Most people are not good listeners. In fact, research has shown that the average person only listens at about 25 percent efficiency.1 Twenty-five percent? What are they doing with the other 75 percent? This puts a lot of pressure on speakers and presenters. Knowing that your audience is more than likely not listening to anything that you are saying can be a tough hill to climb. Steven R. Covey said it best, “most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.”2 We are all guilty of this; we are thinking about what we want to say rather than listening to the person talking to us. Think back to a recent meeting at work. Most likely you knew the agenda and topic at hand and chances are you went into the room armed with your laptop, some spreadsheets, and what you wanted to say, regardless of what anyone else in the room had to say. When others are talking, we are thinking about what we want to say. We all do this. I like to say, especially to my sons, “you may hear me, but you are not listening to me.”
Stop reading right now and write down what you are thinking about at this very moment. Is it about what you want for lunch? Or when you need to pick up the kids? Perhaps you are thinking about a post you saw on Facebook or what you want to do this weekend. The bottom line is that our minds are always working and thinking of the next thing. This is what every person in the audience is doing. They are either thinking about something else or maybe playing with their phone. Sometimes people’s minds go elsewhere. I call this a mental check out. How many times have you been in a meeting and you mentally check out for a minute or two? I know I do it and sometimes I get caught when someone asks me a question! We all do this and you, as a presenter, will never change this, but you need to be aware of it and use it the next time you get up in front of a group of people to present.
How many times have you felt that you were not truly heard or better yet, someone else has told you that they did not feel heard? This is not uncommon. Just ask my wife. If the television is on, I simply cannot listen to her. I hear her, but I do not listen. This is what your audience is doing. The good thing is that there are many ways you can encourage your audience to pay better attention and become engaged. That is what a majority of this book is about. But I want to be clear from the get-go; most of your audience is going to have a hard time listening to you. Now many of you are saying to yourselves, “wait a second, I am a great listener,” but with all due respect, you are not. You may hear really well, but that is very different than listening. By definition, listening means to take notice of and act on what someone says, where to hear means to perceive or apprehend by the ear. Very different definitions of what we perceive to be the same thing.
Let us say that you are speaking to a group of 20 people. We can agree with almost 100 percent certainty that there is one person speaking and 19 people listening. So, in reality, whenever you are presenting there is more listening in the room then there is talking. We can also assume that a majority of the people in the room can hear you, but are they listening? Are they taking notice of what you are saying or are their ears just taking in the sound? Let us take this a step further. Each listener has his or her own filters turned on and if they are actually listening to what you are saying they are doing it very differently. A filter is defined as a device to separate impurities from the primary material.3 It typically applies to solids, liquids, and gasses. But it can be applied to how we listen. When we listen we do so with an opinion, subjectivity, and our own agenda. Our listening filters channel the information we hear and apply feelings, emotions, assumptions, and opinions, and this alters the speaker’s intentions. So when you present, the words may leave your mouth with your own personal meaning, yet when they are set free they are listened to and processed by your audiences’ personal filters and thus they take on many different meanings.
Our beliefs or values come into play when we are listening to a speaker. For example, when the CEO of a large retail company presents the plan for the company’s Christmas sale, many people in the audience, who do not celebrate Christmas might be thinking, “What about Hanukkah or Kwanzaa?” and they may form an opinion about the CEO or simply lose interest and pick up their mobile phone to check Facebook.
Again, this is not something you can change. You cannot tell your audience to turn off their filters. However, by knowing your audience—their demographics, interests, motivators, and so on—you can make some general assumptions of what filters they may have, and this will help you carefully choose your words, imagery, and message so that when your words do pass through their filters you will strike the right chord with them and keep them on the path you intended. If you strike the wrong chord, you run the risk of them turning on you or worse, grabbing their phone and losing interest. Some of the most popular filters include:4
- Beliefs
- Values
- Attitudes
- Personality
- Culture
- Prejudices
- Interests
- Expectations
- Assumptions
- Memories
- Images past and future
- Past experience
Take a look at this list and apply it to yourself. Do you use any of these filters? Do your beliefs or values play a role in how you listen? What about expectations? So often, our audiences walk into the room with great expectations—they expect to learn something or be entertained. I know that as a creative person, I typically use the images filter and my brain takes in the words and translates them into mini movies in my mind. This can go one of two ways. The imagery can help me to better understand what the presenter is conveying or I get lost in my own cinematic brain and I am off on my own journey, which may not be fair to the presenter, but at the same time they need to pull me back into the room. Sometimes our distractions can go beyond our own mind and seem to be out of our own control—like someone coughing or a tray of drinks falling.
External Distractions
External distractions are out of our control—but they happen all the time and as a presenter you have to be prepared to deal with them. I once pitched a billion-dollar dog food company one hour before game six of the World Series in a boardroom that looked out over the baseball stadium where the game was going to be played. Captive audience? No. External distractions? Oh yeah! Everyone in the room was wearing baseball jersey and could not wait to get out the room! Sometimes we are all like Dug the talking dog from the movie Up. We are focused but as soon as we see a squirrel we lose our focus. Our audiences are the same way. Someone leaves to go to use the restroom and suddenly half of the crowd is thinking of doing the same thing. The air conditioning turns off and some members of the audience get hot, a truck drives by, a mobile phone rings, and someone laughs in the hallway. All of these are external distractions that we, as presenters, cannot control or change. Being aware of them and their effects on our audience is important.
Almost everyone in the room is aware of an external distraction. The people who are not are the people you have already lost to their smartphones or got up and left. When there is an external distraction, you can do what they do in television and movies and break the fourth wall—meaning to directly address the audience as if you are one of them. Woody Allen broke the fourth wall several times in his movie Annie Hall, as he explained, “because I felt many of the people in the audience had the same feelings and the same problems. I wanted to talk to them directly and confront them.”5 So when something happens out of your control, do not ignore it; make it part of your presentation by acknowledging it. By acknowledging the distraction you let the audience know that you too were distracted by it. Sometimes external distractions seem bigger than they are, because everyone is thinking about them but no one is acknowledging them. By verbally acknowledging it to the audience, you all share the experience and therefore diminish its size and presence. This is respecting the audience for what they are: human and easily distracted.
Trigger Words
If I tell you to not think about a pink elephant right now, what are you thinking about? A pink elephant, right? It was nearly impossible to not think about it. This is called the Ironic Process Theory, which states that deliberate attempts to suppress certain thoughts make them more likely to surface.6 This comes into play when you are presenting. Your audience is listening to you; they are engaged. But you say something, a single word or a sentence, and their minds wander and suddenly they are somewhere else. How many times have you been in a meeting when you mentally check out for a few seconds or minutes? Chances are it was from something the presenter said. It could be as simple as one word. It happens to me all the time. One word and I am gone.
I call these trigger words: Words or sentences that trigger thoughts in your audiences’ minds that you did not want them to think about. You could say something as simple as “and that is why customers are not converting as well as last holiday season,” and half your audience will start think about their upcoming holiday shopping. Even a single word, like coffee, will force people to think about their next cup or the fact that have yet to enjoy their first cup.
There is no way to change this behavior or fix it. It is going to happen no matter what you say or do. However, knowing this will help you prepare what you want to say and keep you away from certain trigger words that will distract rather than engage.
Nonverbal Communication
When I lead Presentation Elevation workshops for organizations, the first thing I do is go around the room and have each participant tell the group what they love and hate about presenting. It is always a lively conversation and people are rarely nervous. Why? Because they are stating their opinion—something they believe in. Plus they are sitting down and they feel safe in their seats and at the table. The next exercise I have them do is to come to the front of the room and tell a personal story. This is a totally different situation. I am asking them not only to get up and stand in front of the class but also to be vulnerable and open to judgment and criticism. I can literally see the anxiety on their faces and in their body languages as I watch them make the 10-foot walk from their seat to the front of the room. It is fascinating to watch how their emotions impact their physiologies and body languages. What happens in that span of 10 feet? Why do they change, sometimes so drastically? I looked into it and discovered that it comes down to thousands of years of evolution. Deep rooted in our DNA is a response that overtakes our minds and bodies when we are faced with stress: It is called the Fight or Flight syndrome,7 and while it affects us internally, our reactions are visible to the audience and this can be very distracting to both you as a presenter and everyone else in the room. Your body language is just as important as the words you speak.
Some experts say that 93 percent of our communication is nonverbal.8 Whatever the number, the fact is that the way we use our bodies, hands, and faces says more than the actual words we communicate. In the next section of the book, I am going to focus on your style—how you look, move, talk, and so on. What is important to realize is that the way you act on stage is going to say a lot more than you think.
Albert Mehrabian, famous for his 7%–38%–55% Rule, breaks down how an audience reacts to a speaker’s emotions and feelings as 7 percent verbal, 38 percent vocal, and 55 percent facial.9 Mehrabian believes that our voice intonation and cadence, in addition to how we use our face (eye movement, smiles, etc.), says more than the words we actually say when we present our feelings and emotions to an audience. This is critical because when you present, your job is to urge your audience to make a change and take action. Nothing will convince an audience more than your passion, which is fed from your feelings and emotions. The more honest you are the more you respect your audience, because that is what they want—honesty, passion, and vulnerability—it makes you human and that is all they ask for. But what if you do not feel so strongly about what you are presenting? People who give TED talks typically believe in what they are presenting because it is about their lives. But what about an analyst at a big retail company? What if she does not feel passionately about last week’s numbers? How can she engage an audience if she herself is not engaged? Can she fake it? Is that possible?
Amy Cuddy, a social psychologist at Harvard, believes that we can fake it. Cuddy believes that if you act powerfully you begin to believe you are powerful. She believes that your body language influences and shapes who you are. Basically: Be it and the audience will believe it.10 As an audience member, how often do you judge or form an opinion about a presenter before they mutter one word. From the way they dress to the moment they walk to the podium we are judging. Just as we listen with filters, we watch with filters as well. We make judgment calls based on body language all the time.
Cuddy believes that the way we stand and move not only influences the audience but also influences ourselves as well. The way you stand and move in front of an audience will affect how you feel about yourself. For instance, when you stand with your hands clasped low across your body, you display a powerless posture. You are making yourself small, like you do not matter and what you say will make minimal impact. The audience will pick up on this and it will work against you. In contrast, when you stand up straight and use your hands appropriately, you look confident and powerful. Your audience will take notice and, in return, this will make you feel strong and influential.
Amy did a sizeable amount of research on body language and posture and, in the end, she learned that if you fake it, meaning actually fake feeling powerful, you will literally change your body chemistry and begin to feel powerful. Cuddy is simply suggesting that we should stand in a powerful pose before we do something that is scary or makes us anxious. I found this fascinating and decided to try it myself.
Recently, I was presenting to a group of seasoned ad executives—people who had been successfully pitching ad campaigns to clients for decades. Who was I to teach them how to present better? Needless to say, I was concerned; rather, I was scared. I got to the meeting early—as I always do, but more on that later—and my nerves were more intense than usual. Butterflies? No. There were 100 angry moths in my belly. My hands were clammy and my body was shaky. I remembered what Amy had said in her TED Talk, “Fake it ‘til you make it.” She truly believes that if we fake feeling powerful, we will start to feel powerful. So I went out to the parking lot and stood in power poses for five minutes. People must have thought I was insane. There I was, one minute looking like Usain Bolt after he set the record for the 100-meter dash—arms held high in victory—then like Bill Clinton the Democratic National Convention is 2012—talking and using my hands to make a point—and finally, and I am ashamed to admit this, I stood like Wonder Woman—head held high and hands on hips. After five minutes, I felt strong and ready. My hands were dry and I felt steady on my feet. The moths were gone and replaced by happy, pretty butterflies.
What I learned that morning was that Amy is right. We can influence our own sense of power and worth by acting the part. Our minds are extremely powerful and influential and we can change our physical feelings by simply changing our posture.
When we speak all eyes are on us. The audience is looking right at you. They are waiting for you to say something, anything that will engage them. But before you actually utter your first words, you either stand up from where you are sitting, walk onto the stage, or if you are sitting down make some sort of movement to call attention. Your body movement in that few seconds sets the stage—so to speak.
When you are presenting to an audience, you are doing more than just communicating with your voice. Your body language is communicating as well. Social psychologists call this nonverbal communication. How you stand, use your hands, your face, and your body can say as much as the words you are speaking.
Picture this. It is 9:00 a.m. and you have to present to your boss and a team of six people at 10:00 a.m. You are prepared. Your slides are in order; your handouts printed and stacked neatly on your desk. You have rehearsed and figured out answers to possible curveballs the audience will most likely throw at you. You are ready! So why are you getting nervous? Your heart is racing a bit, some sweat is forming on your brow, and your hands are shaking a little. Getting nervous is normal. In fact, if you do not get even a little nervous before you present, then you are not human. It is normal to get some butterflies. But, this level of anxiety is a bit high. The reason? You are thinking about the presentation too much and your body is releasing cortisol—better known as the stress hormone. Rather than shaking it off, you get more and more anxious. At 9:55 a.m. you enter the conference room. Your boss is already there as are the other six people. Your anxiety level is skyrocketing. Your heart is racing, you are breathing faster, and you are really sweating now. You want to run away, but you know you cannot. Why are you feeling this way? Adrenaline, the fight or flight hormone, has just kicked in at high gear. Forget about the cortisol, your mind is telling you one thing; get away or fight! You take a deep breath and begin your presentation. Your voice is quivering and your hands are shaking. But you get through it. By 11:00 a.m., the meeting is over and all you want to do is take a nap! Your body and mind are wrecked and they are the ones to blame.
Cortisol and adrenaline can be your best friends or your worst enemies. Your body secretes these hormones because you are facing a stressful situation and you need to cope. This is a biological response that is rooted deep in your DNA and dates back to the time when your stress was focused on more important things: like not getting eaten by a saber tooth tiger. While we do not face those kinds of risks anymore, we do have stressful situations and our bodies will react the same. Your DNA does not discriminate between being chased by a lion or presenting your ideas to a rapt audience.
I have coached hundreds of speakers and presenters and the number one pain point for many of them is the quivering voice and shaking hands. In fact, I am often faced with the question, “How can you help me to stop shaking?” My response is always the same, “it is not your feelings of nervousness or anxiety that is making you shake; it is your stress hormones.” The anxiety you feel is a result of your cortisol and adrenaline racing through your veins.
There are a couple of tricks that can help you calm nerves. In the story I just told, we oftentimes begin to exhibit the nervous rush before we actually take to the stage or start the meeting. Hours before the event we can get butterflies in our stomach and start sweating and shaking. If this is a normal response for you, I would suggest these three tips to curb the initial cortisol spike:
- Get more sleep—the more fatigued you are, the easier it is for cortisol to run its course.
- Don’t drink anything with caffeine—sounds like common sense, but the truth is that stress can pollute the body. We want to keep it as clean as possible and get rid of as many stimulants as we can.
- Exercise the day of the event—This is a great way to detoxify the body and clean out any stress pollutants.
Remember, the surge of cortisol is to prepare your body to deal with an immediate danger. Our blood pressure rises and our muscles tighten because we are in danger. Yet in our modern lives we are often not faced with the threat of being eaten or killed, but our body reacts the same way no matter the stress. Although some people may beg to differ, presenting to their boss is scarier than being chased by a wolf!
So your cortisol has kicked in an hour before the meeting and you are starting to be anxious. That is not where this story ends; it is only the beginning. Often your adrenaline rush will kick in 10 minutes before you have to present. This is when your mind is saying, “Run!” But you cannot run and you are faced with carrying on while thinking about the fact that you are sweating and panting. What happens when you think about sweating? You sweat more! It is a ruthless cycle. As the adrenaline takes over the cortisol, your muscles get twitchy and your voice starts to waver. Your breath gets rapid and you start to sweat from all places. For many of us, this is a nightmare. Remember the opening quote from Jerry Seinfeld? Many of us would rather be dead at this moment than have to get up and speak to the audience.
Let Me Tell You a Story
In 2011 I was asked to speak at a TEDx event. I had six minutes. The day before the event, I was informed that the opening speaker had to back out and I was going on first. They wanted me to get the crowd excited for a day filled with amazing speakers. Ten minutes before I was to go on, my adrenaline started to surge. I made the mistake of looking out to see the crowd. The room was packed—over 1,000 people in the audience ready to be inspired and engaged. My hands started to shake; my heart was racing and I had the sudden urge to run away. Being a speaker coach, I was well aware of what was happening, but stress hormones do not react to reason. I had to calm them and burn them off. I walked to an area behind the stage curtain, dropped to the floor and did 20 pushups. I then did 50 jumping jacks. I used the adrenaline the way it wanted to be used—for movement. I then stood still for two minutes, closed my eyes and did a deep breathing exercise. By the time I hit the stage, I was pumped and ready to rock the room! I may have been sweating, but it was not from my stress hormones—it was from my exercise.
Here are some tips to help you when you feel the adrenaline rush come over you:
- Do 20 jumping jacks and 10 push ups.
- Go outside and sprint across the parking lot four times.
- Walk a few flights of stairs.
- If you have the time, take a 20-minute walk or jog around the block.
Any exercise to quickly burn off your stress hormones will help. Try a few and find the one that works for you.
If you are not able to do anything physical, then I suggest doing some deep breathing exercises. Dr. Andrew Weil created my favorite exercise. It is called the 4-7-8 (or relaxing breath) exercise.11 It is very simple and takes very little time to do and master. Dr. Weil suggests you sit with your back straight. Place the tip of your tongue on the roof of your mouth just behind your front teeth and leave it there for the entire exercise. The only real challenge with this is that you will be inhaling through your nose and exhaling through your mouth. Go ahead and try to breathe out of your mouth with your tongue on the roof of your mouth. It’s hard, I know. A trick is to literally “blow out” forcefully. Dr. Weil suggests this order for the exercise:
- Exhale completely through your mouth, making a whoosh sound.
- Close your mouth and inhale quietly through your nose to a mental count of four.
- Hold your breath for a count of seven.
- Exhale completely through your mouth, making a whoosh sound to a count of eight.
- This is one breath. Now inhale again and repeat the cycle three more times for a total of four breaths.
You may want to find a quiet place where you are alone due to the fact that you will be making the whooshing sound when you exhale. Doing it on a crowded subway may get you some funny looks. The key to this exercise is that the exhalation takes twice as long as inhalation. The time you spend on each phase is not important; the ratio of 4:7:8 is important.
Weil says this exercise is a natural tranquilizer for the nervous system. It is subtle when you first try it but gains in power with repetition and practice. You can do it every day as much as you want. He suggests that you do not do more than four breaths at one time for the first month. You can up it to eight breaths when you get into shape. If you feel a little lightheaded when you first breathe this way, do not be concerned; it will pass. Once you develop this technique by practicing it every day, it will be a very useful tool that you will always have with you. Use this exercise before a big meeting or when you have to present. It does not matter if you feel anxious or not. The goal of this exercise is to focus on your breath and fight off your stress hormones. By taking deep breaths, you are cleansing your body of your stress hormone pollutants.
When it comes to stress, you need to reframe it and channel the energy in a different way, because it is not going to go away. If you do not learn to deal with it, then it could take over and I want you to take control of it before it overtakes you. At its core what you are feeling is nervous. That is what most people say when I ask them what they are feeling. They say, “I get nervous before I have to speak.” The challenge is that the word nervous carries a negative connotation. And for good reason—when we are nervous we feel uneasy and apprehensive. Yet at the same time, feeling anxious and nervous is the same as feeling excited. All three are high arousal states of being, where feeling calm is a low arousal state. It is too difficult to tell your mind and body to just be calm. Your hormones and nervous system do not work that way. Remember, these systems are acting on thousands of years of evolution—your DNA is not rational. So when you are nervous, and anxious you are aroused. But we do not feel excited; we do not think of this situation as a positive one. Rather than try to calm down, reframe your mind. Because you cannot simply tell your hormones to stop. Alison Brooks, a professor at Harvard, suggests that you simply say, “I am excited” rather than “I am nervous.”12 Tell yourself how to feel. Label the feeling as a positive one and not a negative one. Say it out loud right now, “I am excited!” It is kind of hard to say it without a small smile. Like Amy Cuddy, Alison is suggesting we fake it. Tell yourself that the feeling you are feeling is not anxiety but excitement. Alison simply wants us to re-label our anxiety. Do not be nervous—be excited. Use the nervous energy to your advantage. Own it. Take control of it. When you do, your body movements will slow down and be more controllable. Rather than your hands shaking and looking unnatural, you will be able to use them constructively.
Hands
We all use hand gestures when we speak. Think about the last time you were talking on the phone—chances are you used your hands to emphasize a point and there was no one in front of you. It was natural to use your hands when you speak. Blind people, who have never had sight, use hand gestures when they speak. It has been known for over 30 years that apes use hand gestures to communicate with each other. It is in our DNA to use our hands when we are talking, telling a story, or making a point. Hand gestures are so natural that we rarely think about how we are going to use our hands when we talk except when it comes time to speak in front of a group of people. When was the last time you worried about your hands when you went out to dinner with a group of friends? Zero times. But five minutes before you are about to present to your coworkers, you suddenly start to wonder about those things at the end of your arms. “What do I do with my hands?” is the number one question my clients and students ask me. I always reply with, “What are you doing with them right now?”
A speech-related gesture is an outward expression of an inward condition.13 This is extremely important because I want you to remain authentic with your hand movements. In the realm of respecting the audience, the more authentic you are the more they will believe you. If you are shy or more reserved, then big hand gestures will seem unnatural and out of place. If you are more extroverted and typically the life-of-the-party type of person, clasping your hands, or leaving them down by your sides will confuse your audience. Stay true to yourself and use your hands the way you always do.
Hand gestures play a major role for any presentation. While they help make your point and engage the audience, they are just as important for you as a presenter. Research has shown that hand gestures help us think when we talk. They enable us to work through the challenge when we are “looking for the right thing to say.”14 Think back to a time when you were asked a tough question. What did you do with your hands? Chances are—you put one hand on your chin, or you scratched your head while you were thinking of the answer. I can say with near 100 percent confidence you did not leave them at your sides or on the table. Gesturing with our hands kicks our minds into gear and helps us figure things out with movement and thinking working together. A hand gesture during a presentation can help you make a point more dramatic and at the same time help you figure out the best way to say it.
We know that children who are asked to gesture in certain ways while learning new tasks learn better than children who are asked not to gesture. Considering that gesturing benefits children while learning, it is possible that gesturing plays a role in the development of fluid intelligence, perhaps by simulating action. If this proves to be true, children might be able to literally give themselves a hand in their own development by gesturing more15
There is no better speaker who uses his hands then Bill Clinton. His best visual aids are his hands. Watch any speech he has given in the past 10 years and you will see how he uses hand gestures to make his points, share his emotions, and excite the audience. Overall, his arm movements are open and wide, relaying an image of accessibility and authenticity.16 He never uses his hands to push the audience away. His hands make him seem welcoming, animated, and confident.
Clinton is probably one of the top five orators of the last century. But he was not always as good as he is now. In 1988, he was asked to introduce and nominate Michael Dukakis at the Democratic National Convention. He was given 15 minutes, yet he took 35. It was a perfect example of disrespecting the audience. The audience wanted Dukakis but Clinton was blind to it. He literally droned on and on. In fact, the audience tried to boo him off the stage. The only time they cheered and clapped was when he said, “In conclusion…” It was a perfect example of a speaker thinking he was Luke Skywalker when he needed to be Yoda (see Chapter 4). If you take the time to watch the speech from 1988 and then the speech Clinton gave at the 2012 Democratic National Convention you will clearly see the difference. It is the same man, same cadence, but the confidence level in 2012 is light years ahead of 1988. In 1988, Clinton used his hands, but oftentimes his hands were clasped on the podium or he was pointing and using the “Clinton Thumb.” Not very warm and welcoming gestures. He comes off a little lost—a small fish in a massive pond. Flash forward to 2012 where Clinton spoke for close to 45 minutes and never once lost the attention of the crowd. Of course he was president for eight years and clearly had matured—that helped boost his confidence. But it is the way he uses his hands, his eyes, and his body that allow him to have total command and control of the audience and the situation. Bill Clinton exudes passion and confidence. Mehrabian’s 7-38-55 rule comes into play with Clinton because he uses his hands and face better than anyone in the business; and they play as important role as the words he speaks. Without his nonverbal communication Clinton would not be as confident and convincing as he is today.
There are many ways to use your hands when you speak. In “Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance,” Adam Kendon of the University of Pennsylvania explains what a difference the palm’s direction makes.
Palms Down
Gestures from the palm down family are used in contexts where something is being denied, negated, interrupted, or stopped, whether explicitly or by implication. Kendon is saying that when you push down with your hands you are implying that something needs to be stopped or the results may not be that good.
When a speaker says something like, “We have to stop this behavior” or “I’ve got some bad news,” an accompanying hand gesture where the palms are faced down would be appropriate.
Open Hands
Gestures from the palm up family are used in contexts where the speaker is offering, giving or showing something, or requesting the reception of something. This is when the speaker is offering new ideas or asking the audience to join him or her in what he or she is saying.17
There are a number of hand gestures that have many meanings, for instance, putting your hands on your chest. Clinton uses this gesture a lot and it is quite obvious in its meaning. A speaker should use this when speaking about something personal or close to the heart. Using a chopping motion can be seen as negative and aggressive. Rolling your hands in circles may indicate you are struggling at articulating your point. Finger pointing can be seen as hostile. The point I am making is that we use our hands to help us to engage the audience and get our ideas across. At the end of the day, you need to remain authentic and not over do it. So try things out. Practice. Ask friends and colleagues to give you feedback on how you use your hands. The goal is to remain natural and use your hands the way you would when you are telling your grandmother a story.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, I never want you to not use your hands. It looks unnatural to speak for any amount of time with your hands on our hips, lap, or table with absolutely no movement. If you do not use your hands at all, that may be perceived as indifference. Your audience may feel that you do not care about what you are talking about.18
And the last thing I want you to do is hide your hands in pockets or behind a podium. When you hide your hands, you are showing distrust, and that you are uncomfortable or do not want to be speaking in the first place. It may seem subtle, but the audience will pick up on it and look at you through their filters. By hiding your hands you are not being 100 percent truthful and that will gain you no respect from the audience.
What to Do with Your Hands When Waiting?
There are two situations when you are waiting to speak. The first is when someone is introducing you and you are standing on stage. The second is when you are part of an ensemble and it is not your turn. It can feel awkward just standing there because chances are the audience is watching you. The best pose is to stand with your hands clasped behind your back. It shows respect for the current speaker while putting you in a relaxed and confident pose.
Overdoing It
Now that I have talked about how to use your hands, you have to be careful not to overdo it. Using hand gestures just for the sake of them will seem obvious and awkward. Making grandiose gestures, such as big wide arcs or “jazz hands,” will feel contrived. Like my mother used to tell me, “everything is fine in moderation.” I do not think she was talking about hand gestures, but you get the idea.
Quick Exercise #2
The next time you have lunch with a good friend (it has to be a good friend because you will be asking for honest feedback), ask him or her to give you feedback on how you used your hands when talking. Ask your friend to make hash marks on a piece of paper every time you use your hands during a two-minute period. Have him or her give you descriptions of your hand gestures. Did you make circles? Point? Chop? Sweep? Clasp? The goal here is to find out if you are using your hands constructively and how often. Ask your friend if you use your hands in a nervous way, such as touching your nose or playing with your hair. I want you to get an idea on not just how many times you use your hands, but also if you use them in a positive way. The second time you do this, have your friend pull out their smartphone and film you for two minutes, so you can actually see how you use your hands.
Let Me Tell You a Story
I was once coaching a TED talker and asked her to do a dry run before a group of other TED talkers. She was a seasoned speaker and very confident, however, when she spoke she would touch her hair. In fact, during her 12-minute rehearsal she touched her hair 32 times. That is every 22 seconds; it was incredibly distracting. When she finished I asked her how many times she touched her hair. Her response, “I was touching my hair?” She had no idea she was doing it. It was completely unconscious and most likely a habit she had for years. She and I worked for weeks on how else she could use her hands. It proved to be challenging because now her entire focus was centered on her hands. My first exercise was for her to sit on her hands and tell a personal story. She was completely uncomfortable and fidgeted a lot, but the point was for her to realize how poorly she was using her hands. The next exercise was to give her TED talk in front of a mirror so she could watch how she used her hands. We did a lot of work and eventually she was able to use her hands constructively and give more meaning to a very personal story. I am happy to say that she only touched her hair two times during her TED talk. The moral of this story is that so much of our hand gestures are from habits and unconscious. What I want is for you to make it a more conscious effort and eventually better and more effective hand gestures will become second nature.
Eyes
It has been said that the eyes are the windows to your soul. They let people in without you even saying a word. Think about the last time you saw a little kid get hurt and before they can even cry you can read their emotions through their eyes? Or what about the last time you saw someone roll his or her eyes when you made a suggestion on where to go for lunch? How did that make you feel? You can tell a lot about a person by the way they look at you, or better yet how they do not look at you. When you are presenting to an audience, your eyes can say quite a bit about what you are talking about and if you are being truthful, passionate, or dishonest.
I am big fan of making eye contact with as many members of the audience as possible. It allows me to make a connection with every single person in the room. Sims Wyeth, a presentation coach suggests that, “focusing your eyes helps you concentrate.” When your eyes wander, they take in random, extraneous images that are sent to your brain, slowing it down.19 Remember back in Chapter 1, when I was discussing how external distractions could make it hard for the audience to concentrate? Well, the same thing goes for you as the presenter. The more you look around, the easier it will be to get distracted and lose your train of thought.
Eye contact can be uncomfortable for both parties. Some people just don’t like to be looked at—especially from someone on stage. If you feel someone getting uncomfortable then look away. Remember we need to respect the audience—do not make people feel uncomfortable. Put yourself in their seat. Do you like it when someone on stage looks directly at you? Maybe you do and maybe you do not. At least be respectful and pick up on the audience’s cues and look away when someone starts to fidget when your eyes stay on them too long.
On the other hand, as a presenter you have to make eye contact with a good portion of the audience. If you look at your slides or the ground or just one person, the audience is going to think you have no interest in them or that you simply do not want to be in the room. A good trick is to scan the room as you speak and make eye contact with someone every 10 seconds. You can look away. In fact, you should, because you do not want to stare at anyone—you just want to make a connection. When we are talking with someone one-on-one, we will look at him or her for seven to ten seconds before we glance away. This is a natural response. The listener actually looks at the speaker much more than speaker looks at the listener. This is a great rule to use when presenting. The reality is that the audience is looking right at you. It is your job to look back but in a natural and authentic fashion.
Eye contact is actually a very good tool for the presenters who are nervous when speaking in front of large groups of people. It sounds counter-intuitive, but making eye contact with one person out of a room of 50 is a great way to ease your nerves because as soon as you make eye contact you will be having a one-on-one conversation with that person and the other 49 people will melt away.
I am speaking from an American perspective in regard to eye contact. Other parts of the world have different ideas and customs when it comes to making eye contact. The United States, UK, and Australia are basically the same when it comes to eye contact. In Japan, making eye contact can be deemed inappropriate. Often times in Africa and Latin American countries, direct eye contact can come off as aggressive and confrontational.20 Please do research before you find yourself speaking or presenting in different countries or to different cultural groups in America. Again, as the presenter it is your job to give your audience the upmost and deserving respect. Do your homework and you will come off as a great presenter who understands the audience.
Much of what I have discussed to this point is about how your body plays a major role in your presentations. From dealing with your stress hormones to how you use your hands and eyes, your body can give clues to the audience about how you are feeling and whether you believe in what you are saying. So much about how you are perceived and in the end, judged, is based on your physical being. In the next section, I am going to focus on you and how your personal style will take you to the next level as a presenter.