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The post Is the future of speaking virtual? Presenting my set up for my first ever full virtual experience speaking experience. (Professional Speaking. Episode 310) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

As mentioned earlier I am not doing weekly episodes of ProfessionalSpeaking any more. After 300 weekly episodes of sharing speaking tips – for free, and without selling anything – I decided to reduce the frequency a bit while I focus on some other projects. I hope you have found value from these free speaking tips, and appreciate the episodes when they do come.

In this episode of Professional Speaking I thought I would share some lessons about writing.

And for this episode I will not do a video, but instead communicate via text and I will not talk about speaking, I will instead write about writing.

While video has become much more important for speakers than it used to be, writing a book is still more or less essential. Not necessarily because people are buying a lot of books (they are not), or because it gives you credibility (it does, but not as much as it used to), but because writing a book is a great way to structure your thoughts and push you to do research.

So how do I look at book writing? As if it was baking. Let me explain.

1) Research (getting all the ingredients in order)
2) Work the text. (Kneed the dough)
3) Let the text rest (letting the dough rest)
4) Send it away (put it into the oven)

Let’s look at them one by one.

1) Research (getting all the ingredients in order)

Many people who have never written a book seem to think that writing a book starts with writing. It doesn’t. It starts with researching. The worst books (with some exceptions) are books where people just wrote down their thoughts on a subject.

Writing a book, if you ask me, is at lest 80% research and perhaps 20% writing.

Interview at least 100 people on the topic you are writing on. Have a folder on your computer (like Evernote) where you keep every article, text, video, information, quote, story etc about the topic you are writing on.

Only 10% or so of all the material you actually collect should be good enough to make it into the book. (And then just 10% of all that made it into the book makes it into the speech.)

A book takes 2-5 years for me to write. But the writing is usually less than 6 months. The rest is research, and me thinking about what I am going to write once I do.

Lesson: Do more research and collect more material than you think you need. Writing is not writing. Writing is research and thoughts on paper.

2) Work the text. (Kneed the dough)

There is no one way to write, but this is how I write: I re-write and re-write and re-write.

Some people make an amazing structure and stick to it.
Some writers write a rough draft, not caring about structure, and then go back and edit.

I start to write as soon as I have an idea of the kind of text I want to create and then, if I stumble on a sentence, I will sit and re-write that one sentence (or paragraph, or page) over and over again until I feel it has the flow I am looking for.

The “Delete” button is most likely the second most key on my keyboard after “Space”…

To me, writing is a joyful way of solving a puzzle, and you can feel it in your soul when the pieces (the words) have fallen into place in the correct order.

Lesson: Writing is not writing. Writing is re-writing. So re-write over and over again.

3) Let the text rest (letting the dough rest)

Writing a book for me takes time. Not because of the writing itself, but because I will let a text “rest” for months on end. When I do write, I write in chunks. I block off 1-2 weeks or more and do almost nothing but write all day. But after a while you get so sucked into the words that you cannot see what you have written. That’s when you need to distance yourself from the text. I can leave a text for months. When I come back to it, I read it as if it was written by someone else, not as if I know every word by heart (which is how it feels when I am in writing mode.)

When I re-visit a text after being away from it for a while it becomes much easier to separate the beautiful sentences from the ugly ones. The ugly ones are the ones that need editing.

Because no matter how much you have re-written a text while you were in writing mode, you can bet that large chunks of it needs to be re-written once you come back to it after giving it a rest. (Most books I re-write multiple times. For one book I did more than 20 edit rounds before sending it to the editor.

Lesson: Give yourself time to take a break from the text to be able to read it with fresh eyes.

4) Send it away (put it into the oven)

No matter how great of an writer you think you are, always send the script away to an external editor. I can not stress enough how important it is to get a professional editor to go through your text. Yes, it can hurt to get all that feedback, but better to get it before the book comes out than after…

Many first time writers will “save” on editor, but please do not do that.

Lesson: Get a professional editor.

Conclusion: As I am writing this I am actually working on 5 books at the same time. One is ready to be published, one is in the final editing stages, and three are in different stages of development. I do not recommend working on five books at the same time – it tends to drag out the time it takes to get them out – but that’s how my brain works…

But know this: never stress a book out. The process of writing a book is the most rewarding part, at least for me. Few things gives you so much satisfaction than to take a huge amount of mumbled up thoughts of yours and then structuring them into a book that clearly communicates those thoughts to other people in a way that gives them value.

Good luck with your book writing – and with your speaking!

Fredrik Haren – The Creativity Explorer and the man behind ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

The post How writing a book is like baking. ProfesionalSpeaking. Episode. 309 appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

Watch on YouTube and on LinkedIn.

Also: Do not miss the 5-hour long FREE online course on YouTube: Master the Keynote. (Totally free. All I ask is that you help spread the word for the course, if you find value in it, and that if you hear of anyone interested in booking a speaker on creativity you think of me

Become the best speaker you can be.

The post Creative Virtual Speaking Setups. (Professional Speaking. Episode 306) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

But in this week’s episode of Professional Speaking I want to share a “not so glamorous” episode of that process.

I had 3 virtual speeches to deliver last week, but my greenscreen stand had not arrived from Amazon so I decided to use a number of boxes with books to build a “wall” that I could hang the greenscreen from. (It’s 3 X 6 meters so I needed a big wall.)

It worked great and the speeches went well with me being able to walk around and deliver a speech instead of being “stuck” right in-front of the camera.

After the last virtual speech I kept the greenscreen up as I had one zoom interview to appear on. That went well too, after that I went to have lunch.

When I came back after lunch and opened the door I saw that all the boxes – we are talking about 30+ boxes @ 10 kg each – had crashed down (some of them from 2.5 meters up) right down where I had been recording not long before.

They brought down the screen, knocked over my camera (it survived), broke a table, and almost smashed my MacBook Air. And had I stood there speaking when it happened a bunch of them would have crashed down on me…

Had this happened while I was broadcasting it would have been a total disaster – or a very funny viral video. Or both.

The lesson here is to build professional solutions – even when building things at home. The solution I built was temporary, but still. I should have invested time in building a professional solution.

And that is what I am doing now.

Actually, the incident made me go back and take a second look at the backdrop solution I had planned and redesign the solution I wanted to make it easier to switch from white background to greenscreen etc.

I am sharing this story with you to show that not all works out great “behind the greenscreen” for professional speakers, even if it looks all good and shiny on screen.

I hope me sharing this can help you in your struggles to develop your virtual speaking knowing that what you see online is not always what actually goes on behind the scenes.

The post How I almost died giving a virtual speech last week (Professional Speaking Episode 281) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

Let me explain.

The global professional speaker market was one of the first industries to be hit by the Corona crisis. Travel bans and restrictions for large gatherings of people did not help. Conferences have been canceled left, right and center and the whole MICE industry (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Events) is now one of the most hit industries that have come to more or less a complete stop. The professional speaking industry is at the center of this.

For 20+ years speaking at big conferences has been my, and many of my peers, main source of income (supplemented by a much smaller percentage of book sales). So when speaking bookings went down to zero, what did speakers do?

The answer is that they did different things!

– Some started selling like never before

– Some pivoted to produce online courses

– Some went into book writing mode.

– Some did nothing and just went on a vacation to wait it out

– Some did other things

My point is that what you decided to do INSTEAD is crucial. It will give you an indication of who you are beneath the “speaker identity”.

If you went into selling mode, you are a salesperson.

If you went into producing online courses you are a teacher

If you went into book writing mode you are an author

If you did nothing you are – at your core – a speaker (If you went into “wait it out mode” to get back to speaking later.) If you went into “vacation mode” because you wanted to enjoy some free time, you are – at your core – a speaker because you enjoy the freedom it gives you to take time off…

I went into research mode.

There have been a few times in my 20+ years as a professional speaker that I have done more interviews than I have done in the last month.

I always do interviews, but now that I have had more time I have done more interviews.

I define myself as “The Creativity Explorer” – as in someone who goes to explore human creativity – and doing research and interviews to better understand human creativity is a big part of exploring creativity.

My speaking is just a venue to tell the stories of all I have learned from interviewing people.

During the last few weeks I have learned that interviewing people actually give me AS MUCH satisfaction as standing on the stage speaking.

Yes, I miss the energy that I get from speaking from the stage. But I am as motivated today as I was, say 6 months ago – pre-Corona. I wake up every morning saying “What can I learn about creativity today? Whom will I interview? What will they teach me? How can I get those lessons out? How can I share the insights that I learned in the best way?

At my core I am a researcher. An interviewer. An explorer. The Creativity Explorer.

And yes, when the world goes back to holding conferences again I can not WAIT to go back up on that stage and share my message about the power and potential of human creativity – and I will have a lot of new, fresh content to share. But at the moment I am very much in “interview to learn more mode”.

Who are you as a speaker when you do not get to speak? The answer to that question should be easy to dig into in times like this.

And that insight should be strong and very valuable to find out for a speaker.

Who are you underneath that speaker identity?

The post Find out what kind of speaker you are at the core. (Professional Speaking Episode 277) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

As speakers, we are used to be on the big stages, in front of 1000’s of people. So that is not happening at the moment. And to be frank: It will not happen for quite a while.

But do not let that stop you from spreading your message. If you are not sharing your message now, you were never a messenger – you were “just” a speaker.

When the market comes back, we will get booked again – especially the messengers.

Personally I have been creating, sharing and collecting more content in the last month than in any other month in my 20+ year speaking career. I suggest you do too if you are serious about professional speaking.

The post Speakers: Keep singing! (Professional Speaking. Episode 276.) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

As a global speaker, I started to pivot and move my focus from Asia to Europe 6 weeks ago as I saw how conferences in Asia started to get canceled.

On short notice I was able to secure 5 speaking slots in Sweden for one week in March.

I was supposed to fly to Sweden tomorrow to deliver those talks next week.

Yesterday and today they all choose to postpone their events to later in the year, due to big Covid-19 outbreaks in Sweden this week…

My observation was right – almost.
My understanding was right – almost.
My execution was right – almost.

And if the outbreak in Sweden would have stated just a few days later I would now have been on my way home to Asia again after delivering 5 speeches in Sweden.

Instead, I have 5 more postponed events to add to the list of already postponed events.

Sometimes you can get it almost right, and yet end up with nothing. Like a fish getting off your hook just as you pull it out of the water. I tell you this story to inspire you to keep trying to get it right. “Almost” is very close to “Got it”.

#speaker #publicspeaking #professionalspeaking

The post Right strategy. Almost. A speaker war story. (Professional Speaking. Episode 274) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

We are called “thought leaders” for a reason. We are supposed to be leading the thinking.

That means we, amongst other things, need to practise our ability to see what is happening before it happens.

Here are a couple of examples of how I have done this previously in my speaking career exemplified with the biggest changes in my 25 years as a speaker:

1) The beginning: The Internet.

In 1993 I saw The Internet and in 1995 I published my first book – in Swedish – called “Internet and Marketing” as I had come to realise that this “Internet thing” was going to become a big thing.

I started speaking about The Internet before most people in Sweden even knew what it was.

2) The pivot: The rise of the creative Asia.

In 2005 I moved to China because I wanted to be part of when Asia became a creative power house. Most people in Sweden thought I was crazy giving up a successful Swedish speaking career in order to study creativity in China – a country not very known for creativity at the time.

In 2007 I published a book called “The Developing World” about creativity in developing countries.

Today very few people will argue against that creative companies and people can be found in Asia.

3) The disruption. The Global Economic Crises

The last few weeks have been another example of thinking ahead around the greatest crisis to hit the speaking industry.

On Feb 16 I posted a message in a chat group:

“In twenty five years as a speaker (seen dot-com bust and Global Financial Crisis) I have never seen such a rapid downward trend in my own industry.

People who sell type cars in China, make mobiles in China, sit on shaky loans to China, etc. etc. must be a bit worried anyway?

And then, for example, the Shanghai stock index has dropped only 4% since the beginning of the year (+ 11% on a 1-year basis…)

I am not a stock exchange expert, but can anyone smarter than I talk about why the world’s stock exchanges barely get “runny nose when China has the fly”?”

I then – same day 16 feb – sold all of my stocks that my family owned (including in my pension plan and children’s savings). (The date I did that is the line in the chart…)

Since then the markets have virtually collapsed.

On 23 feb (One day before the first major dip in the markets.) I posted:

The saying goes: “When America sneezes, the world catches a cold.” So what happens to the world economy when China catches the flu? I guess we are about to find out.

On 5 March (a couple of days before the largest dip in the history of the Dow) I posted:

“It’s probably time to create a name for the economic crises that Covid-19 (Coronavirus) is creating starting in industries like travel, events and hospitality and likely to spread to more industries.
May I suggest: Global Economic Crisis. (GEC)
Unlike the Global Financial Crisis 12 years ago which started as a crisis in the financial sector and then spread to the economy, the Global Economic Crisis started in the economy and spread to the financial sector.
Here’s to hoping GEC will not be as severe as GFC.”

Yes, I am happy I got out of the stock market just before the markets went into free-fall.

But to me it is not about the money saved. It is about the ability to see that the Coronavirus would affect the world economy before most people understood that it would, or before they even understood it was going to have any effect on the world markets at all.

Just as I started my speaking career understanding that the Internet would change business before most people had even heard about The Internet, or how I moved my speaking business to Asia before most people in the West understood that Asia would become a creative power house I was able to predict the biggest disruption to the speaking market weeks before most speakers (or most investors) understood what was going on.

So what is the trick to being able to stay ahead of the curve as a speaker? Here are some of the things speakers really need to do:

1) Attend the full conference when you speak to hear what all the other speakers are talking about.

2) Interview key decision makers in big companies around your topic to understand how they look at the world.

3) When doing interviews especially ask questions about how they look at the near future.

4) Set aside enough time for self-reflection and long term thinking so draw your own conclusions based on what you have heard. (There is a reason that people say that a CEO should not be busy – a CEO should have time to think, reflect and look ahead. And if you are too busy with day-to-day activities you will not be able to see tomorrow.

5) Ideally travel the world and speak globally, but at least build a network of speaker friends around the world and develop a global mindset so that you are better positioned to see a trend develop even if it is not originated in your own country.)

(I am amazed by the number of speakers in Europe and the USA who did not see the crisis coming until it hit their own country even when the news have been out for weeks from Asia. This does not mean as a criticism of them, but as an observation about how most people’s world view is actually much more of a “country view”.

Personally I spoke in 24 countries last year, and I am convinced that speaking in both the US, Europe, Asia (including China), Africa and Australia last year alone helped me see the global implications of the Coronavirus before many others.

6) Test your insights. Send out test-balloons of the insights that you have recived to make sure that your audience is ready to hear your insights so that you are not TOO far ahead in your message, nor too far behind.

I hope this helps and I wish you the best in navigating The Global Economic Crisis.

ps. So what is my prediction for what will happen next? That I will share in a future post, but let’s just say that navigating in a storm is much harder than seeing the storm coming…

ps. “A canary in a coal mine is an advanced warning of some danger. The metaphor originates from the times when miners used to carry caged canaries while at work; if there was any methane or carbon monoxide in the mine, the canary would die before the levels of the gas reached those hazardous to humans.”

As a speaker your canary does not necessarily have to warn about a danger. It could also give a heads-up about an opportunity.

The post As a speaker: Be the Canary in the coal mine. (Professional Speaking. Episode 273) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

The teacher could have picked from thousands of native English speaking speakers to learn from – but she picked me. A non-native English speaker!

I hope this story can inspire other non-native English speaking speakers by showing that sometimes the non-native speakers can be perceived as speaking “better” English than the natives.

Thrilled to know that I have played a small part in helping this Russian speaker reach her dreams of speaking more globally.

Because the world needs to hear from more non-native English speakers! We need the different perspective! We need other stories! Other messages!

The post A Rallying Call for Non-native English Speakers to Speak More in English (Professional Speaking: Episode 269) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.

I think it makes sense to once in a while share what my life as a global, keynote speaker looks like to show what you could have  if you follow the free tips that I share here.

So in 2019 I did 54 speeches in 24 countries on 5 continents. Here they are, including one thing I learnt by doing that speech/workshop. I share that one thing to emphasise that while speaking is what we get paid to do, and where we get all the attention, LEARNING is what we shall never forget to do. Because learning new things is what gives us the new speaking assignments.

So here we go: One Year in the life of a global, keynote speaker:

1) Swiss Investment Manager Circle Event for SwizzQuant in Zermatt. Swizerland
Learning about the international banking industry from the head of the Swiss Central bank.

2) One day open workshop on Business Creativity for Singapore Management University, Singapore
Learning about creativity in the shipping industry and the ropes (!) industry

3) The Outlook India conference for Outlook Magazine, Mumbai, India.
Learning about the helicopter industry in India and about negotiation tips from negotiations expert and Wharton professor Stuart Diamond.

4) The EO (Entrepreneurs Organisation) chapter of Coimbatore, India.
Learning about Indian entrepreneurship from Indian Entrepreneurs

5) The UK Litigation & Regulatory Conference for DLA Piper, London, UK
Learning about the legal aspects of Brexit from British lawyers

6) Hydro Extrusion Europe Management Conference, Porto, Portugal.
Learning about the latest trends in Aluminium from one of the largest aluminium companies in the world

7) BAM Singapore — Management conference for employees of Booking.com in Thailand. Bangkok, Thailand.
Learning about Thai management styles and the value of culture from a company with an amazing culture.

8) BAM Bangkok – Management conference for employees of Booking.com in Singapore. Singapore
Learning about customer service from a customer service obsessed company.

9) Management conference for Hydro Extrusion Hoogezand B.V., Almeo, Holland
Learning about green aluminium from one of the greenest aluminium factories in the world.

10) OSF Leadership Forum, Peoria, USA
Learning about innovative health care from a hospital ranked as one of the most innovative in the world

11) LocWorld Asia Conference, Kuala Lumpur. Malaysia
Learning about the latest trends in translations and localisations from one of the largest industry conferences in the world

12) Keynote speaker at the first ever HR-Convention in the Maldives, Male, Maldives.
Learning about how the Maldives uses creativity to create the ultimate customer experience.

13) High potential leaders from across the world of Amazon Web Services meeting in Singapore.
Learning about how AWS uses leadership development to stay innovative.

14) CFO’s of Deloitte across Asia meeting in Hong Kong.
Learning about how CFO’s at Deloitte look at the financial future of the world.

15) International conference for CFO’s for Electrolux from across Asia and Africa meeting on Singapore.
Learning how an international company builds best practises within finance

16) Client event for Monitor ERP for their clients across Asia, Penang, Malaysia.
Learning how ERP companies are innovating to change traditional industries

17) LVMH Internal leadership conference together with SMU, Singapore
Learning how innovation is used to push the luxury industry

18) Speech for the The Boys’ Brigade of Singapore’s annual conference
Learning how young Singaporean men look at the future.

19) Customer event for FCM Travel Solutions’ customers across Asia. Singapore
Learning about the latest trends in the corporate travel market

20) Speaking at the Malaysia Speakers Association Annual Conference, KL, Malaysia
Learning about the history of professional speaking in Malaysia

21) Closing keynote at the ACCA conference in Singapore
Learning how the accounting industry is going agile.

22) AVIXA Asia Conference in Bangkok, Thailand
Learning about the latest trends in Audio Visual equipment.

23) Speaker at InnoTown, Ålesund, Norway
Learning about how to build an eco friendly luxury yacht

24) Speaking to all employees at power utility company Eidsiva, in Lillehammer, Norway
Learning about how to take a traditional industry into the future

25) Speaking at the convention of the European Professional Speakers’ Convention, Paris, France.
Learning about automating a speaking business

26) Asia conference for Havas, Bangkok, Thailand.
Learning about creative agencies across Asia.

27) The global banking conference for Deloitte, Rome, Italy.
Learning about how some of the leading bankers of the world look at the fintech revolution.

28) European conference for FINAT, the international trade association for the labels and adjacent packaging industries, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Learning how the label’s industry is becoming more eco friendly

29) Innovation workshop for business leaders in Kiev, Ukraine.
Learning about how people in Ukraine look at creativity

30) Global client event for Avaloq, Zurich, Swizerland
Learning from a financial IT company how IT will transform finance

31) Internal employee event for Avaloq, Zurich, Swizerland
Learning how an IT company keeps its staff motivated to innovate.

32) The European printing conference Dscoop, Barcelona, Spain
Learning how the printing industry is innovative to stay profitable

33) Global conference for employees at Metronic, Berlin, Germany
Learning how medical companies are innovating the future

34) Creativity workshop for HCLI for global top managers of Hitachi, Singapore
Learning how a massive company like Hitachi keeps innovating in so many ways.

35) Speech at conference for business leaders and government officials in Pyongyang, North Korea
Learning about North Korea in North Korea.

36) Speech for to communications leaders of IndoFood, Jakarta, Indonesia.
Learning about the dynamic food industry of Indonesia.

37) Speech for business leaders in Port Louis, Mauritius
Learning about how Mauritius is making sure it keeps transforming

38) 1200 agents of AXA South East Asia meeting in Macau, China
Learning about how AXA inspires it sales people.

39) Executive Education program for Singapore Management University, Singapore
Learning about how innovation can be used to save lives.

40) Open Creativity Workshop for Singapore Management University, Singapore
Learning about how restaurants and movie companies in Singapore innovate

41) PCMA Europe, The conference for conference organisers across Europe, Barcelona, Spain.
Learning how the conference industry in Europe is stepping up to be leaders in sustainability

42) Deloitte China, meeting in Tokyo, Japan.
Learning how a professional services company does marketing

43) + 44) High Potential Conference for DBS, Singapore.
Learning how the best bank in the world trains its best managers.

45) Executive Education program for Singapore Management University, Singapore
Learning about how financial companies look at innovation

46) Keynote speaker at Leadership Energy Summit, KL, Malaysia.
Learning about innovation from the world champion of squash

47) PCMA Asia The conference for conference organisers across Asia, Macau, China
Learning how the casino industry is coming up with new products.

48) Keynote speech for the world conference of World Vision, Manila, Philippines.
Learning how World Vision is coming up with new ideas to save the most vulnerable people in the world

49) Keynote speech for 1700 people attending ASFA (Superannuation conference) in Melbourne, Australia
Learning how Australia become leading in the pension industry.

50) Creativity workshop for HCLI for global top managers of Hitachi, Singapore
Learning about how heavy industries innovate

51) World conference of IAPA in Singapore
Learning how professional services companies look for new ideas.

52) Reliance Digital customer event, Mumbai, India
Learning how the consumer market in India is just exploding.

53) Johnson & Johnson Medical China management conference, Shanghai, China.
Learning how an American medical company is creating innovation centers in China

54) Top management of all the TATA companies, Mumbai, India.
Learning what the leaders of one of the most respected company group in the world is going to focus on for next year.

Now follow Professional Speaking in 2020 to learn how you can build a global speaking career too.

The post Professional Speaking is really about professional learning. (Professional Speaking 264) appeared first on ProfessionalSpeaking.com.