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.

 

 

 

 

A Very Brief Keynote - Outside of my Comfort Zone

Recently I was asked to keynote an online event for a group in the United Kingdom. The event was organized to inform and inspire volunteers to offer for available roles.  After my keynote, there would be a series of past leaders, who had served in the positions, and each would offer reflections on the position and how it aided in their personal development.  My job was to broadly inspire desire in people to step forward.  The event was recorded and a link to the content is provided below.

While preparing to construct the speech, I knew that I had much scholarly material to draw from, and more personal experience and stories, which resonate best with most audiences.

When I sought to better understand the organizers specific needs, I asked how long they’d like me to speak for, what was my time allocation.  I was a little taken aback when I was told I had five minutes to deliver the keynote. This might be the shortest keynote ever. 

Constraints Inspire Creativity and Motivation

I wasn’t offended as I knew the organizers needed to manage an agenda, and they soon sent a copy of their very full agenda.  However, I was surprised - and newly motivated.  Sometimes a constraint does that for us. A constraint can inspire creativity and new motivation.

Instead of casually selecting amongst several talking points, I needed to be super focused on delivering high value in just five minutes. This assignment was outside my routine, and I was a little outside of my comfort zone of developing a twenty-to-forty minute keynote.

When the parameters are set, I’ll work to accommodate them.  In some cases, I might try to negotiate some more time, but these organizers had shared their agenda, it was tight, and ultimately the event did run longer than planned. When all was said and done, I spoke for almost six minutes, almost one full minute over my time allocation, while other presenters were more significantly over their allocation.

 

Typical Keynote Durations

A keynote speech is intended to set the scene, to emphasize a theme, and get an audience engaged and receptive for the remainder of the event. Typically, a keynote speech is at least fifteen minutes long, and this is my preference. Some can run to ninety minutes. I tend to organize my material in eight-to-ten minute components, so constructing and assembling for twenty-to-forty minutes or longer isn’t an issue. 

The challenge becomes researching and understanding the audience needs, selecting content, ensuring relevance, and then planning transitions and the emphasis of key points. I work to ensure relevance by briefly reviewing a speech plan with one or more of the organizers.

For a sample of an excellent keynote speech, or in this case a commencement speech, take a look at the text of Steve Job’s work at Stanford in 2015. This speech is fifteen minutes long, is comprised of three stories, and offers many lessons for speakers. The text is available here https://news.stanford.edu/2005/06/12/youve-got-find-love-jobs-says/

 

Using Time Constraints

Self-imposed time constraints can be helpful. I sometimes impose a time constraint on myself in order to trick myself into making some small progress when I’m procrastinating on a project, or I’m unsure of what direction to take a project. I’ll allocate fifteen minutes and commit to doing something. Surely, I can spend fifteen minutes to get something done.

Here's an example of how short time constraints work for me. I recently used this technique again for an upcoming project I had been avoiding. During that fifteen minutes, as is typical, I started with some silent muttering to myself that fifteen minutes is very little time.  I quickly moved to the realization that I needed to talk with a specific person to clarify a project objective, and I emailed that person to arrange time to talk. Then I thought once that conversation was complete there were two probable directions the project might take, and I began to map what each path might look like.  I made progress.  Not significant progress, but some momentum is helpful.

I ended up spending forty minutes to achieve that progress, more than the fifteen minutes to which I had committed myself. However, I was energized and didn’t mind spending more time. This often happens for me.  I end up spending more than my fifteen-minute allocation because I become excited with the plan that was now in motion.

The recent keynote imposed a different time constraint, one that required me to deliver impact for the audience in a very short time.

 

Video Content

The event was recorded and a link to the content is below. The feedback I received after the event was good. I stayed for the entire event and was delighted that some of the later speakers made reference to content from my keynote. 

Kudos to Daniel Sanders and all of the organizers as they inspired applicants for every one of the available positions. That’s a tremendous success. A key part of that success, in my opinion, was being very clear on their purpose and goal in planning the event.

Should you wish to see the recording please visit this link (My section starts at the 5- minute mark)  https://youtu.be/kpCPdoFb28Q

Comfort Zone – First Project For 2022

 

Before the New Year arrived I had been considering new projects.   A couple of years ago I stepped outside my comfort zone and wrote a book.  That book was on the subject of public speaking.  Then I wrote another book about winter road trips and watching major junior hockey league games.   If you’re interested you can find those books on Amazon worldwide, and in a few Coles/Indigo stores in Atlantic Canada.  Here is a link to Amazon https://www.amazon.com/Mr-Jim-Kokocki/e/B083D741FK

Next Project Options

For next projects I have been considering writing a couple of new books.   I want to adapt the public speaking book for the information technology field, where I began my career.  I continue to see talented IT professionals struggle to explain their work in language relevant to their audience, the people who use their products.  Better skills and processes around communication and assessing an audience can help IT professionals. 

I also want to write about the monthly columns I wrote for The Toastmaster magazine when I served as Toastmasters International President in 2015-2016.  I don’t want to simply republish the columns but instead I want to write about the strategy behind each of these columns. When we communicate either verbally or in written format we need to have an objective for the communication.  With each column I prepared I was working to influence and motivate behavior of Toastmasters members.  For this reason I think this book will be relevant to others serving in senior leadership positions.

And the third project relates to communication coaching.  I enjoy planning and delivering keynote style speeches and coaching others to develop and shape their keynote projects.  I’ve done quite a bit of this one-on-one and for the new project I want to document my process and work with a cohort of people who want to develop their keynote product.  This should be very valuable to the cohort participants for learning an approach, and then discussing and sharing of their content, and their ideas and strategy in the cohort.  I know I will also learn from and enjoy their interaction.

Step Outside The Comfort Zone

The cohort project is outside my comfort zone, and therefore the one I will act on first.  Two years ago writing and producing a book was outside my comfort zone. Now it’s time to step outside my comfort zone again.

What is your first project for the New Year?