This is the first of a five-part series on crises. Let’s start by asking ourselves what makes crisis, more specifically, a corporate crisis. A crisis is a situation in which a company’s public reputation deteriorates dramatically so that there is the danger that the company may suffer permanent damage, up to and including ruin.
One of the most egregious examples of a corporate crisis was the proposed sinking of British Petroleum’s Brent Spar drilling platform twenty years ago, or McDonald’s ill-advised reaction to activist protests around the same time. Or consider Tepco, the utility that runs many of Japan’s nuclear reactors, and its mishandling of the destruction of the Fukushima power plant.
An effective speech is one that is clear. To be clear, create a basic structure around the relevant key messages. Once that’s in place, you can probably speak without notes, and that will leave a much deeper impression simply because it will enable you to look your audience in the eye. Don’t explain things in too much detail. People don’t need you to be their encyclopaedia. Instead, appeal to their passion, but be authentic in doing so. Don't try to imitate other people.
You might call PowerPoint slides the Cinderellas of communication. Most of the time they hardly get noticed, but how they could shine if given a chance! It’s a pity we won’t let them. Instead, we overload them with text, squeezing in a pixelated graph and then never give the audience enough time for the content to sink in. Is there another way? Well, definitely. For a good start to a presentation, start early. When do you usually get your slides done? Honestly? Two days before the event, like most of us? Well, that’s way too late to achieve anything meaningful.
Most of us use PowerPoint, but two of the options the program offers may be a little less familiar. Using them takes a little courage, but it’s well worth it, because they are remarkably effective. This is about the W and the B key. Try them out. Go into onscreen mode in a familiar presentation, click through some slides, and then at a random moment, press W. The screen will go blank, displaying pure white.
The sound of the voice and the way you speak make a huge difference when it comes to convincing your audience. These two factors account for almost forty per cent of the impression you create. This means the only thing that is even more important is how you look, because that gets a score of 55 per cent. By contrast, what you actually say (your content) only gets a measly seven per cent.
So how can you make your voice sound good without taking speaking lessons? First of all, taking lessons isn’t a bad idea. Second, there are some simple tips that you can follow right away.
Most of us don’t like the way we look on camera. There are several reasons for this, and one of them is simply that the camera makes you look as if you have put on weight. This is not out of spite, it’s something the camera can’t help doing. Consider a camera’s job. What it does is take three-dimensional reality and compress it into a two-dimensional image – flattening image depth, as it were. This is why we will always look, well, broader on screen. There’s a saying in Hollywood that the camera always adds ten pounds, and sometimes even more.
