And it’s by telling stories that we have impact through connecting with our audience’s hearts and minds.
So, what holds us back? What stops us from getting on stage or speaking up in the meeting?
It’s a limiting belief we tell ourselves that we need to be perfect.
And it’s also the fear. The fear of not being perfect or saying something that will proves what our internal saboteurs have been saying all along: we don’t belong here.
Well, there’s a reason the majority of us get invited on stage or are in the conference room, and Kristin has been proving it for over two decades with the people she coaches, from with Silicon Valley technology leaders, to TEDx speakers, and everyday professionals.
Kristin shares two simple frameworks with us, one for how to build our speech, the second for how to focus on the audience.
They are simple because Kristin stresses that simpler is better. Simple is comfortable, confident, and impactful.
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Recommended Next Videos to Watch:
- How to Help Others Tell Their Stories | Jen Mueller’s Superpower - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1puYNm0Xc8Y&list=PLbWfh34FP_dUcAaCrI31z00_fLdphi6b7&index=4
- How to Craft Strategic Narratives | Narrative Power with Guillaume Wiatr - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8pv9WS9Fes&list=PLbWfh34FP_dUcAaCrI31z00_fLdphi6b7&index=19
- Unlock the Power of the Stories We Tell Ourselves | Rewriting Inner Narratives with Corinna Calhoun - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=po5jHztgfQk&list=PLbWfh34FP_dUcAaCrI31z00_fLdphi6b7&index=36
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*** Don't miss another episode: https://www.youtube.com/@WDYKTBT?sub_confirmation=1 ***
In this episode, Kristin answers the following questions:
- How to tell an impactful story?
- How to be a better public speaker?
- How does a Public Speaking Coach help?
- What are storytelling techniques to telling an impactful story?
My favorite quote from the episode: “Impact not perfection.”
This speaks to me because many of us start with the idea we have to be perfect, and that is not the case. The beginning of Martin Luther King Jr.’s 1963 speech at the Lincoln Memorial was not stirring the crowd, in fact, it was moving some to leave. It wasn’t until Mahalia Jackson, standing a few steps below the podium, shouted out “Tell them about the dream, Martin.” And you know the rest.
What I know to be true about the episode: Our biggest barrier is our ego, and Kristin’s stories just illuminate this even more. Limiting beliefs, fear of other people’s opinions, past experiences believed to be a predictor of future performance. Toxic mental sludge.
What I learned from the episode: Kristin shares that what gives her the most joy is not seeing a leader on stage crushing it, but instead, it’s that same leader months prior who was paralyzed with fear and ready to make a career-limited move and not get on that stage.
It’s her ability to move her clients from fear and into experimentation that is the biggest moment of joy.
Resources:
- Kristin’s company – Link Coaching: https://kristinlinkcoaching.com/
- Kristin's LinkedIn page: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinlink1/
Chapters
0:00 Welcome and Intro
4:31 How to Tell Impactful Stories
7:30 One Thing Everyone Can Improve At
10:21 Worst Advice You’ve Heard
13:12 Complexities of Humor in Public Speaking
14:11 Who Inspired Your Superpower
16:24 Simple Frameworks for Public Speaking
25:05 Role of Joy in Superpower
31:06 What Do You Know To Be True?
38:10 Best Presenters are Great Listeners
41:47 Lightning Round
Music in this episode by Ian Kastner.
Videos from Pexels with credits to Il Clown Carmello, Pavel Daniluk, Fauxels, Henri Mathieu-Saint-Laurent, Tima Miroschninchenko, Nicola Nar, Werner Pfenning, Artem Podrez, Pressmaster, RDNE Stock Project, Yan Kruku.
"What Do You Know To Be True?" is a series of conversations where I speak with interesting people about their special talent or superhero power and the meaningful impact it has on others. The intention is to learn more about their experience with their superhero power, so that we can learn something about the special talent in each of us which allows us to connect more deeply with our purpose and achieve our potential.
For more info about the podcast or to check out more episodes, go to: https://www.youtube.com/@WDYKTBT?sub_confirmation=1
"What Do You Know To Be True?" is hosted by Roger Kastner, is a production of Three Blue Pens, and is recorded on the ancestral lands of the Duwamish and Suquamish people. To discover the ancestral lands of the indigenous people whose land you may be on, go to: https://native-land.ca/
#publicspeaking #publicspeakingcoaching #coaching #impact #joy
Transcript
Roger: Remember that last time you were captivated by a public speaker, whether it was in college, maybe it was on the Ted stage, or maybe it was at a company meeting. And you thought to yourself, I can never be that persuasive, that gifted, that natural. But there's something you do have in common with that presenter.
You probably were not both born with natural public speaking abilities. So what made the difference for that presenter? It's practice. It's definitely time on stage, and it's probably a great coach.
Kristin: One of the things I talk about a lot with my clients, Roger, is impact, not perfection. There's this misperception that it has to be perfect.
Everything we do when we present is a performance, just like an opera singer or a rock star. Every note has to be hit. That's not true.
Roger: Since many of us support leaders who will have to get up on that stage, and some of us might even have aspirations to be in that red circle at a TED event, I wanted to talk with my friend Kristen Link, who's a public speaking coach for executives and for TED presenters.
To learn more about how she helps them get ready to deliver an impactful speech. And you already know the biggest challenge she has to help her clients face the fear.
Kristin: Watching someone move from sheer terror or a sense of inability. I can't do public speaking. I'm shy. I'm an introvert. I'm an engineer. I can't do this to see them move away from a negative thing like fear is.
equally as motivating to me as seeing them move towards something that's more joyful, and having me feel more joyful at the same time. It really works both ends of the spectrum, moving away from their negative, getting closer to their positive. Both of those bring a sense of joy to me.
Roger: Inspired by her father and tested in the crucible of leading sales training in Silicon Valley, Kristen brings a mountain of experience, a couple simple frameworks, and possibly the most powerful tool.
She's a joyful coach who builds your confidence through practice.
Kristin: And I need to remind them that Most things in life that they do well, they had to learn, whether it's being a CEO or learning to ski or golf or speak another language, play the violin, pickleball, whatever it is. There's a whole series of things that we do to learn a skill, some sort of education, maybe some coaching, a whole lot of mistakes, a bunch of practice.
That's how we learn a skill, and that's how we learn public speaking.
Roger: Welcome to the, what do you know to be true podcast. I'm Roger Kastner for over 25 years. I've been working with leaders and teams to explore new ways of thinking and taking actions so that they could unlock their potential and create meaningful impact in these conversations.
I talk with ordinary people about. Their extraordinary skill, their superpower, and the meaningful impact it has on others. The goal is not to try to emulate or hack our way to a new talent. Instead, the intention is to learn more about their experience with their superpower. And in doing so, maybe we can learn something about the special talent in each of us that drives us towards our potential.
And living into our possibilities. If you're ready, let's dive in.
Hey, Kristen, thank you for joining me today. It's so nice to see you again. Great to see you too, Roger. It's been a while. It has, but I'm excited to have this conversation and learn more about your extraordinary talent of getting people to share their stories of impact before we get too far though, what's important for us to know about Kristen Link?
Kristin: I love what I get to do. I love to help people share these stories that do make some sort of impact, some sort of change. But I think the important thing to really know is that I didn't start out this way. I was actually a really shy, introverted kid, and the thought of public speaking was absolutely terrifying for me.
And so it took me a long time to learn this skill, and now that I have it, I really want to help other people overcome their fear of public speaking.
Roger: I love that, not that you had this fear, but that you had it, you overcame it, and now you want to help others with it. Yeah. And I know you to be a public speaking coach and your rock star power is getting people to tell their stories of impact.
Could you share why storytelling is so important to effective public speaking?
Kristin: Stories are much more memorable than information or data or facts, and what we see is that there's neuroscience behind this. Now, studies literally have been done scanning a brain to watch what happens when information is being relayed versus when a story is being told.
And what we see when a story is being told is that regions of the brain fire that are associated with empathy and action scientists have also done blood tests and notice that when a story is being told the story listener has high levels of oxytocin and dopamine in their system. Cool cocktail of empathy and action and cooperation and memory and all of that makes them more impactful and more memorable.
So, even though there are facts that we need to share in any presentation. If you can spin those into the shape of a story or tell stories along with those facts, we're just going to be more memorable and hopefully we'll make more of an impact with your audience.
Roger: Okay, the smart Alec in me wants to know what chemicals are released in the brain when data and facts are being shared.
Kristin: I do not know, but now I'm curious too.
Roger: Well, you know, maybe no chemicals, like maybe it's not lighting up many parts of the brain. Whereas the stories do begin, like, you know, as you're saying empathy and like the tying into the stories we have. And I've, I've come to learn that memories, um, although imperfect, they contain the lessons that are important for us to learn.
And so when we're retelling those memories, which. Our stories were really telling lessons that have been important to us.
Kristin: Absolutely. Absolutely.
Roger: Now in your role as a public speaking coach, you've helped me become a better host for this podcast. You gave me advice and feedback earlier this year. And if, for those who have been watching since then, they've probably noticed that I've become a better host.
So thank you very much for all the advice you gave. You've you know suggested using shorter questions, which I'm violating here right now. Um, You've also had me respect the pause Not only in talking, but also in editing to allow for the important part to resonate. Um, and I've noticed that the episodes are getting better and the interactions are getting better.
So thank you for all that advice you gave me. So you're welcome.
Kristin: I'm glad it was helpful.
Roger: So what's one thing you think would that everyone can do to improve their public speaking abilities and especially me, but, but, but everyone else.
Kristin: There is a perception that when we're presenting information, we need to dazzle our audience with our brilliance, right?
We're put in a position of authority. We're supposed to be the expert on a topic, and so there's a tendency to put in too much information that may not be understood by our audience. So in order to make sure that you're making an impact, not just spewing facts, you've got to keep it simple. You've got to keep it concise, and you've got to make sure that your audience really cares about it.
I often tell my clients, picture your audience, whether it's one person or a thousand people at a conference. Four o'clock on a Friday, they're a little bit bored, the room's kind of warm, they're hot, they're leaning back in their chairs. And they're looking at you as a speaker saying, so what, why do I care about these facts?
How do they impact me? So instead of dazzling people with your brilliance, take a step back and make sure that the focus is all on your audience, making sure it means something to them and that it's delivered simply and concisely so that it stays in their head for many days afterwards.
Roger: Um, I love that because I think that's part of the dilemma of expertise and we get asked to be on stage to speak in front of groups because the level of expertise and there's that old saying of like, you know, this person knows more or has forgotten more about this thing than I'll ever know.
And that's, that's that idea of just having too much knowledge and being able to boil that down to like three things you need to know. That are at the level of the audience versus the speaker.
Kristin: Exactly. Exactly. In fact, I was talking with a client recently, an old friend of mine who would call me back after many years.
She is in charge of a team of data scientists at a recognizable tech company here in Silicon Valley, whose name I won't mention. And she said her engineers present information that's so complex that their own manager doesn't understand what they're talking about. And if their manager doesn't understand it, they Their manager cannot advocate for them to get more projects, so she was saying that her team was failing because what they share is so technical that no one gets it.
That's a problem and just a kind of a perfect silicon valley story about how we really need to simplify so our audience understands
Roger: That’s a very good piece of advice of simplifying the message to meet the needs and to make the audience care so. What's the worst piece of best practice public speaking advice you've heard other people give?
Kristin: Talk fast and get it over with. The many, many clients have confessed to me that this is their strategy because Someone along the way told them, just talk fast and get it done. Nothing could be further from the truth. Many things happen when we speak very quickly in a presentation. The first of which is the audience hears words coming at them, but doesn't understand.
And again, if they can't understand, there can be no impact made. There can be no difference made at all. But the other forgotten fact is that when we speak quickly, we appear to be really nervous. Now, we may be nervous, but if you can slow down, you can look less nervous. If you speed up, you look even more nervous.
So your confidence starts to get stripped away from you as a speaker when you're speaking quickly. I would much rather have my clients make their information concise, like you mentioned, make what are the three most important things to talk about, and share those at a pace that an audience can not just hear, but understand what they're saying.
Roger: And for me, what's coming up on that is when we're in a meeting room where there's a sense of You know, equality and anyone can speak at any time and anyone could interrupt at any time. Speaking fast might be a good strategy to make sure someone doesn't, you know, take the talking stick away from you by speaking up and interrupting.
Whereas when you're on stage and you have a microphone, you probably have a lot more time than you think you do.
Kristin: Absolutely. And even if you don't, because many times, especially conferences, presentation times get cut moments before a person goes on stage, knowing your content well enough and having it structured and sort of an outline format.
Allows you to cut when you have to and to minimize and take out pieces of information That's something you're going to be preparing for in advance So again, you should have enough control over your content that you can adjust on the fly And not have to jam it in with a rapid pace of speaking
Roger: I was trying to think of what are some of those like bad pieces of advice i've received over the years I had a boss once as he was handing a microphone to me in front of before I was about to go speak to 150 people He said, don't screw up.
I'm like, that's, that's amazing. That's amazing. I will get you back now because, you know, the brain doesn't really know how to process the word don't. It just understands screw up. Um, the, the old advice of imagining everyone's naked. That's, it's just going to be gross. And then the, the idea of like telling a joke and how complicated humor can be.
Um, when it's not, not in the hands of someone who knows how to read a room really well.
Kristin: Absolutely. And, and humor is actually quite distinct from telling a joke. So I, I often work with my clients to add a little bit of safe, business appropriate humor. Jokes, I do tell them to avoid. Most of us are not great joke tellers.
I, myself, am not a great joke teller. It's easy to forget that punchline and then down the drain you go. And also jokes are very nuanced and could be offensive or not understood. It's just not worth the risk. There are many better ways to get attention. Than to tell a joke.
Roger: I've read some research that says, when you're making fun of a person, even yourself.
That can create a little bit of a threat response and people who witness it, but if you're making fun of a situation That everyone could laugh at you should be okay. Yeah, you were saying a little earlier about being a very shy um Child i'm interested in what or who inspired you to have this extraordinary talent of getting people To share their stories of impact
Kristin: My dad. My dad spent his entire career in sales and did a lot of sales seminars over the years, and he and I share this passion for public speaking, so he, he nudged me along my way when I went to college, I major in computer science.
And I was the one comp sci major in a public speaking class in college that I hated every minute of it. I couldn't stand this class, but I learned a few things and I got slightly less terrified so that when I went on to start my corporate career, I started to raise my hand a little bit more for public speaking with my dad's encouragement and took a slew of public speaking classes at Hewlett Packard, where I spent most of my career.
Join Toastmasters, just kept inching along, working through this fear, trying to improve until finally the last job that I had at Hewlett Packard was in leadership training, where I finally said, Oh, this is what I'd love to do. I'd love to be up in front of a group of people talking about leadership. And using these public speaking skills more than I ever have before.
So it was a slow journey with my dad nudging me along the way. And he and I have had many, many great conversations about public speaking tips that he learned from his mother as well. So they've come down through the generations.
Roger: Oh, that's lovely. Yeah. How sweet, you're carrying on this tradition. I am, I am.
And, and which one of your children will be carrying on the tradition? Have you, have you selected the one yet?
Kristin: I have not. I'm waiting to see what they choose to do, Roger.
Roger: Do you have a framework or process you follow when using your rockstar power of getting people to tell their stories of impact?
Kristin: I have quite a few. I'll share one or two here that bubble up quite a bit. And the first one is a kind of a template for creating content when often when people come to me, they know they have to speak on a topic, but they know so much about it that they don't know how to organize that information.
Well. So we spend a lot of time just trying to get all their ideas out and get them into this little template so they can start to craft either their script or their slides or whatever it is. They're going to use to do their presentation. And the template just has 3 steps. I work a lot in triads. The 1st is audience.
The second is key message, and the third is outline. So audience has to be the first thing we're working on any time we're putting together content for a presentation. There's a tendency to jump on Google Slides or to break out a Google Doc and start to just hack away on a script or slides. And I often have to encourage my clients to just step away from the keyboard and let's think very high level for whom is this presentation?
Who, who's in your audience? What do they care about? What keeps them up at night? Do they know your jargon? Do they speak the same first languages? You do all these nuances. Now, sometimes they're speaking, my clients are speaking to hundreds or thousands of people and they, They don't know that much about them, but sometimes they're speaking to a smaller group, and they can really start to drill in and figure out who is my audience.
What do they care about? So that's gotta be the 1st step. Audience is always 1st. 2nd step again is key message. The key message is the 1 thing you want your audience to care about and remember. In about 10 words or less, if you can, the one thing you want them to walk away with. This is critical to putting together a police presentation so that your presentation doesn't wander so you don't break into circle talking where you're trying to figure out the point of your own presentation.
The more you can crystallize that before you start working on slides or a script, the more concise and clear your presentation is going to be. So 3rd step is outline putting together some sort of simple outline and it's simplest format and outline is an open a close and some things in the middle. Now, those things may be 3 most important points that we need to share in this presentation.
They might be information in the form of a story. You might be doing a fundraising pitch where you're talking about the problem that's there in the world, what your solution does and what the benefits are to your client. It doesn't matter, but the more you've put time into audience, key message, and a really simple outline, the more smoothly everything's going to go and the more impactful your presentation can be.
There's a lot more to that, but that's a real high level look at that template. Another template of sorts that I use is reminding my clients that in any great presentation, we need to be thinking about three things. There's that three again. No, feel and do. First of all, no. What do I want my audience to know?
Most decent presentations have this. We have charts, we have graphs, we have information, data, all that stuff is often in a presentation, so I don't need to spend some time convincing my clients. They need to do that. That's fairly intuitive. However, I do often need to remind them that it's helpful if their audience feels something during their presentation.
Dig up some sort of emotion. Are you creating sort of a sense of fear at the beginning about a big problem that exists? And by the time your presentation is done, you've given them some hope. Are you motivating them? Are you exciting them? Are you getting them thrilled about something? What is the emotion that you're going to be conveying at least at the beginning and the end?
If not some nuance of emotional mapping that happens all throughout that presentation. This takes a little more convincing because some folks don't really think it's important to have emotions. We need to remember that we tend to make decisions based on emotions and we back up those decisions with facts.
So no feel and the 3rd piece is due. What do you want your audience to do 2 days after your presentation? They wake up, they have their cup of coffee. What do you hope they do differently because of what you said? So that format we spend a lot of time working on again, especially on the feel. And the two piece,
Roger: I am so excited to run the tape back on that response, because I think in both frameworks, you were following the framework.
You were talking probably intuitively so meta and and what I love is in both of those. It starts with the audience and that the, the, you know, public speaking, we always think, at least my experience has been thinking about, okay, what am I going to say, how do I want to come off, what, you know, what do I want to come as an impact of this for, for, you know, for my own interests and yet the effectiveness, the impact of the presentation.
Of the speech has everything to do on the audience, not necessarily on me. And I, you know, recently I had the opportunity to host a fundraiser and I got to be an MC, not only the MC, but also the auctioneer. And so I got, I got to give a couple like small talks and a couple of little interview, um, intros, and then we got to do the actual auctioneer piece.
Something that was brand new to me. And I kept thinking afterwards about the mistakes I made, the things I forgot to say, the things that didn't even come up, but I wish I could have gone back and say now. And I had to stop myself and think about, okay, what was the impact this had on people? And right after when the event was done and you know, we're hanging out and talking, so many people came up and talked to me about.
You know, the things I had said and the things, how they were feeling and what it brought up for them. You know, I, I, I got some really nice accolades about how people were telling me, employees were telling me how much more this event felt like our organization. Cause it was aligned to the mission and vision and values.
And I just, you know, in, in my reflection and beating up on myself, I had to stop myself and I remember, okay, how did I make them feel? Yeah. And, you know, if as humans, right, we want to be recognized, we want to be, you know, we want people to love us and we want to be recognized for what we contribute. And it's like, you know, was I being recognized and loved because I said the right thing or I forgot this thing or like no one knows the mistakes I made.
Right. Everyone knows how they felt. And so that way it's like, this was a huge success despite the things I'm like, I might be beating myself up on.
Kristin: It's so true. In fact, one of the things I talk about a lot with my clients, Roger is impact, not perfection. There's this misperception that it has to be perfect.
Everything we do when we present is a performance, just like an opera singer or a rock star. Every note has to be hit. That's not true. The, the little link lessons that you know about, these are little two minute videos that I put on LinkedIn with tips on public speaking, and if I make a little word stumble or a little mistake, I don't edit it out, I leave it in intentionally so that my clients can see.
Kristen public speaking coach can make a mistake. First of all, we all do. And even with a little mistake, the impact is still there. I'm still learning something from this video. So letting go of perfection, focusing on impact for the audience is so huge and it takes years and years of practice, but we're going to make mistakes and it's okay.
You all have my permission to make mistakes.
Roger: Well, and it makes you human. It does. It really does. And, and that that's more relatable. Yeah. If you're human. Yes. I love that.
Kristin: And it takes the pressure off.
Roger: Mm hmm. Yeah. This, this question just feels very natural at the moment. Where and how does joy show up for you when you're engaging your, your rockstar power?
Kristin: So many times joy shows up in, in the. Moments where I see a light bulb go off in my client's head. We were just talking about impact, not perfection. When I give them permission to not be perfect, I see their shoulders drop. And that's a joyful moment for me, knowing that I've relieved some of their stress.
When I'm backstage at TEDx San Francisco hanging out in the dark with a CEO who's so nervous to go on stage because he knows he's not prepared, and I look him in the eye and tell him, you've got this. Just tell them your story. You know your story. That's a joyful moment for me because I could see him look at me and say, okay, I'm going to do it.
I got this. I'm going to go talk in front of those thousand people when I was able to help a friend from high school who I hadn't seen and. Well, the long time she reached out and said, I'm officiating a wedding for a dear friend. I said, yes, and I'm about to call her and say, no, because I can't do this. I haven't done public speaking in years.
And the last time I did, it was a complete fail to text her an hour before that wedding. And for her to text back and say, I'm so excited. Thank you for helping me. There's no more joy than that. So I get all these little moments, big and small, where I realized I've made at least a tiny bit of a difference and help someone increase their confidence.
That's pretty joyful stuff, Roger.
Roger: And do you think of that joy? Do you experience it as the outcome of using your extraordinary talent or? Is it motivating to step into that space or is it something else
Kristin: the joy definitely motivates me It really does And there's more that motivates me watching someone move from sheer terror or A sense of inability.
I can't do public speaking. I'm shy. I'm an introvert. I'm an engineer I can't do this to see them move away from a negative thing like fear Is Equally as motivating to me as seeing them move towards something that's more joyful and having me Feel more joyful at the same time It really works both ends of the spectrum moving away from their negative getting closer to their positive Both of those bring a sense of joy to me
Roger: the word that comes up for me in that picture You just painted is liberation like they are liberated from fear.
Kristin: Absolutely it's hard for them to come to me It's hard to share a vulnerability about public speaking, although it's common that many people don't like public speaking. It's that's something we all sort of know exists in the world. There can be a sense of embarrassment for people to reach out to me.
And when I spend time listening to them, like, tell me what's going on, what are the challenges that you're facing right now? Uh, what's at stake if you don't fix these challenges? What do you consider successful public speaking? In those conversations, in my hopeful, really solid listening, they have to share a lot for me to fully understand the depth of this.
I recently had a prospective client reach out and say, I'm looking for a public speaking coach, and by the way, what do you know about panic attacks? So they're sharing a lot with me and it's, it's a pretty honorable place to be down in the depths of fear with people and to see them rise above that in some way.
Roger: Okay, we're going to take a quick break and be right back after this. Each What Do You Know To Be True episode is an opportunity to learn from and get inspired by our guests. Who are everyday people with extraordinary talents making meaningful impact in their communities the best no cost way For you to help support this podcast is to subscribe or follow the podcast and leave a comment or a review This helps us get the word out to other people and it ensures that you won't miss any future episodes It's great to have you be part of this community, and I'm glad you're here Okay, let's get back to the conversation Well not to sound too cliche, but there's the jerry seinfeld joke about I'm sure you you know this very well about research shows that people are more afraid of public speaking than of than of death So the person given the eulogy would rather change places with the person in the coffin um How wonderful it must be to step into people in their, in their places of fear, like someone who has panic attacks, how crippling that is.
And yet the people you're working with, like, they gotta be pretty well known. They have to have certain levels of expertise to be able to even be, you know, asked to be speaking in front of an audience. So that's, yeah, that's gotta feel really good to be able to be, to help them go through the storm.
Kristin: Yeah, absolutely.
I've had a C. E. O. Say to me, Kristen, I turned into a scared little boy when I get on that stage. I had a C. E. O. Way in the past. Say if I can't figure out public speaking, I'm not the right person for this job. So there are some, there are some high stakes situations that these people are in. And to get them out of that mess is, is really rewarding.
Roger: They're probably in those positions because they have so much to offer. And that, that story of limiting belief that they're telling themselves might. And, and the thing that you can help them with to unlock, to liberate themselves from, and then have such an impact with others. Yeah, that's pretty cool.
It's a good gig. Yeah. So what do you know to be true about getting people to share their stories of impact?
Kristin: A big thing is convincing them that public speaking is a learned skill. I believe there's a perception or perhaps a misperception that public speakers were born that way. And granted there are some, there are some people that just do this intuitively, but most of the us have had to learn it.
And I need to remind them that. Most things in life that they do well, they had to learn, whether it's being a CEO or learning to ski or golf or speak another language, play the violin, pickleball, whatever it is. There's a whole series of things that we do to learn a skill, some sort of education, maybe some coaching, a whole lot of mistakes, a bunch of practice.
That's how we learn a skill, and that's how we learn public speaking. So it makes public speaking more approachable and not so. Only other people can do that. It enables them to say, Oh, this is just like learning to ski. If I can spend some time really focusing on this, I can pick up the skill as well.
That is so important to me and it's something I spend a lot of time convincing people of. I'm often asked, What's a quick hack to increasing my confidence with public speaking? And although I'm not big on quick hacks, at least this one does make sense, and it's rehearsal. By rehearsal, I don't use the word practice quite as much because I want it to be a full rehearsal.
Even if you're standing in your living room practicing, Hold a water bottle in your hand. If you're going to have a microphone, speak out loud as if you're in the size of the room, you're going to be in use gestures, et cetera. So fully rehearsing makes a huge difference to increase your confidence. And nobody likes to rehearse.
I don't even like to rehearse, but doing this out loud on a regular basis is so important to increasing your confidence. It makes a huge difference. I also encourage people to record themselves, which no one likes to do, because we don't want to see ourselves on on video necessarily, but if that's too daunting, just record your audio as you're learning your presentation as you're rehearsing it, record the audio.
Make sure the sound of your voice is the way you want it to be look for multi syllabic words that you're tripping over and change them to something more simple. Listen for filler words, et cetera. So there are definite techniques you can do to increase your confidence by rehearsing out loud. Recording your voice, and if you're really feeling bold, video yourself.
Those are incredible tools to make your confidence increase very quickly.
Roger: I was, as you were saying that, I was thinking about, and I've heard the advice of doing the videotape, and when I've gone through different workshops where we work on public speaking, we'll do that videotape. I wonder about how valuable it would be to just record the audio.
So you're not looking at, Oh, you know, I made that silly gesture. My hair is a little, I just listened to the audio itself. How powerful that could be to find little things to work on that piece. Um, I also, you know, I've heard the advice of, you know, give your speech in front of a mirror. No, go to the room.
Like if you can go to the room, go to the room, be up on stage, talk into a microphone, like get used to hearing your voice over the loudspeaker. And if you don't have access to that, find a way to be able to talk so you could hear your voice in, in the headphones or, or be able to get used to hearing the, whether it's the echo or just the sound of your voice as you're talking valuable could be.
Cause that, I think for me, that's what throws me off sometimes.
Kristin: Absolutely. If, if you can make it as realistic as possible, get there, get in that space, get with that microphone, be with the AV person, get it all lined up. That's not always possible. But if you can absolutely take advantage of that. I was working with a client who said, oh, we have a sound check at 5, but I'm not going to go.
I had to have a little chat with her because her, her misperception was that the sound chat was for the sound check was for the AV person. I said, no, no, no, that's for you. That's for you to have some confidence with that microphone behind that podium on that stage with that lighting, all of that matters to create some comfort for you.
So I couldn't agree more.
Roger: Do you ever give the advice of people to go do karaoke?
Kristin: I don't, but I have talked to a few people about improv classes. I have talked to people about stand up comedy. I have talked to people about singing. So, karaoke, yes, in a way, but not exactly. It's more getting, uh, smooth.
Sound to your voice with singing versus talking, but karaoke is a good idea. I might add that to my arsenal. I like that.
Roger: I have like, I can get up in front of people and talk. Getting up in front of people and singing. There's the, there's a limiting belief. I'm telling myself right now about that. And I'm like, okay, maybe, maybe this is more of the advice for Roger.
Maybe I need karaoke. I'd love to do improv. So, you know, I'm sure there's things I could, I could, I've been, I think I've overused the yes. And for way too long, I need to learn a couple more improv tricks, but, um, but yeah, the karaoke I think would be, would go a long way to getting comfortable. Absolutely.
What did you believe early on? About getting people to share their stories of impact that you've come to learn is not true
Kristin: that people at very high levels of organizations who are very intelligent I had the thought that they would be good at public speaking I I sort of just assumed if someone is in the c suite of any organization That that would be a skill they should have or should have had or could have and oftentimes they don't And it also makes me realize that, unfortunately, in most of our education system, public speaking is not offered at young ages or in certain, um, majors and colleges.
So, oftentimes, my most technical clients. Are the least confident about public speaking. And so that that was all news to me. I, I sort of guess that someone who's a computer scientist like me or an engineer may not be great at public speaking, but I wasn't really aware that a CEO or someone in a C suite could rise to that level and.
Now I have this skill, no fault of their own. Now I understand better. It's all about where they came up through the organization and what their background and talent pool is. And they just happen not to touch organizations that had either sales or marketing or public speaking. And it's all a completely new skill to them.
Roger: So before we got going, we were talking about how the best public speakers, some of the best public speakers are also very good listeners. Can you speak a little bit about that polarity?
Kristin: Because presentations are all about the audience and not about the speaker so much, that speaker needs to listen to that audience as much as possible.
And that listening can happen long before they get on stage. Again, part of this audience analysis. Who are they? What do they care about? If you can research these people, if you can meet with these people, if you can get in touch with them, and really start to say things like, If I had 30 minutes to teach you something, what would be most helpful for me to cover?
What can I say that can make your life better? How can I help your organization, et cetera? So, if that's at all possible, literally listen to these people, if you're in a situation where you can physically meet people in a room, if you're doing an in person. Presentation prior to you getting on stage, greet them when they walk in, chat with them, ask them that question.
So what's on your mind today? But what about public speaking? Could I help you with whatever it might be? And even during the presentation, you may not be listening to them if they're not speaking in the usual sense, using your ears, but you can be listening to them with their eyes. How are they reacting?
Are they looking confused? Are they looking interested? Are they literally asleep with their head on the desk? I need to pick up the pace of things. So, the more a speaker listens to their audience before and during a presentation, the more that presentation is going to be customized for them. And again, the more impactful it will be.
It's really important that you spend some time listening. When you speak,
Roger: I want to add to this by saying, the more you're in front of an audience, the more you'll be able to pick up on those cues, as well as become familiar when those cues aren't what you think they are. I was once I was once teaching a class where someone had signed up for it that I knew, knew this subject and probably knew it better than I did.
And so I was, I was a little curious why they would sign up for this. And while I was talking. You know, in the middle of the class, they had a face on that, you know, was not a very pleasant face that I thought they were looking at me. Like I just said, the stupidest thing ever at the end of the session, they came up and said, this is the best way I've ever heard that thing be described.
And I'm like, Oh. You, you, and I realized that that was their thinking face, not their disgust face, but it, it looked very similar. And so it was, it was just a great learning experience of paying attention to the cues. But being familiar with like blank stares or snarls or, you know, whatever face is going on may not be what you think it means.
Kristin: Absolutely. And depending on the setting, if there's any way at all to get audience interaction, Hey guys, let me just pause here to a question you have. I want to make sure my pace is okay. Obviously that's not always possible, but if you can interact with an audience and just check in with them, that can make a huge difference.
And you get little surprises like this. When someone says, no, this is fabulous. This is exactly what I need to hear. And you didn't think that was the case. It's really reassuring.
Roger: Are you ready for the lightning round? I am. Yeah. And what's it's funny with the lightning round and I'll Often guests have a hard time giving short concise answers and I have a hard time sticking to the short concise Answer format, although I think you're going to be really good at this, but I don't want to set you up for failure So I won't say this Fill in the blank getting people to share their stories of impact is Fulfillment for me.
Who in your life helps you with telling your story of impact?
Kristin: My dad.
Roger: That's lovely. Is there a practice or routine that helps you grow, nurture, renew your ability to get people to tell their stories of impact?
Kristin: Working with mission based and nonprofit clients. Really really helps me grow
Roger: Say a little bit more…okay, lightning round? There I go. I'm violating it. It was like we're having a blinking contest and I just blinked Yeah, say a little bit more about working with non profit clients
Kristin: I I love to give back in any community that i'm a part of that's really important to to me. It's just who I am and Nonprofits have such an incredible mission as do mission based for profit companies.
And when I'm working with people who do really meaningful work, there's just such a passion there, and there's such a desire to get their stories across. And not often the funding or the training to make that happen, that if I spend a very short amount of time with them, we can make a huge difference.
And if I'm lucky enough to spend a lot of time with them, we can even make a bigger difference. So although I can't volunteer in a lot of nonprofits, there's only so much time in a day. If I can help the people who are in these organizations, it's like a double whammy for me. I just love it. It feels good.
Roger: And it's, it's a double whammy for you. And it's a force multiplier for them, because if they can tell their stories better, that's going to show up in being able to provide more services, get more funding, having a bigger impact. I'm right there with you. Absolutely. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah, of course.
Is there a book or a movie that you recently consumed or watched that you would recommend that has getting people to share their stories of impact as a theme?
Kristin: I've read so many books, so I'm going to jump to a movie just to keep this simple, and it's an older movie called The King's Speech with Colin Firth, and he won an Oscar for this.
This performance about a king who had a such a stammer as it was called at the time that he was not able to give speeches and worked with a very eclectic speech coach and changed his way of speaking. It's just a, it's a feel good movie that has to do with public speaking and those don't always come along.
So the king's speech with Colin Firth.
Roger: That's such a good movie. And I've seen clips of that. In so many public speaking workshops, so it makes a lot of sense that you would identify that So what's one thing that gets in your way? Of using your rockstar power
Kristin: Doing too much because I love to help people I can overcommit myself And I need to Back off and maybe be a little more selective about the the folks that I work with Just so that I can give a hundred percent of myself to the clients I have
Roger: Seems like a good problem to have but i'm sure there's like you said there's more that you want to do.
There's more people that you want to help. So it's probably easy to get overextended It is So is there a word or phrase that describes what your superhero power feels like when it's had a positive impact rewarding If a listener wanted to ask you a question and follow up with you, where do you want to point them to?
Kristin: I'm on linkedin Kristen link and you can find me there dig into my Activity page while you're there. I have these little link lessons that I mentioned earlier, two minute videos or little posts, and the intent behind these is to give away my services for free for folks who can't afford or, or cannot have as public speaking coach.
So check those out. And then also my website under my business name, link coaching.
Roger: And I'll provide links to both of those on the show notes. And I have been such a fan of the link lessons, those little videos you put on LinkedIn and how helpful they are. So I'm a big fan and you see me fan boying and those, um, engaging with those cause I love them so much.
Well, Kristen. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom, what you know to be true about your superhero power, and it's just such a delight to spend time with you and learning about something that is so near and dear to your heart and something you're so good at.
Kristin: Thank you, Roger. This has been such a joy and fun to catch up with you again.
Roger: And hopefully you're noticing that I'm getting better at this from your instruction and will continue as I get more practice. So thank you for that. And again, thank you so much. It's just so wonderful to have this conversation with you. You too. Take care. You too. Bye bye. Bye
Kristin: bye.
Roger: Thank you all for being in this conversation. Thank you, Kristen, for sharing your wisdom on how to become a more impactful public speaker. The question I'm asking myself now after this conversation is, the next time I'm preparing for a presentation, how can I listen for that sabbatore that's whispering?
Or screaming fear into my ear and point us both towards the audience and what we want them to feel. What do you know to be true is a Three Blue Pens production and I'm your host Roger Kastner. We are recording on the ancestral lands of the Duwamish and Suquamish people. To discover the ancestral lands of the indigenous people whose land you may be on, go to https://native-lands.ca
Okay, be well my friends and love you, mean it.