Relevance Archive - Page 20 of 20 - The Art of Communicating

Who is your presentation actually for?

Most people would answer that it’s for their audience. But more often than not it turns out that that’s a rather fuzzy term. Often it’s actually for …

Themselves: It’s about what they are proud of and what matters to them. These people often use terms like “innovative”, “breakthrough technology” etc.

The board: It’s about what they think pleases the board. So, they include all sorts of stuff that’s irrelevant for their audience but that needs to be in because someone said it’s important and can’t be left out.

The committee: It’s the least common demoninator that’s left after everyone had their say.

Their peers: It avoids anything that might expose them among their peers. “We just don’t do it like this over here”, so they don’t do it, either.

…

All of this is valid and it might be just the right thing to do for this specific occasion. But don’t forget that there’s always the other way: To give a speech that resonates so strongly with the people in the room that their feedback will prove you right. In any case, it helps to have clarity about who the presentation is actually for and then go all the way in that direction.

What to build

There are things that everybody needs but nobody wants.

And there are things that everybody wants but nobody needs.

Both might earn us a fortune but both are hard to find and it’s highly unlikely that the thing that we’re building is in one of these categories.

Then, there are things that are really cool but that nobody wants and nobody needs. In fact, there are lots of things in this category.

It’s much easier to find and build but super frustrating because it will rather burn a fortune than earn one.

But this might work: To build useful things that some people love because they need it and want it. And when we build that thing, all we need to do with our communication is to tell the truth.

What are you building?

Lazy empathy

“What’s in it for them?” is in my top 3 of most misleading speaking advice. It sounds perfectly reasonable. Of course our audience wants to know what’s in it for them. What could possibly be wrong about that stance?

It encourages an attitude that I call “lazy empathy”. “What’s in it for them?” is easily satisfied by some bullet points on a slide. Too often, I have seen the argument stop at “It has more features than before”. Or “It works in a million different conditions.” Or “It’s for ten different scenarios.” when, in fact, the customer only needs that specific feature under that specific condition in that specific scenario.

“What’s in it for them” too often barely scratches the surface. I believe that’s because it’s the wrong perspective. It starts with “us”. It assumes that we built something primarily to make us a profit and now we need to go hunting for a reason that makes people want to buy the thing. It assumes that we need to extract something. Often, it even leads to making up something.

Yet, when you start with “them”, there’s no need to specifically address “what’s in it” for them. Because the whole thing is. It is for them.

What’s the ideal number of slides for a presentation?

Martin Luther King didn’t need a slide at all. Dick Hardt used 50 slides – per minute! Both used the ideal number of slides – for the story they wanted to tell on that day to that audience.

Rather than with a number of slides it’s much more useful to start with a story and then add slides as we need them. A slide is needed when it allows us to communicate something better with that slide than without it. Sometimes, we need a lot of slides, sometimes we don’t. Sometimes a slide needs a lot of time to explain, sometimes it doesn’t.

In essence, the simple (though, admittedly, not necessarily easy) answer to the question about the ideal number of slides is this: You need as many slides as you need.

Keeping the best for last

… is a great way of finishing strong. But what would happen if you turned that upside down and started with the best?

Would people stay to hear the rest?

If not, then why not?

And more importantly: Why would you want to bother your audience with it, anyway?

This, I believe, is one of the easiest ways to distinguish mature communicators from beginners: great communicators don’t withhold information, they build up tension by speaking about the things that truly matter to their audience so that it wants more. Great communicators care for their beginning to be strong not because it doesn’t tell the audience what it came for but because it’s so relevant that the audience will stick to their lips.

If there’s a need to withhold information, most likely it’s because you haven’t nailed the story.

When a story truly nails it, people will be dying to know more. And what appeared to be the second best are actually the pieces that make the whole story even more adorable.

Change as a measure of relevance

Most social media platforms measure engagement in order to determine relevance. Basically, the more people interact with a piece of content and the more time these people spend on a piece of content, the more relevant the piece is considered to be (and also, the more profitable it turns out to be for the platform as they can show us more ads).

And it makes sense, right? Why would people interact with content if it wasn’t relevant? Well, maybe. But it misses the point.

Because why would I need you to interact with this piece of content for it to change how you act as a leader? Why would I need you to spend ten minutes on this piece when all I need to say can be said in two minutes?

Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate your thumbs up as much as anyone. And I’m grateful when you choose to spend your time with me. But it’s not why I’m doing this. I’m posting my thoughts because I hope that it will lead you to reflect upon the way you speak, act, and lead. If it actually does, you’ll hopefully come back to hear what else I have to say.

Change is a much more useful (albeit hard to measure) metric for the relevance of a piece of content than the time we spend together or the amount of interaction we exchanged. It’s the metric that I use in choosing the content that I consume.

Does it make me think? Does it open up a new perspective on something? Does it make me act differently? These are the things that matter much more than the time I spend on a piece.

(PS: So, from a social media platform algorithm point of view, my podcast is probably the worst thing you could do with each episode being only about two minutes long.)

If in doubt, focus on relevance

If our story isn’t relevant, it doesn’t matter how beautiful our slides are, how elaborate our body language is, or how eloquent our wording is.

If our audience can’t relate to us, then it doesn’t matter whether it’s a story it doesn’t relate to, a beautiful design, or eloquent words.

If, on the other hand, we manage to make it highly relevant, our audience is willing to tolerate quite some frustration.

That’s why – if in doubt – I’d always work on relevance before I begin working on the show. I’d always work on substance before I begin working on the delivery.

Copywriting legend John Caples put it this way:

“If I had a year to create an ad, I’d spend 11 months working on the appeal, and a month – or even a week — on writing the ad. In other words, what you say in your copy is much more important than how you say it.”

“I’m going to make him an offer he can’t refuse.”

While that makes for one of the greatest movie quotes, it’s certainly not the kind of business we strive for. I don’t know about you, but the businesses I work with would much rather make an offer their customer wouldn’t want to refuse.

While Don Corleone has a deep understanding of what’s worst for his audience, they strive for a deep understanding of what’s best for their audience. Don Corleone’s offer is made out of a position of power while their offer is made out of a position of relevance. While he uses force, they rely on resonance.

The crucial difference is free will. Telling a story that resonates so strongly that people will want to come along eliminates the need of force. Ultimately, if your work really does make a difference, then resonance might even be the stronger force.

What’s at stake?

If I didn’t follow your advice what would happen? Where would I be missing out?

Because why would I listen if nothing’s at stake?

We tell stories on behalf of our audience

The power of stories is that it’s us who re-live the life of the story’s hero.

That’s true even in a business context. A story is a great story when it makes us feel: “That’s me! That’s exactly what I struggle with.”

A good story provide us with a new perspective on our own lives. It lets us imagine actions that we wouldn’t take without the story. It lets us feel feelings that we wouldn’t feel without the story. It lets us visualise outcomes that we would consider out of reach without the story.

Great stories lead to action.

And that’s why we tell stories on behalf of our audience.

SEARCH

Explore

Work with me

Connect

SUBSCRIBE