I have consistently been coached to find my unique and differentiating
factors and to emphasize them during presentations. For example,
I have the luxury of having low-cost, professional posters available. I
was convinced that these posters would become my way to be remembered.
As a frequent presenter with these posters, I was receiving positive
feedback. I found my use of them got to a point of dependency. I
wouldn’t necessarily call it lazy with my writing, but my incorporation
of the props became a focal point, thus a distraction from the main
messages. I learned as a speech contestant that I would receive rave
reviews in the early stages because judges often thought the posters
were a nice touch and separated me from other competitors. As I progressed
further in the competitions, so did the judges. Their experience
level typically increased and they wanted a picture to be painted
vividly with words, not an actual picture. In a key competition, I excitedly
turned a poster around from its blank-white back to the high school
yearbook picture of a friend of mine who had passed away. I
lost the competition.
After losing, I received some feedback that although the poster
was nice, many people thought it took away from my message. Obviously,
I had leaned on my prop as a principle focus instead of just as a
supporting tool. Some feedback also indicated that right from the start
the audience was guessing what was on the front of the poster, so I
was losing their attention before I had even started. At the point when
I turned the poster around, it hit the stand slightly. Although subtle
to me, apparently the distraction was bigger in the eyes of the judges
because they saw the risk ahead of time, and I fulfilled their prophecy.
The most important feedback given to me on that day was that
the line I delivered in the speech before I turned the picture around—
“He was four-foot-eleven with a five-foot smile”— had described in
words everything people needed to envision this person properly on
their own. Unfortunately, I showed them the movie immediately after
they had just read the book. Whatever picture they had in their own
mind was instantly ruined. It was as if I had just stolen the audience’s
imagination. Finally, I was told that the audience at times felt my stage
presence was hindered or even predictable because the props dictated
where I was going on stage. Thus, the supporting props had become a
distraction.
I may have lost the competition, but I guess I really won going forward
if such caring people were willing to provide me substantial,
easy-to-act-on feedback. I learned a lot that day about ensuring that
visual aids and props support the message, but don’t take away from it.
Thomas B. Dowd III’s books available in softcover, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only):
- Now What? The Ultimate Graduation Gift for Professional Success
- Time Management Manifesto: Expert Strategies to Create an Effective Work/Life Balance
- Displacement Day: When My Job was Looking for a Job…A Reference Guide to Finding Work
- The Transformation of a Doubting Thomas: Growing from a Cynic to a Professional in the Corporate World
- From Fear to Success: A Practical Public-speaking Guide received the Gold Medal at the 2013 Axiom Business Book Awards in Business Reference
- The Unofficial Guide to Fatherhood
See “Products” for details on www.transformationtom.com. Book, eBook, and audiobook (From Fear to Success only) purchase options are also available on Amazon- Please click the link to be re-directed: Amazon.com