Last fall, I did a three-part series on becoming a better presenter. It was a detailed look at the elements I thought were important to deliver the best presentation possible. If you're a new subscriber, you can find the first of those three issues here. This week, I want to take this to a whole new level by analyzing every measurable aspect of a keynote I delivered this past Thursday with the intention of drawing out some observations and insights that I hope you will find useful as you try to become the most effective presenter you can be.

The opportunity

I was asked to do a keynote talk on crisis management for a group of about 200 professionals in the public works sector. My time slot was right after lunch.

Timing

I showed up 50 minutes prior to my start time. I was to start at 1:00 pm and I was given 30 minutes in total. Any professional speaker knows you never go over your time. This is out of respect for the next speaker, the meeting planners and, finally, the audience. I put a lot of thought into condensing my typical 60-minute talk into half of that. Which lessons and examples would I use? Which ones would I ditch? I 'killed' about half my regular content and did several walk-throughs to judge timing. On presentation day, we ended up starting almost five minutes late. Five minutes is a lot when you only have 30 mins in total. So even before I got to the lectern, I had already decided which additional content would have to go. I watched the clock casually but consistently throughout my presentation. I ended at 1:29 pm. I had time to take one question and walked off at 1:30 pm.

Lesson: Show up early. Never go over your allotted time. Mind the clock. Practice with your content to make sure it fits.

Slides

PowerPoint gets a lot of hate. And if a speaker is using bullet points and clip art, that hate is deserved. But PPT is a big part of my presentations. I invest a lot of time and effort into making visually captivating slides and using video examples to reinforce lessons and get those synapses firing. Excluding my title slide, I had 40 slides, which sounds like a lot for less than 30 minutes. However, most of those slides were up on the screen for less than 30 seconds. There were images, logos, short videos and big lessons spelled out. My title slide was an ominous image of Godzilla smashing his way through a town.

Lesson: Odds are the audience has been subjected to boring slides and bullet points prior to your talk. Shake them awake with stunning images and compelling videos that drive your main points home. Don't use PPT as a crutch but as dynamic, intelligent wallpaper. FYI, the total number of bullet points in my presentation: zero.

Heart rate

I'm not a nervous presenter. While they were introducing me, I didn't feel anxious. I felt a combination of calm and excitement. So I was really surprised when I looked at my heart rate on my Fitbit later that evening. The accompanying image shows my heart rate from presentation day. My talk was from 1:00 pm to 1:30 pm. In other words, the yellow section with a peak heart rate of 116 bpm. That's almost two beats per second! I didn't feel nervous at all so this is fascinating to me. I guess I would chalk this up to professional excitement, feeling the pressure of wanting to do a great job and, maybe, the three cups of coffee I pounded before getting on stage.

Lesson: If your heart rate is elevated before a big presentation, don't take that as a negative. Lean into it and understand it's part of taking it seriously, having some level of professional butterflies and wanting to do a great job. Ultimately, I feel the important thing is who's in charge? You? Or your heartbeat? You can let nerves paralyze you and hamper your performance. Or you can harness those nerves toward a great performance.

Spicy language

My talk was fast-paced and while it was planned out in terms of the theme, it was ad-libbed (to some extent) in terms of the actual words I used. I hit on a rapid fire list of crisis examples, including United Airlines, Maple Leaf Foods, NASA, Tylenol, Boeing, Walkerton, Hockey Canada, Tim Hortons, Rogers, Bell Media, BP, Facebook and Mandalay Bay to name a few. The main gist of my talk is that in 2023, there is absolutely no excuse for any large organization to not have a sound crisis management plan in place, to have their executives media trained, etc. I'm not reading a script. These lessons and stories are baked into my brain at this point. I know where I want to get to but I might deliver it slightly differently every time. Part of deciding how I'll deliver it is 'reading the room'. What kind of mood is everyone in? What's resonating with them? Should I add more of this? Less of that? During my talk, I used a bit of colourful language. I said the word 'shit' (e.g. "...when the shit hits the fan") and I also used the term 'dickheads' (to describe the executives of a very large company that handled a high-profile crisis very poorly). Saying these words wasn't on my checklist for the day, but it felt right in the moment. And it was delivered with humour and in the spirit of shaking leaders awake to appreciate the importance of crisis prep. And during my talk, the 'dickheads' comment actually got a big laugh from the audience.

Ultimately, I received two emails after this talk. This first one was an anonymous email from someone in the audience who was clearly quite offended that I used those words:

The second email I received was from one of the event's organizers:

I don't regret my delivery. It was the best version of that talk I think I could have done that day. People were laughing. The room had a buzz. I got lots of positive comments afterward. So, ultimately, the email that matters more to me is the one from the organizer.

Lesson: It doesn't matter what size group you're presenting to, there's going to be someone who doesn't like it. Be true to yourself and your content. Don't be afraid to have a bit of fun with your topic, even if it's on the serious side. While every audience member matters, it's the client's satisfaction that matters most.

A few other items

There are a few other things I wanted to list since they might be helpful to other presenters. They didn't necessarily warrant their own paragraphs but I wanted to mention them:

• I didn't eat prior to my talk, even though they generously offered me a great-looking lunch. I think eating slows you down and can make your delivery sluggish. I find presentations are best delivered when I'm a bit hungry.
• I really did have three cups of coffee before I got on stage. This works for me. It may not work for you.
• I stayed to watch the next presenter (she was great). I would love to stick around all day but with other meetings and commitments, it's not always possible. But I always try to see either the person before me or the person after.
• I checked in with the A/V person ahead of time to make sure the slides were set up, the audio worked for the videos, etc.
• I brought my own slide advance/remote/clicker (everyone calls it something different). They had one there but I ended up using my own. It's easier to advance slides without having to click a certain button on the laptop.
• I had hard copy notes of all my slides. I was reviewing them in another room prior to my talk, making notes and getting in the zone. Always bring a paper copy of your presentation!

That's it for this week. Every presentation is different and each speaker will have a different experience. But if there are a few tips in here that would be valuable to you, that's the objective. I'm giving numerous versions of this same crisis communications talk in the next few months and I'm going to take some of the information I gathered from this event to try to make those ones even better. Thanks again for reading and have a great week!

WW

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