Relevance Archive - The Art of Communicating

The prerequisite

A question that’s not asked nearly often enough when preparing a speech:

So what?

Your talk can be
… factually correct,
… logically structured,
… accompanied by beautifully designed slides,

and still fail to
… make an impact,
… change your audience’s thinking,
… let alone compel them to act.

Why?

Because it lacks a compelling answer to that simple question:

So what?

Audiences look for an answer to this simple question every time and if they can’t find one, they will simply tune out.

Sooner or later they will just stop paying attention.

But without attention, change can’t happen.

Any effort you put into structure, wording, or design will likely be a waste of time until you can compellingly answer why your audience should care.

So answer that one first.

The more compelling your answer is, and the earlier you provide it during your speech, the more likely it is that you will have their attention.

That one message

If I forced you to remove one message from your website, which one would you remove?

Why don’t you?

.
.
.

No, honestly now:
Would removing that message make your story weaker or stronger?

We seldom look at it that way. Most people just evaluate completeness. Through that lens, it’s obvious that nuance and detail will be missing when you remove that message.

But will that make your story weaker?
Or perhaps stronger?

Act accordingly!

PS: So what did you do? Did you leave it, remove it, or change it? I’d love to read about your choice!

If only they knew

A big mistake in communication is to assume that others would arrive at the same conclusions as you do if only they knew the same.

But that’s not true.

They have a different frame of reference.
They have a different set of values.
They’ve made different experiences.

And so, even if both of you have the exact same information, they may still arrive at a different conclusion.

Which means that there’s no use in bombarding them with ever more facts and details that support your conclusion.

It won’t change their mind.
They have already perfectly understood your point.
Missing information is not the problem.
They will still arrive at a different conclusion.

A better way forward is to try and understand their perspective.

What makes them arrive at that conclusion?
What do they see when they look at the question at hand?
What does it remind them of?
Which values are at play?

This puts you in a much better situation to answer the next set of questions:

What would need to be true for them to arrive at a different conclusion? (Is there a way for me to make it true?)

What would be an outcome that makes sense for them? (Is there a way for me to create that outcome?)

What do they really want? (Is there a way for me to make it easier for them to get it?)

I’d love to hear your strategies for dealing with situations where the others seemingly just don’t get it.

PS: If you want help in finding better words, not just more words, reach out!

Let’s try doings

Meetings can be a living nightmare.
Let’s try “doings” instead. What’s the difference?

Meetings have an agenda, doings a goal.

Meetings cover topics, doings aim for results.

In a meeting, you talk about things.
In a doing, you do things.

To be sure, getting to results can involve lots of talking.
But it’s not about the talking.

Too often, we meet just for the talking.
Ending up with lots of, well, talk but no result.

But where will the talking lead you?
Asking that question is a powerful shift already.

You don’t meet to talk.
You talk to make progress.

Often, when a meeting is over, the work starts.
But when a doing is over, the work is done (ideally, at least).

Here’s a simple recipe:

There’s an issue. (For example, a decision needs to be made. A plan needs to be made. A conflict has emerged and you seek alignment.)
No issue, no gathering.
You agree on what exactly you want to do in the meeting.
You gather in a room.
You do what you said you’d do.

Even if the result is merely a plan, if that’s what you agreed upon as the goal of gathering in a room, then that’s much more than the open-endedness of many meetings that simply end because time’s up.

Getting people together, whether in a meeting room or online, to work on solving problems is great. The problem is when it’s just for the sake of it.

How do you deal with meeting madness?

PS: Don’t get me wrong. There’s tremendous value in “merely” meeting for the sake of it, but there might be better places than a meeting room.

A great show

WOW opens the mind.
AHA changes the mind.

So much advice on public speaking focuses on the WOW effect.

How to turn the spotlight onto yourself.
How to put on a great show.
How to dazzle your audience.

But do you want your audience to cheer for your great performance or for the brilliance of your idea?

If it’s the latter, then WOW will only get you half the way.

To get all the way, consider turning the spotlight around and onto your audience.

Sure, put on a great show if that’s your thing. But make your audience the star of the show.

And shine a bright light. Yet not to dazzle but to light your audience the path to a profound insight.

It’s so much more fun.
It’s so much more worthwhile.

Best of all, AHA moments tend to last longer than WOW moments.

What’s your take on this?

Your Style

“Our audiences expect it that way.”
But honestly now, do they really?

The statement sounds as if it would be in service of the audience. But more often than not, it’s just an expression of fear.

The fear of rejection.

Because, well, what if they don’t like it the other way?

When I started to do things differently with my speaking some 20 years back, my colleagues in our working group were very worried about me. They kept reminding me that audiences would expect a more traditional way of presenting and that I was risking my reputation.

Turns out I wasn’t.
Neither did audiences expect a more traditional way.

A couple of things I frequently heard after a presentation:
“That was a refreshing way of presenting.”
“Finally, someone speaking plain English.”
“I loved the way that you spoke with us, not to us.”

No one had missed the boring bullet point galore of the traditional way.

In fact, never even once in my life have I met someone who would have preferred a boring presentation over a more entertaining one just because the boring would be more traditional.

Here’s what audiences really expect: They expect you to not waste their time.

Audiences are way more tolerant than you think regarding style.

What’s much more important is that

what you say is relevant and
how you say it resonates.

What I’ve learned is that the latter is much easier if you dare to be more “you” in the way you show up. But make sure that what you say is highly relevant.

Would love to hear your experiences with being you! How do you deal with the warning that “audiences expect it that way”?

Relevance beats elegance

If I can’t relate to a speaker’s words, it doesn’t matter how beautiful their slides are, how elaborate their body language is, or how creative their storytelling is.

It might be nice but it’s also pointless.

If, on the other hand, they manage to make it highly relevant, I will tolerate an ugly slide or two and a little nervousness.

In other words, work on your story’s relevance before you begin to work on the show.

The good news is that when it’s relevant, a great show will only amplify the impact.

Should you give that talk?

A single “yes” to one of these questions might be enough of a reason to go for it:

Will the ideas you share make a profound difference in your audience’s life?

Is your story inconvenient but your audience needs to hear it?

Can you grow personally by preparing for, showing up, or speaking up at this event?

Does the thought of standing on that stage make you feel excited?

Is there a reasonable chance your insights could spark meaningful conversations within the audience?

Are you providing a voice for those who cannot speak up in this context?

Will sharing your experiences or knowledge help others navigate their challenges more effectively?

What would you add?

Things your audience does during a presentation

Tick all boxes that apply:

□ listen carefully to every single word
□ look the speaker up on LinkedIn
□ catch up on this morning’s emails
□ surf Instagram
□ try to match what’s being said to own experience
□ sleep
□ prepare to ask a question
□ flirt
□ doodle/take notes
□ mentally rate the presentation on a scale from 0 to 10
□ imagine giving the presentation themselves and how they’d do it differently
□ make a photograph of a slide
□ make a selfie
□ fact check a claim the speaker made
□ …

The list goes on.

The important question is:

What do you want your audience to do during your next presentation?

And how do you create the conditions to make that happen?

An excellent tool

PowerPoint is an excellent tool to turn great ideas into confusing presentations.

Sure, it can be used to turn a great story into a great presentation. But mostly it does the opposite.

We’ve all seen it happen a little too often.

In PowerPoint, it’s easy to prioritize fluff over substance,
and cram slides with detail just because the space is there.

It’s easy to focus on aesthetics – fonts, colors, images, animations – while neglecting the foundational work of crafting a compelling, relevant story.

PowerPoint as a tool doesn’t particularly care for clarity or relevance, nor does it encourage that.

Essentially, PowerPoint is about filling slides, not telling stories.

It helps to keep that in mind when using the tool. The more we allow it to pull our attention away from the story we want to tell and direct it to filling slides, the more we risk wasting time on creating flashy but empty presentations.

Audiences don’t care nearly as much about fancy slides as you might think; they crave clear and engaging stories. If that’s with a beautifully designed slide … great, we’ll take it.

But if it’s fancy slides with a lame story, we’ll pass. (Let alone ugly slides!)

Don’t let PowerPoint lead your process. Start with clarity, understand your audience, and build your story first. Then, use PowerPoint to amplify your message in ways that words alone can’t.

That’s how you transform a well-thought-out narrative into a powerful presentation.

Resist the urge to start with slides.

Start with the story.

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