat and scream, “Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.” And when the plane smoothed out, I’d exhale and relax.

          Sitting across the aisle from me was a boy who could not have been more than 6 years old. And EVERY time the plane hit a bump and I shrieked, “Ahhhhhhhh”, the kid would lift his arms in the air and yell, “Wheeeeee”, just like he was on a roller coaster.

        I was both humbled and enlightened as I realized that life had just slapped me in the face and said, “Pay attention.” I understood that the boy and myself were both being given exactly the same information. The data we used to judge our situation was exactly the same, yet our responses were completely different from each other. How could that be? Because our beliefs about the situation were different! And it is our beliefs about a situation, as expressed by our self-talk, that drive our behavior, not the nature of the situation itself.

               My lasting takeaway? If I am going to change the way I act in a situation, I have to change my self-talk rather than try and change the external situation.

Here is how I used the four ingredients to create my story:

• .            The Set Up: Who is the main character and what is the situation? (I was on a turbulent plane ride)

•           The Challenge: What is the problem/conflict the character finds him/herself in? (How come the boy is having fun and I’m so afraid?)

•          The Resolution: How does the story turn out? How is the problem solved? (I understand about self-talk)

•        So What?: (I now have a way to manage stress and deal with fear; I learned something about myself)

Now that you have the ingredients, go cook up your own great stories! 

Izzy Gesell (Izzy's website) is an organizational alchemist who helps individuals and organizations transform their thinking from commonplace to extraordinary. Through his keynotes, trainings, coaching and facilitated sessions, Izzy offers imaginative, intuitive and immediately useful insights and programs. He is skilled at delivering meaningful material in a way that makes participants enjoy their time with him.

Izzy was one of the first to use Improv Theater concepts as tools for personal and organizational learning. He is the author of Playing Along: Group Learning Activities Borrowed From Improvisation Theater, a co-author of Cancer & the Healing Power of Play, a co-author of Humor Me: America’s Funniest Humorists on the Power of Laughter, and a contributor of a chapter on Improvisation as a facilitation tool in the IAF Group Facilitators Handbook. His video course for Lynda.com was their first  course shot before a live audience. A second Lynda.com course, "Humor in the Workplace" was just released.