Power Skills for Your Delivery

This is Bart queen, and welcome to the remarkability Institute. Great to have you all back.  Now, if you've been following in the last series that I've been sharing, we've been focused on this idea of your delivery mechanics. And if you're just joining us, one of the things that I've spoken about many, many times is this idea that what you say and how you say it has to match.

[00:02:05] It is the driving principle at looking at what a lot of people may call body language or what I call the delivery mechanics. How you physically come across. Now in our first couple of sessions, the very first one I, I covered this idea of your posture and your movement, bringing those two pieces together. I did one single, separated podcast guys just around eye contact and the power of what that can bring to the table.

[00:02:37] Today, I want to focus on a couple more of those pieces. I want to be able to take a look at gestures. I want to be able to discuss facial expressions, what you're doing with your face, and then I want to get into this whole broader concept of vocal variety. So let me come back to this idea that people buy what they see before they buy what they hear, which has to be congruent.

[00:03:02] So, as we go through this section today, I want you to realize that these mechanics are kind of the cherry on the top. They don't fall into the bucket of what I call your power skills. Your power skills are your posture. Your eye contact, the power of the pause, and a short to medium sentences. Those four things are the things that give you the greatest confidence and the greatest power when you're communicating the additional mechanics of your facial expressions, and your gestures, your vocal variety of some of the other pieces are cherry on the top.

[00:03:42] They continue to enhance what you're doing. But if you said to me, Bart, where should I focus? I'd say focus on the power skills first. Now, I also taught you and shared with you that every single thing counts. So I am not diminishing these. These are important, but if you gave me an opportunity, if you said, Bart, give me a choice.

[00:04:07] Go to your power skills first. Now as we walked through these this afternoon, this morning, wherever you happen to be listening, as you're driving to work, whatever you happen to be doing, I want you to take some notes on some of these ideas, whether their mental notes are notes you put on some paper because there are some pieces here that I want to make sure that you can remember.

[00:04:32] If you can do that, you'll find that when you go to practice some of these ideas, you go to implement some of these ideas. You can come back to your note, and you can physically implement each of these pieces one by one. Let's dive in this afternoon in this idea of gestures, the number one purpose of a gesture, number one purpose.

[00:04:58] Is to enhance your content. Now, when I'm talking about enhancing your content, I mean two things. The number one reason that most people gesture is an emphasis is what you see a lot of. The second reason you gesture is what I call visualization. If by chance, you've ever watched. Drew Carey show, whose line is it?

[00:05:26] The next time you're channel surfing and you come across that show, do me a favor, hit the mute button on your TV. Just watch their gestures are so effective that you can tell what they're talking about without even hearing anything. The majority of those gestures are more for that idea of visualization.

[00:05:48]Now, there's a couple of components within both of those you want to think about. If you think about this idea that people gesture to add emphasis, that brings us to a couple of dues and does not. I want you to consider you'll find a lot of people who will point. Now, if you're a parent with small children, you'll see them do this often where someone is pointing at you.

[00:06:15] How does that get perceived. Most people would say, well, Bart, that gets perceived as condescending or scolding, a basic rule of thumb, never, ever point. I want you to break yourself of that habit. So if you can visualize what president Clinton, President Bush, and President Obama did when they pointed, they kind of.

[00:06:44] Made a little fist, and with their thumb, they would emphasize something in my mind that is still pointing. What I would want you always to do is what I call an open Palm. So if you can do me a favor with your hand, make a finger point, like you're speaking to a child, you're pointing at them. Then do what the presidents did.

[00:07:10] Make more of a fist with your thumb. And notice how that comes across. And then I want you to do what I call an open Palm. You're taking your Palm; it's open, you're directing it forward. Your fingers are not spread apart. Your fingers are together, your thumb is apart from your hand, and you make a gesture.

[00:07:30] Now, as you look at that, ask yourself this question, which is more open and approachable, a finger point or more of an open Palm. I am mystified why our leaders, our executives, don't understand this: one simple comment, one simple concept on using your gestures. Again, we don't even know we're doing it.

[00:07:59] We're not even thinking about it, but we're trying to emphasize a point, and you're pointing at people. That open Palm will create a whole big difference. Now, remember, it's about connecting and having a conversation. So if you're at Starbucks and you're sitting with your friend or a spouse or somebody you care about, a colleague, you're not going to point at them.

[00:08:19] You're going to do more of an open type of a gesture, always an open Palm. Then that brings me to the second kind of guiding principle, never back of the hand. I'm not saying that your listeners can't see your back of the hand, but I see this a lot. I'll see someone standing in front of an audience, and they're going to show the number two, and they'll go, there are two things you should think about, and they'll do the back of a hand.

[00:08:50] Now, in other parts of the world, this is extremely offensive. Most people will say, well, Bart's, that's doing the peace sign. No, the peace sign is more Palm forward. So the basic rule of thumb is if you've got notes in front of you, mental note guys, never back. Rule of thumb, Palm, always forward, Palm, always forward.

[00:09:14] Now, with that, I want to add one more thing. The Palm always leads. Suppose I would share with you that we have increasing costs, and I was standing in front of a group of people. I would put my Palm up, and I would take my hand up. The Palm always leads. If you wanted to share something about decreased risk, take your hand up in the air, face the Palm down and say, this is decreasing risk.

[00:09:44] Bring your Palm down. The Palm always leads. So number one, no finger point guys. Number two. No back, no. Back of hand. Number three, the Palm always leads. Now, a couple of more do not, and I have names for these so that it will help you remember how many times have you been standing or seated in an audience, and you've seen somebody do what I call spider pushups.

[00:10:19] It's where they put their fingers touching each other. They're creating this, and they're bouncing their hand back and forth like this. This is what we call spider pushups. If someone is doing this, answer this question, where's the focus? Yes. You're probably focused on their hands. If you remember, the number one place you as a listener should be focused on is their face.

[00:10:47] Everything you do with your gestures should emphasize a point, visualize the p...