Episode #107: Presenting Needs Rhythm

The competition to grasp and then hold the attention of our audiences is becoming more and more fierce.

We have all become fervent multi-taskers, listening to someone speak while surreptitiously scrolling through our email feed, Facebook or LinkedIn or all three! Having our listener follow what we are saying, digest it and agree with it, must be the goal. Otherwise, why are we bothering?

Many people imagine that the content of their talk will be sufficient to carry the day with their presentation and that emphasising delivery skills is simply dabbling in verbal voodoo. Such beliefs are often firmly held by technically oriented people, for whom proof, evidence, statistics and data are sacrosanct, solid and sacred. The weight of the evidence is all we need to persuade others. Not true!

“If your evidence was compelling, but nobody was paying close attention, would it matter?”. The answer is obviously “Yes, it matters”. Let’s presume that the presentation’s opening has been well designed and is successful in grabbing the attention of even the most distracted audience. Before we get to the wrap up and call for Q & A, we have our main points to present. This number will probably range between three and five brackets.

We can take a bracket of 5 to 6 minutes as our framework for the speech. Every bracket needs to have a change of pace to keep our audience’s attention. Even within the same topic or sub-topic, we need to switch gears and vary the delivery.

We might introduce a powerful visual effect be it on screen or in the room using a prop. I used a rolled up Japanese scroll to great effect in a speech. On the scroll was written “DatsuO NyuA” (脱欧入亜), which was a play on words reversing a Meiji era slogan of Japan turning away from Asia and going toward European civilization. I was making the point that my country of Australia was moving away from Europe toward Asia. I could have just said so in words, but the scroll was much more powerful.

On another occasion, I was making the point about Australia being as safe a Japan, because of the similar strict gun control laws. Hidden in my suit jacket I had a plastic replica Magnum 38 handgun, which Clint Eastwood made so famous in his Dirty Harry movies. It has a very long barrel and is a physically big gun, so even when viewed at a distance, it has visual impact. I slowly pulled the gun out and held it in profile view to the audience, high above my head, saying “This is illegal in Australia, the same as in Japan”, to make my argument about the safety of sending their children to study in Australia.

Now our speech cannot become littered with too many such devices every five minutes, because we will be exhausting our audience. It might be a powerful quotation, a joke or a visual on a slide that grabs our attention. We are going for the mental equivalent of an audience stretch break every five minutes or so. The key is to plan the speech this way from the beginning, if we want our message to be heard.