Be Like Howard: A Public Speaking Epiphany at Spin Class

Howard, the excellent spin instructor at my local gym, was away last class and I was really missing him.

Why wasn’t I fully engaged and energized? I was well rested. Fuelled up. Ready to bust my ass for an hour.

The substitute instructor was perfectly… fine. Nothing was obviously wrong. It just wasn’t as right as it should be. As right as it is when Howard leads the class.

My energy was fading. My focus was slipping. A number of people were leaving early. Nobody ever leaves Howard’s class early.

My mind wandered, as it often does, to work. I’ve got a few speaking engagements approaching, and I’ve been thinking through what topics to focus on, what approaches to take, and what to skip.

Regardless of the audience and regardless of the length of my time slot, I want to be like Howard. I want everyone to be fully dialed in, energized, and with me to the end. It’s so terribly tempting for people to mentally check out and so hard to get them back.

I realized that there are three things Howard does that this substitute spin instructor didn’t. I also realized it was a near-perfect parallel to what’s needed to rock a speaking stage.

1. Howard has Clarity of Purpose 

The substitute instructor welcomed everyone, introduced herself, made a joke or two about the weather, and away we went. Okay… time to pedal I guess.

You could say the purpose is self-evident. We’re there to work. But that’s like saying the audience at your presentation is there to listen. That’s not a compelling purpose.

Howard paints a picture. “Today we’re going to climb a long, winding road. There are going to be four big pieces of work. Each will be nine minutes long, and each will begin with…”

We know where we’re going. We know what it’s going to look like. What it’s going to feel like.

It’s a coherent journey with a beginning, a middle, and an end, and we’re not going to allow ourselves to quit until we cross the finish line.

I realized that I haven’t always done a good enough job of clearly establishing the purpose of my presentations. Jumping right in doesn’t cut it. A bullet-point agenda isn’t compelling. A joke or a story about what happened on the way here this morning seldom achieves more than a few polite smiles. 

Be like Howard: Establish an absolutely clear and compelling purpose, right from the beginning. 

2. Howard has Clarity of Path and Progress

Throughout the substitute’s class I was never entirely sure of where we were at. Am I supposed to be at maximum effort right now, or something a little less than that? Are we dialing up the intensity in a minute? How long until the next recovery?

Lacking clarity of path and progress had two consequences… both bad. First, I never quite gave it my all. I was never flat out killing it because I had to hold something in reserve for whatever was coming out of the fog. 

I also didn’t experience the sense of accomplishment that comes from completing a well-defined course. Things wound down as we approached the end of the hour and we were done. 

Kinda sounds like a lot of presentations, doesn’t it? 

Howard makes the journey clear and vivid. We always know exactly where we are, and we can calibrate our intensity accordingly. 

Clarity of path and progress fuels engagement. It also fuels retention.

I can tell you, in detail, what we did two weeks ago in Howard’s class. I still remember three weeks ago pretty well. With the substitute, I’d be hard-pressed to tell you what we did today, even as I walked to the change room. Generally, sure, but not specifically.

Be like Howard: Plot a clear path for your audience, one that takes them on a vivid journey to a meaningful finish line. Along the way, employ visual and verbal signposts so they always know where they are. They’ll be fully engaged, and they’ll remember your message much better and much longer.  

3. Howard Aligns the Parts

In the substitute instructor’s class, the music was a seemingly random background. It was better than silence for sure, but it didn’t really contribute to what we were doing.

In Howard’s class, the music is an integral part of the experience. It ebbs and flows in harmony with our journey. A powerful tide of rising musical intensity pulls us toward a crescendo in perfect synch with the demands of our ride, and recedes to soothe us as we recover.

The parallel here is the visuals in a presentation. Oftentimes they do little to support the journey you’re trying to take the audience on.

We’ve all suffered through painful eye charts, bullet point reading, and distractingly amateurish slides, but avoiding these obvious pitfalls isn’t enough.

Be like Howard: Ensure your visuals wrap their arms around your audience and lead them on a clear journey.

Do they support a central metaphor aligned with the purpose of your talk? Does your cadence of slide changes ebb and flow in harmony with the intensity of your spoken words? Do the visuals match the emotions of that part of the talk… serious when you’re serious, light when you’re light?

Do the visuals consistently help to maintain the clarity of purpose and the clarity of path and progress?

I’m really looking forward to my next presentation. And I’m going to make sure it would make Howard proud.