November 8, 2024 • 40 mins
What if your voice could shape a more inclusive future? Andrea, a seasoned advertising executive turned entrepreneur, joins us to share her journey of empowering others through the transformative power of storytelling. Andrea's transition from the not-for-profit sector to founding Talk Boutique and the Thought Leader Academy reveals her deep commitment to unlocking the potential of experts and change makers. She discusses the vital role of public speaking in effective leadership, emphasizing how harnessing one's voice is crucial for both personal growth and team influence.
Throughout our conversation, Andrea unveils the art of idea communication, drawing on her experience as a TED speakers coach. She reveals how distilling an idea into a single impactful sentence can guide any presentation, much like a "North Star." Andrea also addresses common public speaking fears, providing practical strategies to help speakers maintain audience engagement by structuring presentations as continuous stories. We explore the need to balance expertise with emotional connection, enabling speakers to overcome imposter syndrome and connect with their audiences more authentically.
Andrea introduces her Storytelling Toolkit, offering frameworks like the idea framework and story spine to unlock storytelling potential. She shares insights on effective public speaking, discussing how self-perception and audience perception influence communication. Listeners will gain practical advice on embodying thought leadership and discover resources to enhance their storytelling skills, including Andrea's free online tools and coaching services. Join us as we learn how to communicate with confidence and authenticity, inspiring others while sharing unique ideas with the world.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(00:22):
or check the link in the shownotes.
Here we go Right.
Check out therecklessgroupcom,or check the link in the show
notes.
Here we go Right.
You're like that buzzer ain'trang, that game ain't over with,
so keep going.
I have thrived in that chaos.
How could this be happening?
(00:42):
Did any of you guys payattention to anything I said,
like get arrested.
Guess until they get the messagewelcome back to the reckless
ceo podcast, where we keep itreal raw and reckless about
business and life.
They ain't really gotten thesauce and I ain't got.
You know what I mean it's like.
Here is your host, the recklessceo himself, michael mcgovern
(01:03):
all right.
Well, andrea, I appreciate youcoming in today.
I'm very.
Here is your host, the recklessCEO himself, michael McGovern
All right.
Well, andrea, I appreciate youcoming in today.
I'm very excited.
You know, a lot of times when Ihave people come on and new
guests, and you know, a lot oftimes it's people that I've
gotten to.
You know I know them Right,I've got to have some experience
with them and got to meet them,and so I'm always excited when
I get somebody in that's thatand someone that.
(01:24):
Especially, I love publicspeaking.
I love just really goingthrough all the things that
you've done and kind of craftingthe brand message and all of
the stuff, and so, andrea, Iappreciate you coming in today.
Can you give us a littleinsight about you?
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Sure Well, thank you, Michael.
I really, really appreciate youhaving me on your show.
So I've spent most of my careerin advertising.
I started off many, many yearsago, Actually.
I started in the not-for-profitside as a fundraiser, but then
moved into advertising andstarted in doing direct
(01:59):
marketing, eventually moved intobrand strategy, finished my
career close to 10 years ago now, but after spending almost 25
years doing that and now I havea company, I'm an entrepreneur,
I have a company called TalkBoutique and we have a sister
company called the ThoughtLeader Academy and we work with
(02:19):
experts and change makers and wehelp them to transform into
thought leaders by helping themto become storytellers, and we
do that so that they can createthe impact that they want to
make.
And I do it personally becauseI believe that we all have a
voice in helping to create andco-create a future that
represents all of us.
So that's a little bit about me.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Yeah, I love that.
You know, andrea, what got you.
You know, obviously I'm surethat the story goes way back
right Of kind of how you'veevolved and where you're at
today.
But you know, I think when youknow public speaking, right,
it's one of those things that Ithink everybody wants to do it,
everybody's scared to do it, ormost right it's.
It's and especially as youbecome, you know, an
(03:02):
entrepreneur, and for me, Ialways kind of had this, this
vision of wanting to speak onstages and, you know, wanting to
do these things, and I didn'tget to do it for the longest
time, right.
Then I got intoentrepreneurship and was still
kind of figuring that out aswell.
I started taking some, somespeaking classes myself.
But you know, I think so manypeople don't realize how
(03:23):
powerful and important it is tobe crafting your public speaking
skills, even if you don't planon getting on a stage.
Just your ability to lead ateam, just in your ability to
absolutely people.
So how did you kind of get intothe space?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Well, you know it was , as a lot of my career has been
a little bit of, you know, byaccident and by circumstance.
I had, like I said, I had spenta lot of time in marketing and
advertising.
And you know, when I enteredthe business of advertising,
coming out of the not-for-profitworld, you know, I had this
dream that I could, you know,move out of these, you know
(03:59):
these organizations that had bighearts but empty pockets, and I
could move into a place thathad really big pockets but maybe
not so much heart, and Ithought I could bring the heart,
you know, and so I came intoadvertising, you know, this sort
of real idealist wanting tomake a difference with this
incredibly powerful medium.
(04:20):
And you know, my belief wasthat I could start to in some
way impact that you know, thosemessages, so that it was a
little bit more representativeof what the world looks like and
less so consumer oriented.
And of course, the reality isadvertising is selling, and so,
yes, I could make a little bitof impact.
(04:42):
But, you know, after 25 years I, you know, sort of woke up one
day and realized I was anidealist in a capitalist world
and I had to make some changes.
And I had to.
I had to look at because I wasnot achieving the impact goals
that I wanted to make.
I remember it was the year thatI was turning 50.
And I was at a point in my lifewhere I my daughter was off to
(05:04):
university and I'm living in alovely home, but in the suburbs,
and I'm thinking to myself whatam I doing with my life?
Where from here?
Because, as I looked back, Ihad achieved everything I wanted
(05:24):
to achieve when I was 20 andmaking these big goals or seemed
like big goals, but at 50, yourealize well, I've done a lot
already in those 30 years inbetween 20 and 50.
And so I had to do somethingdifferent, and so I just had
this opportunity to start.
I was still in advertising, butI just started going to
conferences and I started doingsome volunteer work and I found
myself Volun Hired as aspeaker's coach for TEDx Toronto
(05:45):
.
Now, at the time I didn't evenknow what a speakers coach was.
It was brand new to me.
But I also, you know, my wholedays were spent presenting
because at that point I was asenior vice president of
strategy.
My job was to present researchand strategies and work with
clients on a very deep level fortheir businesses strategies and
(06:05):
work with clients on a verydeep level for their businesses,
and I started working as aspeakers coach for TED and again
, this was in the early, earlydays of TEDx, and so there
weren't many out there.
Tedx Toronto was actually oneof the top brands at the time
for the TED world because it wasso new, and so I found myself
(06:28):
working with these incredibleindividuals, people who were
literally changing our worldScientists, academics,
technologists, artists.
These were people who were sobusy doing the work they were
forgetting to tell anyone aboutit.
And the reality was that Istarted working with them and I
remember being incredibly likeoverwhelmed, thinking what can I
(06:50):
teach these people?
I mean they, you know?
I remember walking into ameeting with one of my very
first speakers and he had a PhDin engineering and a PhD in
medicine and he was working onthe worldwide project to decode
the genome and I, you know, I'mthinking, wow, little old me
like, yeah, I work inadvertising, right, what am I
(07:11):
going to help this guy with?
You know, and I think the thingthat I learned was that the
work that I had done inadvertising, you know, I was
highly trained to be able totake very, very complex data and
turn it into very simple ideas.
In the ad world, we would dowhat was called find key
consumer insights.
(07:32):
They are the underpinnings ofall ad campaigns, and that was
what my job was.
And so what I had to do was totake, you know, consumer
research and find why it is wemake the buying decisions we
make.
Well, that was the exact skillthat somebody with a dual PhDs
decoding the genome needed to beable to take that incredibly
(07:56):
complex work and turn it into a15 minute TED talk.
And you know, it was a powerfulrealization for me.
I didn't know I had this skill,I didn't understand the power of
it or the transferability of it, and so I started working in
the TED world and understandingwhat I could do, but also what
(08:20):
was needed, because I eventuallymoved in.
I was a speaker's coach, I wenton to become the director of
curation and eventually Ichaired the event.
And I went on years later tohold licenses and run my own TED
events and also work with manyother TED events.
But in that time I started tounderstand that all of these
(08:42):
people, the good work thatthey're doing in the world, you
know, if we don't know about ityou and I, the people who are
actually going to be living theresults of their work, the work
they're doing not only doesn'tget recognized or understood,
but it also doesn't get fundedor in some way picked up.
(09:03):
And so if we're never knowingabout it and they're not able to
communicate it, the whole worldsuffers.
And so I started to think whatif I created an organization,
some form of support forindividuals like that?
Because, you know, on TEDxToronto we would get over a
thousand applications every yearfor 10 spots on stage, and the
(09:27):
people who made it to stage.
They got some training and someexpertise.
But what about the 990 thatdidn't?
And you know, it's not thatthey weren't ready for the TED
stage, it's just, for whateverreason, they didn't match our
criteria and they were all doinggood work in the world.
And the thing is, no one outthere wants to talk about those
(09:49):
people, because the reality isour media prefers to talk about
the bad news, not the good news,right, and so how do we help
them?
And so that was why I createdTalk Boutique, and in that, it
wasn't just to get on a publicstage although that's part of it
, because being on a publicstage gives you a platform but
what I did was I created acompany where I could teach them
(10:11):
how to communicate theircomplex ideas simply and
powerfully, no matter where theyare, whether they're on a
public stage, whether they're infront of a boardroom, whether
they're on a podcast or whetherthey're just talking to somebody
at a dinner party, whetherthey're on a podcast or whether
they're just talking to somebodyat a dinner party because the
reality is we need them to,because their work is changing
our future.
And the reality is we need notonly do we need more of them,
(10:35):
but we need a greater diversityof them, because that was the
other thing that came later.
That I started to see was that,you know, the more diverse that
person identified as, the lesswe knew or understood their,
their knowledge and contribution.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yeah, well, that's amazing, so many things in there
.
One is I, I would.
I've always wanted to do a Tedtalk.
That's been.
I have a friend that's done itas well and he's he's kind of
leaned into me to start goingdown that route a little bit.
I haven't I haven't really, Iguess, put much intention or
focus on it.
But you know, in the futurethat's definitely something I've
always been interested in.
(11:11):
Just you know, for me, I thinkI'm still kind of understanding
what I've been.
You know my message might beright.
I think that I have, you know,evolved and grown so much and
every time that I think I knowwhat I would talk about, I'm
reminded that maybe I'd betalking about something
different again.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
So that's typical, like I'll tell you, having
worked with a lot of TEDspeakers.
They all come in with a verysimilar sort of look I know I
want to do a TED talk, but whatdo I talk about?
Or I've been asked to do a TEDtalk.
Oh my God, what am I going totalk about?
So you know it's pretty common.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Well, and and you know, I think there's two I
think that, from the experiencethat I've had working with some
speaking coaches and things aswell, as you know we, we, you
know when, when you go to youknow tell a story, and there's
there's so many, you know thatthat that's a hard thing, right,
as you, you know when I did it,they had you say just hey,
start, kind of you know your,your overall kind of brain, who
(12:08):
you are, right, kind of gothrough this, then kind of go
back through and start to pickout those you know key moments.
But I think, as you know someonethat gets into it, we think
everything's kind of a keymoment.
Right, there's all the certainthings, because it's like we
have a lot of identity, I think,tied into these little things
that we want people to know.
And so much about speaking isthat when you're getting into it
(12:30):
, you want to tell people yourcredibility versus allowing the
story to tell them thatcredibility, right, like it's
not about you getting them tosee you, it's you getting them
to see themselves through you.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Yeah, see you, it's you getting them to see
themselves through you.
Yeah, and I think I thinkyou're getting at here and this
is something that I deal withall the time is that, especially
with people who want to be on aTED stage because we all listen
to TED, ted talks and you knowwhat's so compelling about a
good TED talk is we listen to itand it feels like that person
is talking directly to us,telling a story, and and so we
have this perception as peoplewho want to do a and you're not
(13:10):
wrong, but you're not fullyright.
You see, here's the thing.
It's not the story, it's theidea.
And the idea is hidden inside ofthat story.
And this is the hard part,because when you are thinking
about what it is you want totell people, of course our brain
goes to well, what's the storyI'm going to tell?
Well, the answer to that iswhat's the idea you want to
(13:33):
convey?
And so we have to start withidea first.
And so one of the things andthis was, I think, probably one
of the things thatdifferentiated me when I started
as a TED speakers coach wasthat I never went to the story
first because I was trained, asI said, as a researcher.
So for me it was like well,what's the underpinning, what's
(13:55):
the thing that you want to getout there in the world?
And so, identifying that ideafirst.
And what I've learned and I'vebecome really good at is
defining an idea.
Most people don't know how todefine their idea.
In fact, what often happens issomebody goes I have a great
idea, Let me tell you about it.
And a half an hour later, we'restill listening and we're like
(14:16):
where's that idea?
Speaker 1 (14:18):
you, told me about.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
And so what I've done is I've found a way and I did
this in the early days of TEDwas to define an idea in one
sentence, and when you're ableto do that, now that's a very
packed sentence, don't get mewrong.
It holds a lot of information.
But the reality is, when youcan do that, it becomes the
(14:40):
center point, the North Star foryour talk, and then finding the
story that can hold that ideais way easier.
So to your point where you'relike well, where do I start?
Where do I go?
Because our lives are long, ourexperiences are deep and vast,
and so where do you go?
How do you find that startingpoint?
(15:02):
Well, you start with what isthe idea.
So when I know what my idea is,then I can go.
When in my life have Iexperienced something similar to
that?
Like, what is it?
Because all ideas have a changeor an to that?
Like what is it?
Because all ideas have a changeor an issue or an opportunity?
Right, that's kind of.
The key to an idea is there's,you know, a conflict, a concept,
(15:22):
an idea, a change, and so whenwe look at that, okay, well,
those lend themselves to what wecall in the story world of
tropes, and there's nothingwrong with a trope.
A trope is great because whatit is is it's a learning tool,
it's like a metaphor, right.
So when you identify your ideaand then you go, okay, what's
(15:45):
hidden inside of that?
Is that a transformation?
Is that a revelation?
Is that a learning from thefuture?
Like, what is it?
What can we pull out of it?
What archetype is hidden insideof that story?
Now, where in my life have Iexperienced that archetype?
Or where in my career?
Or where in my business?
And so then we find a place andthen what we do is we very
(16:10):
deliberately build the storyaround the idea, because it acts
as the context.
As I said, that idea is tightlypacked.
It's one sentence.
So the story helps to do twothings.
One, it contextualizes it, sothat when you hear that idea
said out loud, it's like, oh, Iget it, because that story
equals that idea.
(16:31):
But the second thing it does isit starts to unpack the pieces
of that story and it gives you,in many ways I always like to
call it a breadcrumb trail tofollow for the rest of your
presentation.
Because if you open with astory that leads to an idea, now
you've given yourself.
If you've been smart about it,you've given yourself a whole
bunch of places to go back to inthat story to keep the story
(16:53):
going.
So to the listener, the entirepresentation and it could be a
boardroom presentation feelslike a story.
But to you you're now unpackinga very tightly wound idea and
you're giving it to them inbite-sized chunks so they
remember it.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Wow, that's amazing.
Chunks so they remember it.
Wow, that's amazing.
I love that.
You know, when you you knowthere's probably a lot of
listeners out here that want to,you know, that are interested
in getting into speaking right,what, what is the?
You know what?
What do you think is one of thethings that really you know?
And obviously Ted Ted talks isone spectrum of it.
But just you know, in general,with people that you know, like
(17:35):
you said, maybe it's a boardroom, maybe it's leading their team,
maybe it's having conversations, like they want to do it, but
they're they're, they're nervous, they're scared, they're going
to get up there and forgeteverything.
Right, I know that when I firststarted doing it, I would write
, you know, write every singlething out and then try to go
back and remember everything Iwrote out or chunk it down.
I mean, you know what?
Do you see?
A lot of things that holdspeople up from, really, you know
(17:57):
, starting to tell these storiesor getting more into this kind
of space.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
And there's so many things and you've just hit on a
couple of them, you know.
Number one is like how am Igoing to remember all this stuff
?
That's a lot, you know.
The second thing is am I theright person to do this, you
know.
Another one is like you know, Ican't tell a story in a
corporate setting, that's justyou know.
Or in a scientific setting, oryou know, story is one of those
(18:22):
things that you know we gettrained out of us early on, like
you know, it's just a facts man, just the facts, right.
No one wants any of that, youknow.
Rhetoric, right.
Yeah, reality is we'rehardwired for story.
That is the way we, as humans,communicate the best, and not
only the best, but communicatein general.
Just even listening to ourlanguage.
We use metaphors so easily andfluidly in our language, but yet
(18:48):
we don't even realize it.
So those are like some of thetop ones.
But you know, an impostersyndrome is real.
So many people show up thinkingwell, you know, someone else is
always so much better than meor another piece.
You know, I get into mindset alot when I'm working with people
who want to step into that roleas what I call a thought leader
(19:09):
, and you know, what I see isthat you know when we are in
that place of beginning ourjourney towards thought
leadership, we really are insort of in two places.
One, we've got our knowledge,our expertise.
What is it we know and howconfident are we in that thing
(19:30):
that we know?
That only we know.
Because here's the thing, likea thousand people could be doing
the same thing you're doing,but you know your thing
differently than anyone elsebecause of who you are, the
experience you've had, thecultural background you've
experienced the education you'vechosen, or maybe the education
you didn't choose.
You know the things that you'vedone.
(19:52):
All of those things contributeto your knowledge set.
The second thing is theinfluence that you exert with
the audience you're in front of,and your influence is one of
those things that a lot ofpeople don't even believe they
have.
But here's the thing If you'rebeing asked to be in front of
the room or on a stage, or evenon a podcast, you have influence
(20:22):
.
And so how confident are you inthat influence and how
comfortable are you in leaninginto it?
Because influence is reallyabout emotions, right?
So we've got confidence inknowledge and the ability to
connect emotionally.
Those are the two pieces thatsort of trip people up and they
tend to kind of fall into acouple of different categories.
The first one is, you know,those who are highly confident
(20:43):
in the knowledge they have, soconfident in fact they would
call themselves an expert.
But because they callthemselves an expert, the
challenge is, is that they don'twant to be seen as anything,
but so leaning into emotionsbecomes, feels like a crutch to
them, like, oh, I can't do that,that would be unethical, that
(21:03):
would be showing a weakness,right.
But that's not true, becausehere's the thing we isn't the
audience we'd.
You know when they're tellingus, all of you know and we've
all sat in the audience withexperts, right, whether it be
again in a boardroom or in alarge audience where they're
spewing data and facts, and youknow research, studies, and
you're like, oh my God, thisperson is so smart, I don't
(21:26):
remember a thing they said and Ifeel intimidated by them, right
, so I don't connect to them.
Then, on the other side, youget people who lean heavily into
their influence.
Now, this is an interestingthing, because what I see is
that people who are experts areoften also on this other side.
They flip-flop back and forth.
(21:46):
And again, I want to just makeit clear I'm talking about
mindset, not reality.
Okay, so these are talkingabout mindset, not reality.
Okay, so these are mindsetsthat we take.
So you've got the expertmindset.
Or maybe you're on the otherside of the spectrum, where I
call them change makers, andthese are people who are really
passionate about what they do.
They come to it with lots ofheart.
(22:07):
They are telling us about theimpact and what will happen, and
they've got stories and they'vegot lots and lots and lots of
information that is all heldinside of a lot of very
passionate information, but theydon't go into the facts.
It's a lot of it feels likeconjecture, and so what happens?
(22:28):
As the audience, we feel likethey're trying to convince us.
We feel like there's a wholelot of like nothing going on.
They're like, oh my God, I mean, I, I love the, how passionate
they are, but is any of thistrue, right?
And so we, we, we, kind of wego I need, I need some of the
facts and, like I said, what Ioften see is that people
flip-flop between this Like weget the experts that turn into
(22:50):
change makers, that turn backinto experts, and it goes back
and forth.
And then the third category thatI see are what we call
connectors, and those are peoplewho are literally in imposter
syndrome, where you know theyget the opportunities and they
go.
Michael, you know what You'reso much better at this than me.
Why don't I do all the work andI'm going to hand it to you and
you go ahead and stand at thefront of the stage, right, and
(23:17):
the problem with that, of course, is that we never get that
person's true impact becausethey are so afraid of showing up
and using their voice that weget denied the knowledge that
only they have.
And so those are sort of thepieces, and you can see there's
hidden inside of that a lot ofdifferent reasons why people
don't show up, or the storiesthey tell themselves when they
do show up, because that's allit is, it's just stories it is,
(23:39):
and I mean there's so much inthere, right, that that's,
that's incredible.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
I I know that for myself as I started to get into
it, and I would say honestly forme, the more I started to.
You ever heard of bo eason?
no so, bo is that, that's who Iwent to he was.
He was the this public speakingcoach that I worked with and,
yeah, I went out to Californiaand we had a you know an event
out there that I was with himand you know the.
We were two days in and theexercise they had us do was
(24:08):
everyone stand up, everyone walkup on the stage.
And there's 30 people at thisevent.
Right, they say pick yourfavorite animal.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Act like it, yeah, and start to.
There's executives.
You know we're crawling onstage on our hands and knees and
you know it was for me I.
I honestly believe that it wasone of the most transformational
like, getting into publicspeaking was a, uh, an internal
transformation for me, becausethere were so many fear of
rejection, fear of judgment,fear of all of these things that
(24:40):
people say about you when youget up there and how you feel
when you're getting like allthose nerves right.
They, you know he had us get upthere and start doing this, and
I'm growling at guys, and, and,and I had never felt so free,
yeah, the, the weight, the, theweight that came off of me when
I, when I felt, even when I cameback and like, talk to my
(25:01):
people and my team, it was likeMike, you're glowing, there's
something different about you.
It's like, because so much ofit was just all of these again,
the judgments, the things thatwe just we're getting.
So we tell ourselves all ofthese stories before we, you
know, get up there and speak andyou know, one of their reasons
was one to do that, obviously toget you out of your comfort
zone, right.
The other side of it is that youknow, as humans you know we
(25:24):
were, so we use vocabulary somuch in our communication, right
and you look at other panelsright and the physicality that
they have and the way that they,you know, use their body and
the way they present themselvesand the way they hold themselves
right, like you don't realizeas a, as a human, how closed off
we are and how much we, youknow, we, we have this amazing
vessel that that has been givento us as this instrument to be
(25:45):
able to communicate with Right,and we're so scared to use it.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
It's so true.
I mean, that's exactly what Iwas going to say.
It was about really learningthat you are not just a floating
head up there on stage.
You've got a body that you getto actually use and this is
something that is so powerfulfor most, most communicators,
most speakers to really reallyfor it to drop, like, I like to
(26:11):
say drop from head to heart,right, because what happens is
when we start to understand thatour body like when we look at
the performance skills like youknow we spend, we agonize over
the words we're going to say,right, like, as you know, when
we're working on a talk with,like, when I'm working with a
(26:31):
speaker on a talk, like, we'reagonizing, like, and we're not
necessarily writing a script,but we're trying to get the
narrative down.
We're trying to make sure thatthe messages are correct and
what are the stories and all ofthat.
But the reality is, 60 to 70%of what the audience takes away
comes from how you look and howyou sound, and what I mean by
(26:51):
that is your physicality onstage and the way in which you
use your voice.
Those are the things that we inthe audience are connecting to.
Now, that's not to say that thecontent isn't important.
It is Because here's the thingIf you only focus on those
things and you got crap thatyou're putting out there, that's
(27:14):
what your audience is going toremember about you.
So it is about having the rightwords or having the right
message, of course, but when youlearn to embody your message,
because that's what we're reallytalking about, and you know,
one of the things that I alwaysdo with my clients is you know,
(27:34):
I don't even get into deliveryuntil we've got the words down,
because let's first of all makesure.
But then it is exactly what youjust described.
It's like okay, stand up, let'sget those words not living in
your head, but living in yourbody.
How are you embodying thatmessage?
Where does it live in your body?
One of the things that we liketo do there's a great exercise
(27:57):
so it's similar to the animalone, but we do one.
It's where we get speakers tostand up and start to do the
opening lines of their talk andthen we say, okay, now do your
talk like a Shakespearean actor,now do your talk like a country
music singer.
Now do your talk like a, youknow, like a rock and roll, you
(28:18):
know, or you know whatever, andwe give them a whole bunch of
archetypes and, to your point,like, suddenly you see the range
that you've got access to andit forces you Cause, like you
know the range that you've gotaccess to, and it forces you
because, like you know, if I'mgoing to be a Shakespearean
actor, I'm in a whole differentplace than if I'm a country
music star, than if I'm a 10year old.
And you move them through theseemotional and physical places
(28:43):
so that they start to see whatthey have access to.
And for me, as their coach, Imost interesting things is
listening to how somethingsounds when somebody is
(29:10):
believing themselves versus whensomebody isn't believing
themselves, because you can hearit and it's usually where I'm
listening to them.
I'm like wait a minute, we gotto go back to your content.
You don't believe yourself,your audience isn't going to
believe you, so let's go back.
What is it you're saying rightnow that you don't believe?
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Let's go back.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
What is it you're saying right now that you don't
believe?
Let's rework it.
And you see it.
You see it in the whole body.
Cause that's why, um, whenwe're watching somebody,
especially a good Ted speaker,and we feel like they're talking
to us.
Why?
Because not only do theybelieve every word they're
saying, they've learned how toembody that message in such a
way that it feels like they arejust having a conversation with
us off the cuff.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
That's good, yeah, and and, um, you know, one of
one of my qualities is I'm I'm apretty big guy, um, you know,
not a little bit above average,right and so, but in you know, I
, one of the one of the thingsthat the that my you know, my
coach was stressed with me washe.
He says that when you walk, youshrink yourself to rooms, he's
like.
You see, you know he's like andyou can see it in your voice
(30:12):
and in your presentation.
You're trying, you're like youwill shrink down.
He said, well, he had me do waspracticing outside.
Right, he's like, go outsideand speak loud and be big and
you know, and get used topracticing and expanding
yourself, versus practicing itwithin the four walls.
Because, you know, for so manypeople, especially a big guys,
(30:32):
like in you, when you get upthere and you start to shrink
yourself down and you're not,you know, using the room and
really being able to, you know,expand yourself, you know people
will lose interest in that too,because they it doesn't feel in
alignment or they they feellike you're not really getting
the message to them that yourbody should be delivering.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
That's it, and this is something the acting term for
that is status.
Status.
It has nothing to do withsocioeconomic.
It is about how you embody whoyou are and how you show up, and
status is really comprised ofthree things.
I like to think of it as atriangle, and it starts with my
(31:10):
perception of myself.
So we can agree that I'm 100%in control of my perception of
me, right, and so I always candecide what I think of myself.
And if I have done the worklike you have, and you're sort
of showing up going, yeah, I'mpretty happy with who I am and
I'm, I think I've got somethingof service and I think that I'm
(31:33):
pretty good at this.
You know, one of my coachesalways uses that like, do you
have something that you canoffer that will be of service?
Yes, you do.
Are you pretty good at this?
Yes, you are Okay.
So we can agree that that'strue.
The second part of status is thepiece that most people don't
look at and it's kind of alittle bit of a hard one to wrap
your head around, and that ismy perception of how you
(31:57):
perceive me.
That's the piece that trips usup every time Because, as you
described, sort of shrinkingyourself to the room.
Part of what you're doing isyou're like, ooh, I can't be as
loud as I need to be.
I can't be, as I can't be asbig as I need to be.
I'm going to.
I'm, you know, in there.
There's some perception you had,or we're holding, that you were
(32:17):
in some way going to overwhelmthe audience or overwhelm the
speakers or whatever it wasDidn't really matter.
There was something going onwhere you were in conflict.
My perception of me, so yourperception of you, and your
perception of how the audiencewas perceiving you, were in
conflict with each other.
And what happens is theaudience doesn't know what's
(32:38):
going on in your head, but whatthey do know is they start to
feel that there's a conflictgoing on and they, you know this
is where the audience would belike I don't know what it is
Like, I really liked him, butthere's just something about him
.
I can't put my finger on it,right, and that's what you're
projecting, because the thirdpiece of that triangle is how
(32:58):
the audience actually perceivesyou.
But, like any triangle, if youare in control of two sides or
two of those angles, the thirdone gets filled in for you.
So you are in control of twosides, or two of those angles.
The third one gets filled infor you, so you are in control
of two of them.
You're in control of how youperceive yourself, you're in
control of how you perceive thatsomeone else perceives you, and
(33:19):
so you actually are in controlof how they perceive you.
So when you know that.
So the idea of you going andpracticing outdoors was you
learning to just fully embodyand accept the bigness of who
you are.
So when you walked on that stage, you were like a big welcoming
bear on the stage for people andthey're like, oh my God, I love
(33:41):
him Because you had acceptedthat that was actually good,
you'd heard yourself in all ofwho you are and it's powerful,
right?
And when we start to decodethis and start to understand it,
it's helpful.
It's just helpful to know thosethings.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Yeah, and you know, I love it because you hear public
speaking or the TED Talks andwe think, I think we almost put
it in a box, yeah, right, wherewe're like, oh, it's public
speaking, it's like you don't, Idon't think, and it's just like
anything.
Right, as you grow a businessand you develop, you become
someone different in thatprocess as well.
Right, and I think so much withthe public speaking side is
(34:19):
that when they hear, or peoplehear, public speaking, they just
think going up on a stage andtalking, right, they don't
realize the transformation ofthe individual to be able to get
on that stage, to do that.
Speaker 2 (34:31):
Right, there's a lot in there that, I think, is very
overlooked business TalkBoutique, and got into the TED
world, yeah, people would alwayssay, oh, you're in public
(34:52):
speaking.
And yes, I was.
I even have a speaker's bureau.
So, yes, I guess I am in publicspeaking.
But the reality for me was thatit was actually more about
thought leadership, Because whatI started to see was that it
was less about where you werespeaking and more about the
messages you were conveying andhow you were conveying them,
because those messages are soimportant for our world.
(35:13):
And so if we kind of bring itdown to this little box of
public speaking and we go yeah,you know, it's just a thing I do
, I get up on stage and I talkto people about things Well,
actually there are some peoplewho do that, and you know
there's lots of motivationalspeakers out there, and you know
that's important, don't get mewrong, but I think the best
speakers, the ones that we alignwith the most, are the ones who
(35:37):
are so authentic about whatthey're doing and why they're
doing it.
They're the ones that change us,and and and they change us
because they've changedthemselves through their own
process.
They've discovered who they are, and with that, we discover who
we are, and so that, to me isthought leadership.
(35:57):
That's not public speaking.
Public speaking is the thingthey're doing.
What they're conveying is atransformation of self, and
that's thought leadership.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
That's good, this is good.
Andrea, I appreciate you.
I mean, coming in today andsharing all this has been
amazing.
Let me ask you obviously youhave the business and the
speaking and all the coachingand all that as well, and
there's probably people that areinterested in taking that step,
but there's also the peoplethat are kind of, you know, just
want to maybe not jump intogetting coached yet Right, and
(36:29):
they want to make those thoseincremental steps right.
What?
What are some maybe ideas orsome things that you could share
to maybe help someone beforethey, you know, make the jump
and commit all in.
But what can people do to startto improve themselves a little
bit in this area?
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Well, you know, first of all, we've got some great
tools and I'm happy to offerthem to your listeners.
We've got something called theStorytelling Toolkit, which has
our three main frameworks, sothe idea framework, the story
spine and the talk canvas, andthese are the tools that we use
with all of our clients andhappy to give your listeners
that as a free download, becauseI really truly do believe that.
(37:08):
Look, I'm a speaker's coach.
Come hire me, love it, but Idon't think you, not everyone
needs to.
And so go and tell your stories, learn how to tell your stories
, learn how to structure yourideas to.
I've got a YouTube channelcalled the Thought Leader
Academy, which I do a lot offree resources and also do.
(37:32):
I'll tell you how to use a lotof these tools.
So go and watch some of that,because the thing is, it's
important that we all learn touse our voice and to tell our
stories that hold our ideas.
And so, if you're just gettingstarted, the first thing is
think about what is your storyand what is the idea that lives
(37:53):
inside of that story.
Sometimes it's easier to findthe story first and then back
the idea out of it.
Other times, it might be easierfor you to start with that idea
.
Now, either way, you need toidentify the idea first, but how
you get there it will bedetermined by who you are and
where you are in that.
But find that idea, and thatidea is really something that
(38:15):
you uniquely do, and you do itin a specific area or topic.
I always say it's a what, a howand a why.
The what is your topic, what'sthe thing that you are really,
that you that you are reallyenamored with or that you live
for, and millions of people canhave that same topic, yeah, but
your next piece, the how, that'syou, that's what you bring to
(38:38):
that topic, that's how youactivate it uniquely.
And the what and the howtogether are the uniqueness of
your idea.
But it's not quite finishedthere, because, you see, it's
not just your idea, it's an ideathat's changing others, and so
the why is the outcome, theimpact that your idea has.
(38:59):
So when you put your what, yourhow and your why together your
topic, your point and yourimpact now what you have is a
well-structured idea and an ideathat will likely light you up.
And so start there and then findthe story that holds it.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Yeah, that's so good, so good.
Well, andrea, I appreciate youcoming on today.
It was great to have you andgreat to connect with you.
I'll make sure that I put allthe you know in the show notes
as well.
We'll have everything in therefor you so everybody can locate
that and find it.
What's the best way to contactyou or reach out to you or
potentially even work with you?
How can they find you?
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Sure, go to our website, talkboutiquecom.
Sign up for our newsletter.
It's great and it comes from me.
You can directly contact methere.
Also, follow me on LinkedIn.
I'm very, very active onLinkedIn and, of course, like I
said, check out our, myInstagram, but also our YouTube
channel, the Thought LeaderAcademy.
I'm active across all of them.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
You're busy, I'm excited to get more into it
myself, right?
This has kind of sparked alittle bit back in me.
I feel like I've kind of notbeen as intentional with my
(40:15):
public speaking or focus on it,and so just this conversation
today has kind of got me, I'dsay, fired up to kind of get
back into it again.
So I appreciate you for that.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Oh well, thank you so much, Michael, and I'm excited
to see what you.
Hey, thanks for listening to the Reckless CEO
podcast.
This is just a quick reminder.
In case you'd rather watch thefull episode, you can find it at
youtubecom.
Slash the reckless CEO.
Well, if you'd like to listen,you're in the right place.
If you find value in thiscontent, please like and
subscribe.
If you are a home service CEO,ready to scale your business and
join an incredible community,check out the reckless groupcom
(00:22):
or check the link in the shownotes.
Here we go Right.
Check out therecklessgroupcom,or check the link in the show
notes.
Here we go Right.
You're like that buzzer ain'trang, that game ain't over with,
so keep going.
I have thrived in that chaos.
How could this be happening?
(00:42):
Did any of you guys payattention to anything I said,
like get arrested.
Guess until they get the messagewelcome back to the reckless
ceo podcast, where we keep itreal raw and reckless about
business and life.
They ain't really gotten thesauce and I ain't got.
You know what I mean it's like.
Here is your host, the recklessceo himself, michael mcgovern
(01:03):
all right.
Well, andrea, I appreciate youcoming in today.
I'm very.
Here is your host, the recklessCEO himself, michael McGovern
All right.
Well, andrea, I appreciate youcoming in today.
I'm very excited.
You know, a lot of times when Ihave people come on and new
guests, and you know, a lot oftimes it's people that I've
gotten to.
You know I know them Right,I've got to have some experience
with them and got to meet them,and so I'm always excited when
I get somebody in that's thatand someone that.
(01:24):
Especially, I love publicspeaking.
I love just really goingthrough all the things that
you've done and kind of craftingthe brand message and all of
the stuff, and so, andrea, Iappreciate you coming in today.
Can you give us a littleinsight about you?
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Sure Well, thank you, Michael.
I really, really appreciate youhaving me on your show.
So I've spent most of my careerin advertising.
I started off many, many yearsago, Actually.
I started in the not-for-profitside as a fundraiser, but then
moved into advertising andstarted in doing direct
(01:59):
marketing, eventually moved intobrand strategy, finished my
career close to 10 years ago now, but after spending almost 25
years doing that and now I havea company, I'm an entrepreneur,
I have a company called TalkBoutique and we have a sister
company called the ThoughtLeader Academy and we work with
(02:19):
experts and change makers and wehelp them to transform into
thought leaders by helping themto become storytellers, and we
do that so that they can createthe impact that they want to
make.
And I do it personally becauseI believe that we all have a
voice in helping to create andco-create a future that
represents all of us.
So that's a little bit about me.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
Yeah, I love that.
You know, andrea, what got you.
You know, obviously I'm surethat the story goes way back
right Of kind of how you'veevolved and where you're at
today.
But you know, I think when youknow public speaking, right,
it's one of those things that Ithink everybody wants to do it,
everybody's scared to do it, ormost right it's.
It's and especially as youbecome, you know, an
(03:02):
entrepreneur, and for me, Ialways kind of had this, this
vision of wanting to speak onstages and, you know, wanting to
do these things, and I didn'tget to do it for the longest
time, right.
Then I got intoentrepreneurship and was still
kind of figuring that out aswell.
I started taking some, somespeaking classes myself.
But you know, I think so manypeople don't realize how
(03:23):
powerful and important it is tobe crafting your public speaking
skills, even if you don't planon getting on a stage.
Just your ability to lead ateam, just in your ability to
absolutely people.
So how did you kind of get intothe space?
Speaker 2 (03:39):
Well, you know it was , as a lot of my career has been
a little bit of, you know, byaccident and by circumstance.
I had, like I said, I had spenta lot of time in marketing and
advertising.
And you know, when I enteredthe business of advertising,
coming out of the not-for-profitworld, you know, I had this
dream that I could, you know,move out of these, you know
(03:59):
these organizations that had bighearts but empty pockets, and I
could move into a place thathad really big pockets but maybe
not so much heart, and Ithought I could bring the heart,
you know, and so I came intoadvertising, you know, this sort
of real idealist wanting tomake a difference with this
incredibly powerful medium.
(04:20):
And you know, my belief wasthat I could start to in some
way impact that you know, thosemessages, so that it was a
little bit more representativeof what the world looks like and
less so consumer oriented.
And of course, the reality isadvertising is selling, and so,
yes, I could make a little bitof impact.
(04:42):
But, you know, after 25 years I, you know, sort of woke up one
day and realized I was anidealist in a capitalist world
and I had to make some changes.
And I had to.
I had to look at because I wasnot achieving the impact goals
that I wanted to make.
I remember it was the year thatI was turning 50.
And I was at a point in my lifewhere I my daughter was off to
(05:04):
university and I'm living in alovely home, but in the suburbs,
and I'm thinking to myself whatam I doing with my life?
Where from here?
Because, as I looked back, Ihad achieved everything I wanted
(05:24):
to achieve when I was 20 andmaking these big goals or seemed
like big goals, but at 50, yourealize well, I've done a lot
already in those 30 years inbetween 20 and 50.
And so I had to do somethingdifferent, and so I just had
this opportunity to start.
I was still in advertising, butI just started going to
conferences and I started doingsome volunteer work and I found
myself Volun Hired as aspeaker's coach for TEDx Toronto
(05:45):
.
Now, at the time I didn't evenknow what a speakers coach was.
It was brand new to me.
But I also, you know, my wholedays were spent presenting
because at that point I was asenior vice president of
strategy.
My job was to present researchand strategies and work with
clients on a very deep level fortheir businesses strategies and
(06:05):
work with clients on a verydeep level for their businesses,
and I started working as aspeakers coach for TED and again
, this was in the early, earlydays of TEDx, and so there
weren't many out there.
Tedx Toronto was actually oneof the top brands at the time
for the TED world because it wasso new, and so I found myself
(06:28):
working with these incredibleindividuals, people who were
literally changing our worldScientists, academics,
technologists, artists.
These were people who were sobusy doing the work they were
forgetting to tell anyone aboutit.
And the reality was that Istarted working with them and I
remember being incredibly likeoverwhelmed, thinking what can I
(06:50):
teach these people?
I mean they, you know?
I remember walking into ameeting with one of my very
first speakers and he had a PhDin engineering and a PhD in
medicine and he was working onthe worldwide project to decode
the genome and I, you know, I'mthinking, wow, little old me
like, yeah, I work inadvertising, right, what am I
(07:11):
going to help this guy with?
You know, and I think the thingthat I learned was that the
work that I had done inadvertising, you know, I was
highly trained to be able totake very, very complex data and
turn it into very simple ideas.
In the ad world, we would dowhat was called find key
consumer insights.
(07:32):
They are the underpinnings ofall ad campaigns, and that was
what my job was.
And so what I had to do was totake, you know, consumer
research and find why it is wemake the buying decisions we
make.
Well, that was the exact skillthat somebody with a dual PhDs
decoding the genome needed to beable to take that incredibly
(07:56):
complex work and turn it into a15 minute TED talk.
And you know, it was a powerfulrealization for me.
I didn't know I had this skill,I didn't understand the power of
it or the transferability of it, and so I started working in
the TED world and understandingwhat I could do, but also what
(08:20):
was needed, because I eventuallymoved in.
I was a speaker's coach, I wenton to become the director of
curation and eventually Ichaired the event.
And I went on years later tohold licenses and run my own TED
events and also work with manyother TED events.
But in that time I started tounderstand that all of these
(08:42):
people, the good work thatthey're doing in the world, you
know, if we don't know about ityou and I, the people who are
actually going to be living theresults of their work, the work
they're doing not only doesn'tget recognized or understood,
but it also doesn't get fundedor in some way picked up.
(09:03):
And so if we're never knowingabout it and they're not able to
communicate it, the whole worldsuffers.
And so I started to think whatif I created an organization,
some form of support forindividuals like that?
Because, you know, on TEDxToronto we would get over a
thousand applications every yearfor 10 spots on stage, and the
(09:27):
people who made it to stage.
They got some training and someexpertise.
But what about the 990 thatdidn't?
And you know, it's not thatthey weren't ready for the TED
stage, it's just, for whateverreason, they didn't match our
criteria and they were all doinggood work in the world.
And the thing is, no one outthere wants to talk about those
(09:49):
people, because the reality isour media prefers to talk about
the bad news, not the good news,right, and so how do we help
them?
And so that was why I createdTalk Boutique, and in that, it
wasn't just to get on a publicstage although that's part of it
, because being on a publicstage gives you a platform but
what I did was I created acompany where I could teach them
(10:11):
how to communicate theircomplex ideas simply and
powerfully, no matter where theyare, whether they're on a
public stage, whether they're infront of a boardroom, whether
they're on a podcast or whetherthey're just talking to somebody
at a dinner party, whetherthey're on a podcast or whether
they're just talking to somebodyat a dinner party because the
reality is we need them to,because their work is changing
our future.
And the reality is we need notonly do we need more of them,
(10:35):
but we need a greater diversityof them, because that was the
other thing that came later.
That I started to see was that,you know, the more diverse that
person identified as, the lesswe knew or understood their,
their knowledge and contribution.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Yeah, well, that's amazing, so many things in there
.
One is I, I would.
I've always wanted to do a Tedtalk.
That's been.
I have a friend that's done itas well and he's he's kind of
leaned into me to start goingdown that route a little bit.
I haven't I haven't really, Iguess, put much intention or
focus on it.
But you know, in the futurethat's definitely something I've
always been interested in.
(11:11):
Just you know, for me, I thinkI'm still kind of understanding
what I've been.
You know my message might beright.
I think that I have, you know,evolved and grown so much and
every time that I think I knowwhat I would talk about, I'm
reminded that maybe I'd betalking about something
different again.
You know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
So that's typical, like I'll tell you, having
worked with a lot of TEDspeakers.
They all come in with a verysimilar sort of look I know I
want to do a TED talk, but whatdo I talk about?
Or I've been asked to do a TEDtalk.
Oh my God, what am I going totalk about?
So you know it's pretty common.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Well, and and you know, I think there's two I
think that, from the experiencethat I've had working with some
speaking coaches and things aswell, as you know we, we, you
know when, when you go to youknow tell a story, and there's
there's so many, you know thatthat that's a hard thing, right,
as you, you know when I did it,they had you say just hey,
start, kind of you know your,your overall kind of brain, who
(12:08):
you are, right, kind of gothrough this, then kind of go
back through and start to pickout those you know key moments.
But I think, as you know someonethat gets into it, we think
everything's kind of a keymoment.
Right, there's all the certainthings, because it's like we
have a lot of identity, I think,tied into these little things
that we want people to know.
And so much about speaking isthat when you're getting into it
(12:30):
, you want to tell people yourcredibility versus allowing the
story to tell them thatcredibility, right, like it's
not about you getting them tosee you, it's you getting them
to see themselves through you.
Speaker 2 (12:43):
Yeah, see you, it's you getting them to see
themselves through you.
Yeah, and I think I thinkyou're getting at here and this
is something that I deal withall the time is that, especially
with people who want to be on aTED stage because we all listen
to TED, ted talks and you knowwhat's so compelling about a
good TED talk is we listen to itand it feels like that person
is talking directly to us,telling a story, and and so we
have this perception as peoplewho want to do a and you're not
(13:10):
wrong, but you're not fullyright.
You see, here's the thing.
It's not the story, it's theidea.
And the idea is hidden inside ofthat story.
And this is the hard part,because when you are thinking
about what it is you want totell people, of course our brain
goes to well, what's the storyI'm going to tell?
Well, the answer to that iswhat's the idea you want to
(13:33):
convey?
And so we have to start withidea first.
And so one of the things andthis was, I think, probably one
of the things thatdifferentiated me when I started
as a TED speakers coach wasthat I never went to the story
first because I was trained, asI said, as a researcher.
So for me it was like well,what's the underpinning, what's
(13:55):
the thing that you want to getout there in the world?
And so, identifying that ideafirst.
And what I've learned and I'vebecome really good at is
defining an idea.
Most people don't know how todefine their idea.
In fact, what often happens issomebody goes I have a great
idea, Let me tell you about it.
And a half an hour later, we'restill listening and we're like
(14:16):
where's that idea?
Speaker 1 (14:18):
you, told me about.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
And so what I've done is I've found a way and I did
this in the early days of TEDwas to define an idea in one
sentence, and when you're ableto do that, now that's a very
packed sentence, don't get mewrong.
It holds a lot of information.
But the reality is, when youcan do that, it becomes the
(14:40):
center point, the North Star foryour talk, and then finding the
story that can hold that ideais way easier.
So to your point where you'relike well, where do I start?
Where do I go?
Because our lives are long, ourexperiences are deep and vast,
and so where do you go?
How do you find that startingpoint?
(15:02):
Well, you start with what isthe idea.
So when I know what my idea is,then I can go.
When in my life have Iexperienced something similar to
that?
Like, what is it?
Because all ideas have a changeor an to that?
Like what is it?
Because all ideas have a changeor an issue or an opportunity?
Right, that's kind of.
The key to an idea is there's,you know, a conflict, a concept,
(15:22):
an idea, a change, and so whenwe look at that, okay, well,
those lend themselves to what wecall in the story world of
tropes, and there's nothingwrong with a trope.
A trope is great because whatit is is it's a learning tool,
it's like a metaphor, right.
So when you identify your ideaand then you go, okay, what's
(15:45):
hidden inside of that?
Is that a transformation?
Is that a revelation?
Is that a learning from thefuture?
Like, what is it?
What can we pull out of it?
What archetype is hidden insideof that story?
Now, where in my life have Iexperienced that archetype?
Or where in my career?
Or where in my business?
And so then we find a place andthen what we do is we very
(16:10):
deliberately build the storyaround the idea, because it acts
as the context.
As I said, that idea is tightlypacked.
It's one sentence.
So the story helps to do twothings.
One, it contextualizes it, sothat when you hear that idea
said out loud, it's like, oh, Iget it, because that story
equals that idea.
(16:31):
But the second thing it does isit starts to unpack the pieces
of that story and it gives you,in many ways I always like to
call it a breadcrumb trail tofollow for the rest of your
presentation.
Because if you open with astory that leads to an idea, now
you've given yourself.
If you've been smart about it,you've given yourself a whole
bunch of places to go back to inthat story to keep the story
(16:53):
going.
So to the listener, the entirepresentation and it could be a
boardroom presentation feelslike a story.
But to you you're now unpackinga very tightly wound idea and
you're giving it to them inbite-sized chunks so they
remember it.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Wow, that's amazing.
Chunks so they remember it.
Wow, that's amazing.
I love that.
You know, when you you knowthere's probably a lot of
listeners out here that want to,you know, that are interested
in getting into speaking right,what, what is the?
You know what?
What do you think is one of thethings that really you know?
And obviously Ted Ted talks isone spectrum of it.
But just you know, in general,with people that you know, like
(17:35):
you said, maybe it's a boardroom, maybe it's leading their team,
maybe it's having conversations, like they want to do it, but
they're they're, they're nervous, they're scared, they're going
to get up there and forgeteverything.
Right, I know that when I firststarted doing it, I would write
, you know, write every singlething out and then try to go
back and remember everything Iwrote out or chunk it down.
I mean, you know what?
Do you see?
A lot of things that holdspeople up from, really, you know
(17:57):
, starting to tell these storiesor getting more into this kind
of space.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
And there's so many things and you've just hit on a
couple of them, you know.
Number one is like how am Igoing to remember all this stuff
?
That's a lot, you know.
The second thing is am I theright person to do this, you
know.
Another one is like you know, Ican't tell a story in a
corporate setting, that's justyou know.
Or in a scientific setting, oryou know, story is one of those
(18:22):
things that you know we gettrained out of us early on, like
you know, it's just a facts man, just the facts, right.
No one wants any of that, youknow.
Rhetoric, right.
Yeah, reality is we'rehardwired for story.
That is the way we, as humans,communicate the best, and not
only the best, but communicatein general.
Just even listening to ourlanguage.
We use metaphors so easily andfluidly in our language, but yet
(18:48):
we don't even realize it.
So those are like some of thetop ones.
But you know, an impostersyndrome is real.
So many people show up thinkingwell, you know, someone else is
always so much better than meor another piece.
You know, I get into mindset alot when I'm working with people
who want to step into that roleas what I call a thought leader
(19:09):
, and you know, what I see isthat you know when we are in
that place of beginning ourjourney towards thought
leadership, we really are insort of in two places.
One, we've got our knowledge,our expertise.
What is it we know and howconfident are we in that thing
(19:30):
that we know?
That only we know.
Because here's the thing, likea thousand people could be doing
the same thing you're doing,but you know your thing
differently than anyone elsebecause of who you are, the
experience you've had, thecultural background you've
experienced the education you'vechosen, or maybe the education
you didn't choose.
You know the things that you'vedone.
(19:52):
All of those things contributeto your knowledge set.
The second thing is theinfluence that you exert with
the audience you're in front of,and your influence is one of
those things that a lot ofpeople don't even believe they
have.
But here's the thing If you'rebeing asked to be in front of
the room or on a stage, or evenon a podcast, you have influence
(20:22):
.
And so how confident are you inthat influence and how
comfortable are you in leaninginto it?
Because influence is reallyabout emotions, right?
So we've got confidence inknowledge and the ability to
connect emotionally.
Those are the two pieces thatsort of trip people up and they
tend to kind of fall into acouple of different categories.
The first one is, you know,those who are highly confident
(20:43):
in the knowledge they have, soconfident in fact they would
call themselves an expert.
But because they callthemselves an expert, the
challenge is, is that they don'twant to be seen as anything,
but so leaning into emotionsbecomes, feels like a crutch to
them, like, oh, I can't do that,that would be unethical, that
(21:03):
would be showing a weakness,right.
But that's not true, becausehere's the thing we isn't the
audience we'd.
You know when they're tellingus, all of you know and we've
all sat in the audience withexperts, right, whether it be
again in a boardroom or in alarge audience where they're
spewing data and facts, and youknow research, studies, and
you're like, oh my God, thisperson is so smart, I don't
(21:26):
remember a thing they said and Ifeel intimidated by them, right
, so I don't connect to them.
Then, on the other side, youget people who lean heavily into
their influence.
Now, this is an interestingthing, because what I see is
that people who are experts areoften also on this other side.
They flip-flop back and forth.
(21:46):
And again, I want to just makeit clear I'm talking about
mindset, not reality.
Okay, so these are talkingabout mindset, not reality.
Okay, so these are mindsetsthat we take.
So you've got the expertmindset.
Or maybe you're on the otherside of the spectrum, where I
call them change makers, andthese are people who are really
passionate about what they do.
They come to it with lots ofheart.
(22:07):
They are telling us about theimpact and what will happen, and
they've got stories and they'vegot lots and lots and lots of
information that is all heldinside of a lot of very
passionate information, but theydon't go into the facts.
It's a lot of it feels likeconjecture, and so what happens?
(22:28):
As the audience, we feel likethey're trying to convince us.
We feel like there's a wholelot of like nothing going on.
They're like, oh my God, I mean, I, I love the, how passionate
they are, but is any of thistrue, right?
And so we, we, we, kind of wego I need, I need some of the
facts and, like I said, what Ioften see is that people
flip-flop between this Like weget the experts that turn into
(22:50):
change makers, that turn backinto experts, and it goes back
and forth.
And then the third category thatI see are what we call
connectors, and those are peoplewho are literally in imposter
syndrome, where you know theyget the opportunities and they
go.
Michael, you know what You'reso much better at this than me.
Why don't I do all the work andI'm going to hand it to you and
you go ahead and stand at thefront of the stage, right, and
(23:17):
the problem with that, of course, is that we never get that
person's true impact becausethey are so afraid of showing up
and using their voice that weget denied the knowledge that
only they have.
And so those are sort of thepieces, and you can see there's
hidden inside of that a lot ofdifferent reasons why people
don't show up, or the storiesthey tell themselves when they
do show up, because that's allit is, it's just stories it is,
(23:39):
and I mean there's so much inthere, right, that that's,
that's incredible.
Speaker 1 (23:42):
I I know that for myself as I started to get into
it, and I would say honestly forme, the more I started to.
You ever heard of bo eason?
no so, bo is that, that's who Iwent to he was.
He was the this public speakingcoach that I worked with and,
yeah, I went out to Californiaand we had a you know an event
out there that I was with himand you know the.
We were two days in and theexercise they had us do was
(24:08):
everyone stand up, everyone walkup on the stage.
And there's 30 people at thisevent.
Right, they say pick yourfavorite animal.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
Act like it, yeah, and start to.
There's executives.
You know we're crawling onstage on our hands and knees and
you know it was for me I.
I honestly believe that it wasone of the most transformational
like, getting into publicspeaking was a, uh, an internal
transformation for me, becausethere were so many fear of
rejection, fear of judgment,fear of all of these things that
(24:40):
people say about you when youget up there and how you feel
when you're getting like allthose nerves right.
They, you know he had us get upthere and start doing this, and
I'm growling at guys, and, and,and I had never felt so free,
yeah, the, the weight, the, theweight that came off of me when
I, when I felt, even when I cameback and like, talk to my
(25:01):
people and my team, it was likeMike, you're glowing, there's
something different about you.
It's like, because so much ofit was just all of these again,
the judgments, the things thatwe just we're getting.
So we tell ourselves all ofthese stories before we, you
know, get up there and speak andyou know, one of their reasons
was one to do that, obviously toget you out of your comfort
zone, right.
The other side of it is that youknow, as humans you know we
(25:24):
were, so we use vocabulary somuch in our communication, right
and you look at other panelsright and the physicality that
they have and the way that they,you know, use their body and
the way they present themselvesand the way they hold themselves
right, like you don't realizeas a, as a human, how closed off
we are and how much we, youknow, we, we have this amazing
vessel that that has been givento us as this instrument to be
(25:45):
able to communicate with Right,and we're so scared to use it.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
It's so true.
I mean, that's exactly what Iwas going to say.
It was about really learningthat you are not just a floating
head up there on stage.
You've got a body that you getto actually use and this is
something that is so powerfulfor most, most communicators,
most speakers to really reallyfor it to drop, like, I like to
(26:11):
say drop from head to heart,right, because what happens is
when we start to understand thatour body like when we look at
the performance skills like youknow we spend, we agonize over
the words we're going to say,right, like, as you know, when
we're working on a talk with,like, when I'm working with a
(26:31):
speaker on a talk, like, we'reagonizing, like, and we're not
necessarily writing a script,but we're trying to get the
narrative down.
We're trying to make sure thatthe messages are correct and
what are the stories and all ofthat.
But the reality is, 60 to 70%of what the audience takes away
comes from how you look and howyou sound, and what I mean by
(26:51):
that is your physicality onstage and the way in which you
use your voice.
Those are the things that we inthe audience are connecting to.
Now, that's not to say that thecontent isn't important.
It is Because here's the thingIf you only focus on those
things and you got crap thatyou're putting out there, that's
(27:14):
what your audience is going toremember about you.
So it is about having the rightwords or having the right
message, of course, but when youlearn to embody your message,
because that's what we're reallytalking about, and you know,
one of the things that I alwaysdo with my clients is you know,
(27:34):
I don't even get into deliveryuntil we've got the words down,
because let's first of all makesure.
But then it is exactly what youjust described.
It's like okay, stand up, let'sget those words not living in
your head, but living in yourbody.
How are you embodying thatmessage?
Where does it live in your body?
One of the things that we liketo do there's a great exercise
(27:57):
so it's similar to the animalone, but we do one.
It's where we get speakers tostand up and start to do the
opening lines of their talk andthen we say, okay, now do your
talk like a Shakespearean actor,now do your talk like a country
music singer.
Now do your talk like a, youknow, like a rock and roll, you
(28:18):
know, or you know whatever, andwe give them a whole bunch of
archetypes and, to your point,like, suddenly you see the range
that you've got access to andit forces you Cause, like you
know the range that you've gotaccess to, and it forces you
because, like you know, if I'mgoing to be a Shakespearean
actor, I'm in a whole differentplace than if I'm a country
music star, than if I'm a 10year old.
And you move them through theseemotional and physical places
(28:43):
so that they start to see whatthey have access to.
And for me, as their coach, Imost interesting things is
listening to how somethingsounds when somebody is
(29:10):
believing themselves versus whensomebody isn't believing
themselves, because you can hearit and it's usually where I'm
listening to them.
I'm like wait a minute, we gotto go back to your content.
You don't believe yourself,your audience isn't going to
believe you, so let's go back.
What is it you're saying rightnow that you don't believe?
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Let's go back.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
What is it you're saying right now that you don't
believe?
Let's rework it.
And you see it.
You see it in the whole body.
Cause that's why, um, whenwe're watching somebody,
especially a good Ted speaker,and we feel like they're talking
to us.
Why?
Because not only do theybelieve every word they're
saying, they've learned how toembody that message in such a
way that it feels like they arejust having a conversation with
us off the cuff.
Speaker 1 (29:49):
That's good, yeah, and and, um, you know, one of
one of my qualities is I'm I'm apretty big guy, um, you know,
not a little bit above average,right and so, but in you know, I
, one of the one of the thingsthat the that my you know, my
coach was stressed with me washe.
He says that when you walk, youshrink yourself to rooms, he's
like.
You see, you know he's like andyou can see it in your voice
(30:12):
and in your presentation.
You're trying, you're like youwill shrink down.
He said, well, he had me do waspracticing outside.
Right, he's like, go outsideand speak loud and be big and
you know, and get used topracticing and expanding
yourself, versus practicing itwithin the four walls.
Because, you know, for so manypeople, especially a big guys,
(30:32):
like in you, when you get upthere and you start to shrink
yourself down and you're not,you know, using the room and
really being able to, you know,expand yourself, you know people
will lose interest in that too,because they it doesn't feel in
alignment or they they feellike you're not really getting
the message to them that yourbody should be delivering.
Speaker 2 (30:49):
That's it, and this is something the acting term for
that is status.
Status.
It has nothing to do withsocioeconomic.
It is about how you embody whoyou are and how you show up, and
status is really comprised ofthree things.
I like to think of it as atriangle, and it starts with my
(31:10):
perception of myself.
So we can agree that I'm 100%in control of my perception of
me, right, and so I always candecide what I think of myself.
And if I have done the worklike you have, and you're sort
of showing up going, yeah, I'mpretty happy with who I am and
I'm, I think I've got somethingof service and I think that I'm
(31:33):
pretty good at this.
You know, one of my coachesalways uses that like, do you
have something that you canoffer that will be of service?
Yes, you do.
Are you pretty good at this?
Yes, you are Okay.
So we can agree that that'strue.
The second part of status is thepiece that most people don't
look at and it's kind of alittle bit of a hard one to wrap
your head around, and that ismy perception of how you
(31:57):
perceive me.
That's the piece that trips usup every time Because, as you
described, sort of shrinkingyourself to the room.
Part of what you're doing isyou're like, ooh, I can't be as
loud as I need to be.
I can't be, as I can't be asbig as I need to be.
I'm going to.
I'm, you know, in there.
There's some perception you had,or we're holding, that you were
(32:17):
in some way going to overwhelmthe audience or overwhelm the
speakers or whatever it wasDidn't really matter.
There was something going onwhere you were in conflict.
My perception of me, so yourperception of you, and your
perception of how the audiencewas perceiving you, were in
conflict with each other.
And what happens is theaudience doesn't know what's
(32:38):
going on in your head, but whatthey do know is they start to
feel that there's a conflictgoing on and they, you know this
is where the audience would belike I don't know what it is
Like, I really liked him, butthere's just something about him
.
I can't put my finger on it,right, and that's what you're
projecting, because the thirdpiece of that triangle is how
(32:58):
the audience actually perceivesyou.
But, like any triangle, if youare in control of two sides or
two of those angles, the thirdone gets filled in for you.
So you are in control of twosides, or two of those angles.
The third one gets filled infor you, so you are in control
of two of them.
You're in control of how youperceive yourself, you're in
control of how you perceive thatsomeone else perceives you, and
(33:19):
so you actually are in controlof how they perceive you.
So when you know that.
So the idea of you going andpracticing outdoors was you
learning to just fully embodyand accept the bigness of who
you are.
So when you walked on that stage, you were like a big welcoming
bear on the stage for people andthey're like, oh my God, I love
(33:41):
him Because you had acceptedthat that was actually good,
you'd heard yourself in all ofwho you are and it's powerful,
right?
And when we start to decodethis and start to understand it,
it's helpful.
It's just helpful to know thosethings.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Yeah, and you know, I love it because you hear public
speaking or the TED Talks andwe think, I think we almost put
it in a box, yeah, right, wherewe're like, oh, it's public
speaking, it's like you don't, Idon't think, and it's just like
anything.
Right, as you grow a businessand you develop, you become
someone different in thatprocess as well.
Right, and I think so much withthe public speaking side is
(34:19):
that when they hear, or peoplehear, public speaking, they just
think going up on a stage andtalking, right, they don't
realize the transformation ofthe individual to be able to get
on that stage, to do that.
Speaker 2 (34:31):
Right, there's a lot in there that, I think, is very
overlooked business TalkBoutique, and got into the TED
world, yeah, people would alwayssay, oh, you're in public
(34:52):
speaking.
And yes, I was.
I even have a speaker's bureau.
So, yes, I guess I am in publicspeaking.
But the reality for me was thatit was actually more about
thought leadership, Because whatI started to see was that it
was less about where you werespeaking and more about the
messages you were conveying andhow you were conveying them,
because those messages are soimportant for our world.
(35:13):
And so if we kind of bring itdown to this little box of
public speaking and we go yeah,you know, it's just a thing I do
, I get up on stage and I talkto people about things Well,
actually there are some peoplewho do that, and you know
there's lots of motivationalspeakers out there, and you know
that's important, don't get mewrong, but I think the best
speakers, the ones that we alignwith the most, are the ones who
(35:37):
are so authentic about whatthey're doing and why they're
doing it.
They're the ones that change us,and and and they change us
because they've changedthemselves through their own
process.
They've discovered who they are, and with that, we discover who
we are, and so that, to me isthought leadership.
(35:57):
That's not public speaking.
Public speaking is the thingthey're doing.
What they're conveying is atransformation of self, and
that's thought leadership.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
That's good, this is good.
Andrea, I appreciate you.
I mean, coming in today andsharing all this has been
amazing.
Let me ask you obviously youhave the business and the
speaking and all the coachingand all that as well, and
there's probably people that areinterested in taking that step,
but there's also the peoplethat are kind of, you know, just
want to maybe not jump intogetting coached yet Right, and
(36:29):
they want to make those thoseincremental steps right.
What?
What are some maybe ideas orsome things that you could share
to maybe help someone beforethey, you know, make the jump
and commit all in.
But what can people do to startto improve themselves a little
bit in this area?
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Well, you know, first of all, we've got some great
tools and I'm happy to offerthem to your listeners.
We've got something called theStorytelling Toolkit, which has
our three main frameworks, sothe idea framework, the story
spine and the talk canvas, andthese are the tools that we use
with all of our clients andhappy to give your listeners
that as a free download, becauseI really truly do believe that.
(37:08):
Look, I'm a speaker's coach.
Come hire me, love it, but Idon't think you, not everyone
needs to.
And so go and tell your stories, learn how to tell your stories
, learn how to structure yourideas to.
I've got a YouTube channelcalled the Thought Leader
Academy, which I do a lot offree resources and also do.
(37:32):
I'll tell you how to use a lotof these tools.
So go and watch some of that,because the thing is, it's
important that we all learn touse our voice and to tell our
stories that hold our ideas.
And so, if you're just gettingstarted, the first thing is
think about what is your storyand what is the idea that lives
(37:53):
inside of that story.
Sometimes it's easier to findthe story first and then back
the idea out of it.
Other times, it might be easierfor you to start with that idea
.
Now, either way, you need toidentify the idea first, but how
you get there it will bedetermined by who you are and
where you are in that.
But find that idea, and thatidea is really something that
(38:15):
you uniquely do, and you do itin a specific area or topic.
I always say it's a what, a howand a why.
The what is your topic, what'sthe thing that you are really,
that you that you are reallyenamored with or that you live
for, and millions of people canhave that same topic, yeah, but
your next piece, the how, that'syou, that's what you bring to
(38:38):
that topic, that's how youactivate it uniquely.
And the what and the howtogether are the uniqueness of
your idea.
But it's not quite finishedthere, because, you see, it's
not just your idea, it's an ideathat's changing others, and so
the why is the outcome, theimpact that your idea has.
(38:59):
So when you put your what, yourhow and your why together your
topic, your point and yourimpact now what you have is a
well-structured idea and an ideathat will likely light you up.
And so start there and then findthe story that holds it.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
Yeah, that's so good, so good.
Well, andrea, I appreciate youcoming on today.
It was great to have you andgreat to connect with you.
I'll make sure that I put allthe you know in the show notes
as well.
We'll have everything in therefor you so everybody can locate
that and find it.
What's the best way to contactyou or reach out to you or
potentially even work with you?
How can they find you?
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Sure, go to our website, talkboutiquecom.
Sign up for our newsletter.
It's great and it comes from me.
You can directly contact methere.
Also, follow me on LinkedIn.
I'm very, very active onLinkedIn and, of course, like I
said, check out our, myInstagram, but also our YouTube
channel, the Thought LeaderAcademy.
I'm active across all of them.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
You're busy, I'm excited to get more into it
myself, right?
This has kind of sparked alittle bit back in me.
I feel like I've kind of notbeen as intentional with my
(40:15):
public speaking or focus on it,and so just this conversation
today has kind of got me, I'dsay, fired up to kind of get
back into it again.
So I appreciate you for that.
Speaker 2 (40:23):
Oh well, thank you so much, Michael, and I'm excited
to see what you.
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