Presentations in Action - Jerry Weissman [5]
During his campaign, Mr. Obama’s web site displayed a headline banner that read, “I’m asking you to believe. Not just in my ability to bring about real change in Washington ... I’m asking you to believe in yours.”
Following his victory, Mr. Obama delivered his inaugural address, in which he used you or your 15 times, addressing the you of his audience, the “Americans of every race and region and station.” He also used us, our, and we, pronouns that involve you. His speech included 23 instances of us, 62 instances of we, and a whopping 70 instances of our, which, when combined with the 15 instances of you, represent more than 7 percent of the total 2,388 words in his speech.F2.4
Although the historic day was his to celebrate, Mr. Obama kept his audience in mind. Flash-forward a year into his presidency. In a prime-time address to the nation from the United States Military Academy at West Point, Mr. Obama committed 30,000 more troops to fight the war in Afghanistan. The serious speech marked a significant change in his rhetorical style—from an audience-focused to a self-focused point of view. He used you only ten times, with four of them in the closing, “Thank you. God bless you. May God bless the United States of America. Thank you very much. Thank you.” That left only six instances of the powerful word in the body of the speech. In sharp contrast, he used I 41 times.
The shift prompted Peggy Noonan, a Wall Street Journal political columnist—and former republican presidential speechwriter—to exclaim, “I, I—ay yi yi. This is a man badly in need of an I-ectomy.” She went on to explain:
George H.W. Bush famously took the word “I” out of his speeches—we called them “I-ectomies”—because of a horror of appearing to be calling attention to himself. Mr. Obama is plagued with no such fears. “When I took office ... I approved a long-standing request .... After consultations with our allies, ... I set a goal.” That’s all from one paragraph. He then used the word I in three paragraphs an impressive 15 times. “I believe I know,” “I have signed,” “I have read,” “I have visited.”F2.5
Granted, any senior executive—from the President of the United States to a midlevel manager in business—must take full responsibility for all decisions and actions, but Mr. Obama should not abandon the technique that helped get him elected.
The lesson for you is to involve your audiences by finding as many opportunities as you can to incorporate you in your presentations. In fact, adding you enhances any form of communication, from the soaring rhetoric of presidential addresses to the mundane routine of email. Try this simple practice: Before clicking Send on any message, make one final review to see where you can insert additional instances of you. Every time you do, you will heighten the impact of your message. Do the same throughout your presentations, and you will connect more often with your audiences and heighten your chances for success.
It is all about you, not hubris.
3. The “So What?” Syndrome: ... and How to Avoid It
How often have you sat in an audience listening to a presentation and said to yourself, “So what?”
If you are like most audience members—or like me, a presentations coach—your response to that question would likely range from “Quite often” to “Too often.” Most presentations fail to address the audience’s point of view. Worse still, most presentations, being all about the presenter, fail to offer benefits. Either failure produces the dreaded “So what?” Syndrome that produces disinterest and, ultimately, disconnect in the audience.
As a coach, I help my clients avoid failure by using “So what?” to a positive end. In coaching sessions with clients, I role-play an audience member: a potential customer for a product, a potential investor for a private or public financing, a manager for a project approval, a partner for a strategic alliance, or even a donor for a not-for-profit cause. In one session with a pharmaceutical