The Worst Talk?…?Ever.

A Sneak Peek at a sample chapter from “How to Speak: Tips for people who want to tell their story”

This article is a sample from the book, “How to Speak: Tips for people who want to tell their story”.

“The burned hand teaches best. After that, advice about fire goes to the heart.” 

— J. R. R. Tolkien

I’ve seen the worst talk. The Worst. In. The. World. There’s no competition.

I don’t mean those talks that you can suffer in silence, where perhaps the speaker is unprepared or, more painful for them and you, they decide to do a “live demo” and realise they are mortal and so make a typo every few commands and that the internet demons are not on their side… Those poor souls are utterly excusable, although if they’d read this book before taking to the stage they might have saved themselves the wrath of the Demo Gods.

No, I’m talking instead of the curse of the “DOA Keynote”. A talk so bad, and so trumped up, with such intense expectations, that it then falls flat on its face from a great height in a drunken stupor of wretchedness…

It’s an experience that, once suffered, is never forgotten. Surely I’m over-reacting? It can’t be THAT bad? Oh but it is… I’ve been very, VERY lucky as I’ve only had to suffer the fate of the “DOA Keynote” once. Unfortunately, for me, it was a perfect storm. This speaker was the ultimate case and, for obvious reasons, shall remain nameless here but if you recognise yourself in the following then please, PLEASE, change your ways.

Let me explain the audience pain and characteristics of the “DOA Keynote” by telling you my story but first, a survival tip.

Never sit at the front

I never sit at the front of a room. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve given a talk where the organisers tear their hair out as the auditorium fills according to some mathematicians laws of clustering with one large exclusion zone: The 2 rows in front of the speaker. I understand, I am the same when I attend most talks. I will usually hide towards the edges or the back of the room because I’m actually quite an introverted individual. I want to feel I can escape. It’s rare I actually ever do want to escape, but having the option is apparently important to my introverted brain and so I tend to pick my seats, along with everyone else, as far away from everyone else as possible without appearing too rude with good line-of-sight to the door.

So usually I’m just like everyone else, except for when I lose all sense of rationality and completely forget the line-of-sight rule. This only happens on rare occasions. It tends to happen when there’s a high profile speaker, maybe a True Legend(TM), taking to the stage. Someone I’ve dreamed of seeing perform. At those moments I throw caution and introversion to the wind and find myself wide-eyed, readying to whoop and clap like a loon because I’m ready to be part of something special. It’s an Event, with a capital E, and I’m ready to bear witness.

Like a fool I head to the front where I cannot escape. Worse, I’m often a fellow speaker and so people will notice if I leave. I’m trapped, of my own volition, but that’s not how I see it. I’m here for the ride of my life, an experience I’ll be talking about for generations to come, or maybe just on the train ride home. Either way Bring It On, I’m ready!

This is how this story begins. With me sat at the front of the audience in a huge auditorium, far from any hope of escape. Welcome to my nightmare…

You have to be able to speak, so Speak

Intonation, eye direction, body movement, smiles, smirks, pauses, crescendos, whispers; these are all tools of a verbal storytellers trade (I’ll refer to us simply as storytellers from now on in). Your job is to tell a story, tell it well, and leave the audience with memories that they want, and you employ all of your arsenal to do that job.

Somehow, this time none of this could have been mentioned to the speaker on the stage not more than 5 feet from my gradually shrinking shape in the front row.

Shuffling, verbal ticks, narrative garden paths, abandoned points, obvious and utterly unfunny jokes; the list of faux pas really did go on! If there was a canonical list of oratory crimes, this speaker could have been the author. And I’m stuck. At the front. With no escape.

Then things got worse…

The Worst Crime?

Do you know why people are there to listen to you speak? I mean instead of the free food, drinks and perhaps nothing better to do if you’re the keynote speaker. There’s only so much free pizza can do to attract an audience, there really are other reasons they are there. So here’s the fact:

THEY ARE THERE FOR YOU.

They want to hear YOUR take. No one else’s. They want your stories, your experiences, your emotions.

Every fact you talk about could, sometimes literally, be read online, but not with your perspective. Not your smiles or grimaces in the moment. Not your diversions and anecdotes. Your audience is there for this moment with you because they believe that it’s going to give them something special. They want a moment of intimacy with you and your thoughts. They want to be entertained, and they want to leave knowing they got something important, unique even, to take away.

It’s a total honour and a privilege if only one person turns up, because that’s one person who thinks you’re interesting enough to hear from. You get 100, consider that a huge win. You get 1000 people, like there was at this talk, you had better deliver. It’s a duty and a privilege to have all that attention, and good speakers bring their “A Game”.

This book exists because I want you to work up to those moments and then deliver informative and impactful talks when you get there. I want you to meet the challenge of that responsibility, and then blow your audiences away with your unique stories, with your authenticity, with your candour, in a nutshell … with YOU.

This speaker had not read this book. That’s fair, it hadn’t been written. Turns out though that they’d clearly not read any book written on speaking from the Greeks onwards, because at the very moment when I was trying to figure out how to leave without being “the speaker who left” I was rooted to my seat by a spectacle I will take to the grave. I witnessed the the cardinal sin. The worst crime you can ever do.

The speaker played a video.

And not just any video, a video you could find online. For free. A video of a TALK! A VIDEO OF THE SPEAKER GIVING A TALK!

I was sitting there, listening to a terrible speaker give a terrible talk. Who then decided to show a video of themselves. Themselves giving a terrible talk.

They were already at zero, then they leapt four levels of hell downwards!

An hour later and the talk grinds to a mumbled halt. The room is in shock and the muted applause clearly has the ring of people just glad to go get coffee. I do not feel sympathetic for the speaker. Not only are they smugly wandering off into the dark to go pick up their fat, keynote cheque, they have just been a thief. They’ve stolen an hour or so of life from everyone in that audience. For all that life no one got anything in return, and for that I make a vow.

I vow if I ever get any good at writing then I’d write a book on how not to be that speaker.

Welcome to that book.

TL;DR

• A good talk is just that, a talk. It’s a performance, and people are there for you.
• Your audience is there to see and hear you, to have those moments with you, don’t disappoint them.
• Keep your own talks simple, and use the power of your stories to leave your audience happy and satisfied.

(There are) No Dumb Questions

Should I never show a video?

Any and all media and gimmicks are ok as long as they support your story. Be aware of the story you are telling and if you find something just fits, then by all means use it.

Can’t I just hit the stage and present the facts?

You could, but I would not recommend it. Especially not if those facts are easily discoverable online. Facts are not compelling to our brains, unfortunately. You should always not conflict with the facts, that would be deceptive and we leave that sort of behaviour to politicians, but it’s not good enough just to present the facts, you must make those facts compelling with your narrative.

This is a sample from the book, “How to Speak: Tips for people who want to tell their story”.