Behind the Mike

We have a saying in the speaking business. There are three kinds of speeches we deliver: 1- the one we prepared, 2- the one we gave and 3- the one we wish we had given on the way home.

There are many challenging audiences we face every day, but I defy you to find a tougher one than seventh grade students. When my beautiful daughter-in-law, Viviana, asked me to speak to her seventh grade computer science class, I immediately began searching for excuses.

I remember when I was in the seventh grade. I suffered from terminal apathy. With your body changing and life unfolding faster than you can adjust, it’s a tough life for a middle school student. And then there are the boy-girl problems, zits and a variety of other issues in addition to school.

So I prepared for a “teach-in” at Neptune Elementary School in St. Cloud, FL and before the speech even started, I realized that these kids were probably smarter than I was. When I was growing up, we didn’t have a computer science class because there was no such thing as a computer in that part of last century.

However, I did take typing in high school because the class was what I affectionately referred to as a target-rich environment, i.e. all girls except yours truly, Ike Cockfield and Mike Corley, my partners in crime in those days. It was the singular smartest decision I ever made, but not for the reasons I disclose here some four plus decades later.

Beside Latin (which taught me more about the English language than any other course I ever took), typing was singularly the most valuable class I took in my limited number of years in the hallowed halls of the Lexington, SC school system. I use it every day of my life.

What these kids learn in computer science could be the most valuable hands-on tools they’ll learn in any class in school. I can guarantee you that they will use it every day of their lives. And while algebra and science are critically important, the folks at NASA didn’t hire me for my skills in those areas. I have had the privilege of speaking to those geeks on a number of occasions. Go figure- can’t pass algebra but you can deliver a keynote to NASA’s astronauts.

Those NASA presentations weren’t nearly as difficult as a gig in front of a bunch of wide-eyed seventh graders. Thank goodness, Viviana runs a no-nonsense class. She will ring your bell if you get out of line, my own included, so I had to be on my best behavior. She had also persuaded her husband (my son Christopher, a nurse) and her mom, who is a nutritionist, to speak to her classes as well. As if they had a choice.

As a speaker, author, syndicated columnist and a guy who sells life insurance, I had to decide what I was going to talk about. Let’s be frank here; it sounds like I can’t hold a job.

It was easy to eliminate talking about selling insurance. In all my life, I’ve never had a youngster tell me “Gee, I’d like to go into the life insurance business….can you show me the way?” Not!

So I rambled through a bunch of war stories about writing and speaking and ended up trying to sell them on several things:

1. Don’t worry about what you’re going to be when you grow up; it probably hasn’t been invented yet. Today’s college graduates will have 14-20 jobs before the age of 38, according to the department of labor.
2. Learn to keep a journal and make of list of all the things you might want to do in your life. That’s what my grandfather taught me.
3. Get a mentor. A mentor tells you what you’re doing right and they love you enough to tell you what you’re doing wrong.
4. Don’t be afraid to fail. Failure is the process by which we succeed.
5. Have fun. These are the greatest years of your life. Enjoy them because they will come and go before you can bat an eyelash.

Let’s face it. Our presence on this earth is but a speck on the backdrop of time. We’re just passing through. Enjoy the ride!

The biggest challenge for most speakers is finding their own material. I am convinced that everyone has original material within them; they do not have to beg, borrow or steal from others. My favorite suggestion: quote yourself more and others less. Too many speakers are giving book reports. They haven’t done the things about which they speak.

Where do you find original stories and ideas? The first step in the Crafting Your Keynote process is to take an honest inventory.

Literally make a list of everything you have ever done in your life, professionally, personally, spiritually and otherwise. The key to this process is to not value-judge. Make the list of your life journey; do it fast and do not judge it. Do not overlook anything.

My own crazy list includes the obvious stuff like speaker, author, writer, columnist, consultant and the various things we do in and around our profession of speaking.

But go deeper. Go back to your childhood. In doing so, I found my own inventory included bagboy, running a paper route, service station attendant, placekicker, fullback, catcher, pitcher, third baseman, Boy Scout, school paper editor, a member of the track and field team, school bus driver, altar server, meat cutter and on and on. Why list all this stuff? You are searching for the experiences that will become the centerpiece for your stories.

Do not forget to make a list of personal taglines, i.e. son, brother, nephew and grandson and those adult taglines like husband, father, grandfather, brother-in-law, son-in-law, uncle and so forth. The purpose here is to have a complete inventory of your personal life as well.

Next, look beyond your teenage years to your earliest work years and education beyond high school. My early work experiences included being an ambulance driver, working in a funeral home, working the graveyard shift as a jailer, a carpenter, a clerk in a men’s clothing store, an artist, a volunteer firefighter and stringer for a dozen newspapers. Do not judge. We are seeking material, the source of which is buried within the stories you have within these life events.

Most people evolve into their career, often taking many different paths before zeroing in on a final career. The top ten in demand jobs today did not even exist five years ago. By the time a student completes a two year tech school, the material he or she learned in year one is obsolete before they graduate.

Today’s college graduates will have 10-14 jobs before they are 38 years old, according to the Department of Labor. When my own kids entered college my advice to them was simple: do not worry about what you are going to be when you grow up; it probably has not been invented yet.

We are preparing kids today for jobs that do not exists using technology that has not been invented yet to solve problems we do not even have yet. Just take the inventory; it will lead to great stories of how one evolves into the kind of person they will be when they finally arrive.

My own career path included being a builder, a developer, a REALTOR, a fat boy model, syndicate columnist, salesman, Sports Editor of a newspaper, actor, playwright, insurance agent, trainer, speaker, manager and business owner.

It almost sounds like I could not hold a job, but I did many of these things simultaneously. Buried deep within all those experiences is a treasure chest of stories that can be unearthed to become a centerpiece for your keynote address.

The inventory should also include your professional and personal successes… and your failures. For instance, I won the World Championship of Public Speaking for Toastmasters in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1978. That is the good news. The bad news- I lost it the year before in Toronto, Ontario because I went eight seconds over my allotted time limit and was disqualified.

I learned you have to go through Toronto to get to Vancouver. The message became simple: failure is the process by which we succeed.

As you inventory your professional accomplishments it will uncover the best material, the failures you endured to get there. In 2000, the National Speakers Association accorded me the honor or CPAE Speaker Hall of Fame. That is the good news. In my acceptance speech, the biggest laugh I got was when I revealed that I had been nominate 18 consecutive years unsuccessfully. Failure is the process by which we succeed.

Taking the inventory of your accomplishments will help reveal the path of potholes that you endured to get there. There is indeed magic in all those failure stories. Every audience will identify with the failures more than they will the successes. Our goal in cataloging is to uncover them all. Reveal them and expose them for what they are… or are not!

Do not forget to chronicle your extracurricular activity such as being a Sunday school teacher, a little league coach, a Pop Warner coach, play-by-play announcer, church Lector, a scoutmaster or even a blood donor. Some of your funnies stories may lie within those experiences.

Last but not least would be to list all those earned degrees, designations, and offices to which you were elected. I was fortunate enough to be elected Grand Knight of the Knights of Columbus at the age of 21, the youngest ever at that point in time. However, that electoral success did not translate to the political world because I got hammered when I ran for the House of Representatives in 1980.

Having served on the National Speakers Association Board of Directors as well as a number of other Boards for various for-profit and non-profit groups unveiled a further wealth of material that could translate into a centerpiece for a terrific story.

If we buy into the premise that the only reason to give a presentation is to change the thinking of the audience’s world, then these experiences from your life need to be inventoried to find the stories to build your speech.