Presenting with Charisma

Sunday, February 24, 2019 8:28 PM

Charismatic public speaking engages several charisma styles:

- Constructing an inspiring and motivational presentation using

visionary charisma.

- Command your audience's attention and respect using authority

charisma.

- Connect with your audience using kindness charisma.

Constructing a charismatic message

Presentations are about convincing people of something - an idea, an

initiative, a course of action. But it all starts with knowing whom
exactly we are aiming to persuade. You will be communicating with
attention-starved audiences that will only devote part of their
attention to what you are saying. Keeping this fact in mind and
crafting your presentation and designing your speech accordingly,
increases your effectiveness over 80% of speakers out there. Your
audience thinks, acts, interacts, and deals with issues, way before
your presentation. What occupies their minds stay there and you may
have to compete with it for their attention.

Select the single most important idea you want to convey and make
it as crystal clear as you possibly can. You should be able to articulate
your message in one sentence. Within this one main message, have
3-5 key supporting points. The human brain thinks in traids and
cannot Immediately comprehend numbers greater than four.

Open each supporting point with entertaining anecdotes, fascinating

facts, compelling statistics, great metaphors, examples and
anologies. Stories have a particularly strong impact on people.
Audiences often remember first the story, then second, the point the
story was making. For stories to be most effective, choose characters
that are similar to the people in your audience to make them more
relatable and make them as entertaining (and as short) as a

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relatable and make them as entertaining (and as short) as a
Hollywood sneak preview. You're in the entertainment business
whether you like it or not. Make the story dramatic. You're calling on
visionary charisma here, tapping into people's emotional side.

Metaphors and analogies capture your audience's imagination very

effectively. Choose images that would appeal to a young audience
for maximum impact. Speeches that give a feeling of awe and wonder
appeal to our childhood roots. Eg. If you mentioned that there's
untapped potential in your customer base, liken yourselves to
"bounty hunters" or "treasure hunters" searching for "hidden gold."

Make even numbers and statistics personal, meaningful and

relatable for your audience. Whether you use a story, example,
number, or statistic, make sure that you close with either a clear
point or a transition to the action step you want your audience to
take. Make it so simple that even a multitasking, partially listening
audience member would get it.

E.g. "Apple has sold 4 million iPhones so far. That amounts to selling
20 thousand iPhones every single day." - Steve Jobs. " This memory
card has 12 gigabytes of memory. That means it holds enough music
for you to travel to the moon and back.

Remember when crafting the closing of your presentation, that we

remember primarily the beginnings and endings. You want to start
and end on a high note, so avoid Q&A. It's hard to have a Q&A
session as compelling and energetic as your main speech. Ask the
introducer to warn the audience that there will be no Q&A session at
the end, so they ask questions during the speech. This has the added
advantage of increasing the audience's involvement, participation
and general energy level.

Once you create your structure, you can start crafting your
sentences.
• It's all about them. Use the word "you" as often as possible. Use
their worst, their stories, their metaphors - "hole in one" for
golfers, "shipwreck" for sailors. Try also to match your verbs to
your audience: lead or initiate for businessmen, build for
engineers, craft for artists.
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 engineers, craft for artists.
• Get graphic. The brain thinks in pictures, so choose language that
is vivid and sensory-rich.
• Beware of negative associations. Avoid the "no problem" trap.
• Keep it short. With each sentence ask: what value is this
sentence delivering? Even when crafting stories, give only details
that convey comprehension or enjoyment. Think sneak preview
not full length movie.

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Creating a charismatic appearance
Saturday, March 2, 2019 4:15 PM

Creating a Charismatic Appearance

You are going to be in the spotlight, so think carefully about the message
you want to convey through you clothing. Is it authority? Power?
Warmth?

Keep in mind the research on chromatic effects:

Red conveys energy, passion. Wear red to wake up an audience.
Black shows that you’re serious and won’t take no for an answer.
White exudes honesty & innocence. E.g. defendants choose white
in the court room.
Blue emits trust – trust – the darker the shade, the deeper the level
of trust.
Grey is a good neutral, quintessential for business.
Orange & Yellow are not recommended. They are the first to catch
the human eye and the first to tire it.

E.g. when conveying a difficult message, wear a navy-blue suit and a

white shirt.

To project confidence and move with ease on stage, you also need to
feel physically confident.

Make sure nothing is hindering your movements, impairing your balance

or in any other way diminishing your comfort.

Wear clothing you can breathe in and shoes that are stable.
Your brain’s first job is to monitor your safety, whether it’s your ability to
escape predators or stay upright.

If it has to spend any of its attention worrying about your breathing or

balance, that means that at least one part of your attention can’t be
devoted to your success. Why waste any of your focus?

Rehearsing for Charisma

Charisma takes practice.

Jerry Seinfield rehearsed for 6 months for a 6-min spot on the tonight
show.
Steve Jobs, who appeared masterful on stage, was known to rehearse
important presentations relentlessly.

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Like a duck appears to sail smooth on the surface of a lake, while
paddling powerfully below the waterline, it takes a lot of effort for a
presentation to appear effortless.

When a speech is important, practice until every breath is perfect

because knowing that you’ve got the speech so well mastered allows you
to be so spontaneous. You have muscle memory to fall back on.

One interesting technique used by magicians is to run through the

entire presentation once with their eyes closed.

Have your speech audiotaped or videotaped and count what

professional speakers call irritants – any sounds or movements that do
not add to your message.

Because the audience is watching your every move, every sound and
facial expressions you make is a form of communication that demands a
portion of their attention.

If videotaped, ask 3 people to point out any unnecessary gestures – any

tics or distractions.

If audiotaped, have the speech transcribed and ask them to note every
“um” and “ah”.

Don’t do it yourself. It is much harder to hear our own irritants, and

transcription services are inexpensive.

If you can, perform the entire speech at least once in front of a live
audience as a trial run. The dynamic changes dramatically when
presenting the same information to living breathing people.

E.g. professional stand-up comedians organise trial runs for themselves,

performing at smaller clubs, where they can test out new material in a
low-stakes environment.

You too should find a place to break in your sales pitch, your script or
your interview lines in front of live people. Ideally they should be
somewhat similar to the audience you are going to address(age,
profession or level of experience) but in a pinch, friends and family will
do.

Projecting Power

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Charismatic speakers know how to give the impression that they’re as
comfortable walking across the stage as they would be walking across
the living room.

This is called owning the stage. And 3 tricks are needed to make it
happen.
First, have a wide stance, well balanced on both feet. You feel and
look more confident, more stable. Be the gorilla.

Second, practice without a podium or lectern (book stand).

Speaking behind one gives the impression that you are fearful to
venture out and prefer staying behind the safety of a shield. The
presentation becomes more static - stereotype of the lecturer who
stands immobile at his lectern, reading his notes in a monotone
voice. Moving comfortably around the stage will make you appear
much more confident, powerful and charismatic.

Third, find the right volume to project confidence. This is tricky, as

it depends on the microphone or how the sound system is set up.
Before the speech, ask a few people at the back to be your sound
experts and give your pre-arranged signal to raise or lower your voice
if needed.

Projecting warmth

Great public speakers emulate the fireside chat atmosphere, no matter

how many people are in the audience you feel as if they are speaking
directly to you.

A fireside chat is a comfortable conversation that creates a sense of

intimacy. Stories to your favourite friends or having a comfortable
conversation with just one person. To make your audience particularly
special, speak as if you were sharing a secret.

You make this easier by making eye contact first with those who
seem more animated - those smiling, showing interest or nodding.

Use the angel wings visualisation and other warmth internal tools.
Believe that your audience are angels gathered here to work together.
You feel a warm pride, a surge of affection that is palpable.

Increase voice fluctuation to enhance persuasiveness, smile when you

want a warm voice, drop intonation to convey confidence and authority.

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Pause, breathe and slow down

Include notes to yourself every few pages: Pause, breathe, slow down.
While practicing, ask a member of the audience to give you a
prearranged signal reminding you to slow down.

Pay attention to your tempo because the slower you speak, the more
thoughtful and deliberate you sound, and the more attention people will
give to what you say.

It takes courage to pause but just as in conversations, pausing regularly

is an important skill to acquire. It is one of the key skills for great
speaking.
Have the confidence to make your listeners wait for your words.
Dramatic pause: adds drama

After delivering a key point or an impactful story, pause for a few seconds
to let your audience take it in.

If you've just used humour, have the courage to wait for the laughter to
swell and subside, before you move on.

Pausing is both important to begin and end your speeches.

You walk on stage, come to the center, face the audience and stop.
Remain completely silent as you count three full seconds while slowly
sweeping your eyes across the crowd and making eye contact. Nothing
rivets the audience's attention like this kind of silence.

After your last words, pause then say "Thank you" and stay there while
you endure the applause for a few seconds.

If you have trouble pausing, try color coding your speeches e.g. one
blue bar for a one beat pause, two red bars for a two peat pause. It helps
in the heat of the moment (diff. colours) especially when you're mind can't
think clearly.

Underline any part that needs warmth to indicate that you should
smile. You seem wonderfully at ease, fluid and spontaneous and natural.
Try these out in low stakes situations. Since it'not a big deal, you can
practice: voice fluctuation, strategic pauses, and intonation drops to
make your message compelling.

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Midcourse corrections
Saturday, May 11, 2019 7:25 PM

If you make a mistake in the middle of a presentation and let your

internal critic take over, you risk launching your fight or flight
response. So what do you do? If you've luckily noticed the critical
thoughts before the emotions fully blossom, aim for a quick
perspective shift (rewrite your reality). Consider for a second that
the mistake is a good thing. Remember, our brains first reactions to
new concepts is to accept them as valid. In the extra second it takes
disbelief to arise, you will have already moved on with renewed
confidence. Tell yourself that business moguls and entertainers make
mistakes purposefully to make themselves more relatable to the
audience. If the negative emotions have already risen, you need to
flood your body with oxytocin to turn off the fight or flight response.
Do as follows:

Practice: Midcourse corrections

• Check your body: Make sure that no tense posture is worsening
your internal state.
• Take a deep breath and relax your body.
• Destigmatize and dedramatize. Remember that this happens to
everyone and it will pass.
• If any negative thoughts are present, remember that they are
just thoughts and not necessarily valid.
• Find little things to be grateful for: your ability to breathe, the
fact that you will still be alive by the end of this.
• Imagine getting a great hug from someone you trust for 20
secs( of course you may not have 20 secs, but if you do, this is
remarkably effective)

Once your threat response is quieted down, to bring yourself back

into a state of confidence, remember a moment in your life, when
you felt absolute triumph. Thanks to your brain's inability to
distinguish between imagination from reality, your body will be filled
with the same cocktail of chemicals ( yes, we're helping you play
chemist with your brain) as it was during that confidence-filled
moment, thereby changing your body language into exactly what you
need to be impressive, persuasive and inspiring again.

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need to be impressive, persuasive and inspiring again.

Practice this process with little crises as often as possible, so when

the big one hits, it's second nature. (Refer to visualizations) E.g. a
meeting, not happy with an answer you gave and your inner critic is
acting up. While the rest of the group Converses, run through a
midcourse correction before you speak up again.

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Speech day: Getting into the zone
Sunday, May 19, 2019 11:11 AM

Make it about them, not about you. Worrying about yourself, how
you're doing, if a sentence was good enough, easily brings up self-
criticism. Instead make it all about your audience - how they are
doing - take the focus off yourself, get into a state of good will.

Practice: Speech day checklist

• Arrive early if you can, walk around the stage to visualize and
own the stage.
• Go into a quiet room nearby, and use internal tools such as
visualizations to get into a state of confidence and warmth.
• Pause before you start. Count 3 beats, facing the audience,
before you begin to speak.
• During the presentation, expect things to go wrong - whether
external disruption or your flubbing something.
• Use the Midcourse corrections, you've just learned. Take it with
humanity and invite the audience into this mistake as a joke.
• Throughout your speech, remember to pause, breathe and slow
down.
• Don't run off stage; pause after your last words.

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Key Takeaways
Saturday, June 8, 2019 6:33 PM

• Your presentation should have one main, simple, crystal-clear

message supported by three to five key points.
• Support each point with an interesting statistic, entertaining
story, concrete example or vivid metaphor.
• Make your presentation short and entertaining. Watch the value
of each sentence.
• Arrive early if you can; walk the stage to visualize and own it.
• Use a wide, well-balanced stance and take up as much space as
possible on stage. Limit superfluous gestures that distract the
audience's attention.
• Speak as if you're sharing a secret with the audience, telling
them something special and confidential.
• Use smiles and fluctuation to warm your voice.
• Keep eye contact for one to two seconds per person.
• Pause frequently and deliberately, show confidence and add
drama as well as give yourself a chance to breathe.

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