My Process Preparing a Keynote

On Saturday, May 13^th, 2023, I delivered a 40-minute keynote with 15 minutes of Q&A.  The event was organized around three keynote presentations.   I will share my development process here.

Defining My Keynote Purpose

Purpose drives content. My process began with a conversation with the organizers to understand their requirements and what they hoped to achieve with the audience.  I'm generally familiar with the types of volunteer leaders who would be in attendance, and we discussed and settled on a relevant theme.  

I chose a theme around recognizing their successes in general, helping them realize the immense opportunity they have for skill development in their volunteer roles, and a description of the value of the Hersey-Blanchard situational leadership model to help their efforts.  The organizers needed a title and I chose Situational Leadership Every Time.

 

Exploring the Theme

Often people don't understand how they are being shaped during their experiences.  We are all shaped by our experiences. A goal with my talk was to help the audience members enable increased intentional focus on finishing their year well, and their skill development. A key component would be some research I discovered which indicates that most leaders receive their first ever leadership training at age 42 on average, about 10 years after they were promoted! These volunteer leaders in my audience are gifted an opportunity to receive training, exercise leadership skills, and develop further.

Within the theme, I took the audience through the situational leadership model, which is always relevant to any group of leaders, and the work of any leader. I also included material on managing team dysfunction and then offered a simple speech structure that any leader can use at anytime, even spontaneously.

 

Planning

To begin designing my speech, I usually create a draft presentation drawing on existing slides and material, and I did so in this instance.  As a result of many years of presentations, I have a quantity of stories and assets I can use to speak about leadership and communication.   

 

Refining

After reviewing the draft presentation, I scanned the draft to consider what was missing and what new material I can find that is pertinent and interesting.  In this case I found some recent material on the future of work from McKinsey, which is excellent, and is now a new asset for my future presentations.   Here is a link https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/public-and-social-sector/our-insights/defining-the-skills-citizens-will-need-in-the-future-world-of-work

 

A subsequent review of the draft helped me realize I could remove some material that I believe is too basic for this audience, and spend more time on the most pertinent material.   

 As the date of the presentation grew closer, I continued to scan and review, consider and write down key points for reminders during the presentation, and think about flow and transitions from major point to major point.  I never know precisely what I will say, but I know precisely what I’ll speak about, and the mental rehearsal embeds transitions and key points. I always print a 9-sllde horizontal view of my PowerPoint where I can jot notes on key points and sometimes transitions, and so I can glance and preview what is next.

 

Managing Chat Function

I decided to add a couple of skill testing questions to engage the audience. In doing so I recognized that I would ask those offering answers to type them in the chat, as this presentation was online only.  I usually avoid watching the chat as I find it distracting to my thought process, so I usually ask someone to monitor and advise me if need be.  So, I engaged a chat master in advance and armed her with the answers to my skill testing questions.   The two winners were mailed a copy of one of my books, of their choice.  

 

Result

The keynote proceeded swimmingly, and was well received.  Most of the questions were submitted in advance with time for a couple more from the assembly.

I hope you find value in this description of my approach to developing this keynote.