Springsteen shares the stage with a young fan
People love to see a performer share the stage with someone in the audience or, better yet, with someone they know personally. I recently went to a Bruce Springsteen concert where, much to the audiences’ delight, he brought up two people to help him with a song (once he asked a young man to sing a few lines of a song and later held out his hand to bring a young lady on stage to dance to his 80’s hit, Dancing in the Dark). Audiences love this stuff. It breaks down the wall between them and the performer and creates a more intimate and ultimately memorable experience.
If you consider a presentation a ‘performance,’ sharing the stage will help you connect with your audience. For example, I was recently asked to give the keynote speech to executive leaders of AAA clubs from across the country. Other than AAA’s emergency roadside assistance program, I wasn’t very familiar with all of the other services and benefits the organization offered. So I put on my reporters’ hat and went to work. I visited branches, called executives, and even ‘interviewed’ the top leaders who would be attending the conference. I recorded one of the interviews using a Canon video camera, converted it to a digital file and placed excerpts in the appropriate areas of my presentation. During the lunch break after the keynote speech, many people approached me to talk about the concepts of innovation, creativity, and communication that I had discussed. But what part of the presentation do you think they liked and remembered the most? The video interviews, of course. They felt that instead of talking to them, the speaker had taken the time to really know them, understand their business, and make them part of the conversation.
Share the stage with your colleagues as well. Venture capitalists have told me they like to see how well a group of entrepreneurs work together as a team before they choose to invest. If one person does all the talking, it’s not nearly as persuasive as watching a CEO give the high-level vision while letting others discuss more specific components of the product or company.
In another example of sharing the stage among colleagues, I remember speaking to a public relations professional who won a major contract to help the state of Louisiana rebuild after Hurricane Katrina battered New Orleans. Prior to the pitch, he brought his team to the severely damaged ninth ward to see the devastation for themselves. They were profoundly m0ved and brought that passion into the pitch meeting. Instead of showing a PowerPoint presentation, each member of the PR team got up and talked about why they were passionate to work on the account. The personal stories worked and the PR firm won the account with unanimous consent by the decision makers on the client side. The vice president of the PR firm had made the right decision. Instead of handling the pitch himself, he knew it would be more powerful to share the stage with the people who would actually be working on the account.
Remember, a presentation is not about you. It’s about your audience. It’s about connecting with them on a deeper, more meaningful level. It’s about learning so much about their industry that you’re better equipped to teach them something useful. Since it’s about your audience, invite them to share the stage by making them part of the ‘performance.’