A prospective client recently asked me why some content experts terrible speakers. Fortunately, lots of content experts are terrible speakers and sometimes they hire people like me to help them. Here are some thoughts I share with my executive coaching clients who fall into that category:
- Content experts who automatically think they’d be great presenters or trainers are like airline passengers who automatically think they’d make great pilots or gifted athletes who think they’d make great coaches. Totally different skill sets and mindsets involved here.
- Many content expert speakers I encounter have an inherent ‘presenter-centric’ mentality. They’re the experts that the audience wants to learn from, so they’ll tell the audience everything the presenter knows or wants to tell them in the way the presenter wants to tell them as long as the presenter wants to talk. This mindset is often unconscious, but obvious to the audience.
- I empower them to strive to become more obviously ‘audience-centric’ presenters and to discuss (not tell) with the audience what the audience needs and wants to hear in a way the audience needs and wants it shared for as long as the audience needs to accomplish their objectives. A profoundly different approach to presenting, for sure.
- Some clients get it faster and better than others. Some still feel that they’re already successful experts, so why change. Tough sell, but I do indicate that they’ve become successful often in spite of how they present rather than because of how they present.
If this sounds like you, give me a call. Together, we can take away some of the pain you experience when presenting … and some of the pain you cause.