Business Coaching – Developing Motivational Speakers

Coaching Motivational Presenters
By Mike Morrison

Introduction

I received a phone call asking if I was available to coach a pair of TV personalities preparing to deliver a high profile motivational seminar.

The pair had been asked to run an event together and the rehearsals were not being as successful as they had hoped.

Let’s get to know the clients:

He had been a presenter on terrestrial TV for some time and a motivational speaker, he was very successful. Let’s call him Joe.

She was a sports coach and motivational trainer who had recently moved into mainstream TV work, let’s call her Anna.

Anna & I had worked together in the past when I had been asked to model her presentation style and train others to her level. I had seen Joe but never met him.

The Situation:

Joe had a slick presentation prepared with all the visuals and videotape you would expect of a world class presenter. He had the script, could present it with passion and enthuse people to take steps towards their own success

Anna on the other hand preferred to work with no script and to ‘wing it’. She is a pragmatist, she likes to play and dislikes too much structure. I had worked with Anna a year or so earlier when I was asked to ‘model’ her style and workshop content and design a programme to train others to run this high energy and motivational day long seminar. So I know how Anna likes to work.

The styles just collided.

My Role

I was asked to attend one of the rehearsals and then provide feedback about their performance. This was designed as a one off coaching session.

I remember sitting through the first run and making copious notes, they wanted me to see the whole thing in its current form before making any comments or providing any feedback. When coaching people it is vital to know -where they are now, so many coaches focus on where they want to get to that knowing the starting position help me to understand their strengths.

At the end of the first run they both left the room for a while, this left three of us. Divina (Joe’s manager) Joe’s agent and Anna’s Father. The lady to my right (Divina) said “well what do you think?” I paused for a moment and gave my view of the presentation and what would in my opinion make the whole thing more powerful. I also made some comments about Joe’s and Anna’s style. Divina said “no one has said that about him before – that’s very interesting”. We chatted about style, impact and the purpose of the presentation and what they thought I could offer. Joe& Anna returned some time later. Joe introduced himself and said I see you have met my wife – Divina. Whoops I thought. Divina replied “yes we have been introduced – I think Mike can help us – a lot”.

Had I have known that Divina was Joe’s husband I would have said what I said in a much more guarded fashion, that taught me an important lesson that afternoon, say it like you see it. I am not sure that at up until that time Joe had bought in to me being there, Anna said I was there for her (I found that out later too!)

The First Interaction

The above dialogue is an example only not a true record of the session

The discussion with Anna was very similar, but opposite!

I spoke to Joe for a while and discovered that he was really uncomfortable with Anna not running to a given script, it made it difficult for him to know when his cue was to progress with the next section.

Anna likes to be spontaneous; she detests being ‘constrained’ by a script. I spent some time with Anna and pointed out that to some extent she always worked of a script, all be it in her head as opposed to a written one.

Creating the Goal or Vision

Joe, Anna & I sat for a while and explored what success looked like for this presentation, both have very highly tuned visualisation abilities and this was the fastest visioning session I have ever experienced.

We ran a few parts of the presentation with Joe working ‘free wheeling’ and Anna to script, both were uncomfortable. Joe was more engaging than he had been, the presentation was wrapped in a real passion, yet he was uncomfortable, too uncomfortable to do such a high profile event this way.

Then I changed track. I asked them both to start using the start and finish paragraph of each section, this provided Joe with the structure he needed and Anna with the permission to ‘do her thing’. It worked very well.

By this time several hours had passed and we were all very tired. We had a short debrief and agreed that Joe & Anna would have another day of rehearsals later in the week; the main presentation was not for 3 week so we all had time. They were going to see how it went and then if necessary I would be called for another session the following week.

The following week I had a call from Joe; he thanks me for the input and structure. He said the rehearsals went very well and thought their performance had improved and that they were ready for the ‘big day’.

Key gains for the client (as stated by both at the time and Anna in later discussions)

• Being prepared to go out of their comfort zone
• More confident attitude to flexibility & change (for Joe)
• More confident attitude to structure and predictability (for Anna)
• The ability to focus on here & now and using emotions to engage people in a powerful way

Results

The first delivery of the new format motivational presentation for a major international blue chip company went very well. They had been invited back to run the session again for others in the organisation and have since run the presentation for other organisations.

Further Learning Opportunities

• To practice the changes from one presenter to another in a fluid & natural way
• To learn how to ‘be in the room’

© RapidBI & Mike Morrison 2004-2006

Mike Morrison is a business & performance coach specialising in high performers.