Life of a professional speaker

Whoever tells you being a global speaker just means a lot of time on airplanes is missing the point.

By Fredrik Haren

So lets first be honest: being a global speaker does mean a lot of travel as a look at my last week will show.

March 16: 6 am flight Stockholm – Vienna and then train to Steyr to check in to my hotel.

March 17: Speech in the morning and then train to go back to Vienna to board a flight to London and then a new flight from London to Lagos, Nigeria.

March 18: Landed at 6 am. Spent 1.5 hour in car to get to the hotel. Checked in and topped up on an additional 3 hours of sleep in my room before I checked out again and went to the venue where I had lunch and then did my speech in the afternoon.

At 5 pm I was done and rushed to the airport to catch a night flight out of Lagos, via Dubai to arrive back in my home country of Singapore on the 19.th of March.

One might just see “Oh, that just looks like a lot of travel.” and pity me for a “Up in the Air”-kind of life.

(And sure, I visited 6 countries on 3 continents via 5 flights at 6 airports, and had a total traveling time (including transfers, cars and trains) of 50 hours in a span of 80 hours.)

But here is another way of looking at what I got to do in the same period of time:

Because the 16th was an off-day between speeches I could treat myself to a mini vacation in wonderful Vienna where I strolled through the old town, ate classic Austrian food, visited a national park and attended the design exhibition “Happy” by Stefan Sagmeister at the MAK Museum.

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I then took an earlier train so that I could walk around in small, old town of Steyr that looks like it has been taken from an old movie set with castles, churches and old, beautiful houses and narrow cobbled stoned streets all build next to the fork of two rivers.

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In the evening I had dinner in the most authentic of Austrian eating houses while getting almost an hour one-on-one time with the global head of the engine production of one of the most respected companies in the world. (Read about that meeting in a previous post.)

During my hours in Nigeria I got to experience the vast contrast in quality of life between (many) humans in Africa compared to (many) in Europe. (To be thrown between the image of the big, roomy multi story villas spread out in the Austrian mountain landscape to the crowded, bustling slums of Lagos Nigeria in a matter of hours is the mental equivalent of going from a cold ice-water swim into a sauna.)

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But I also got to see how present the refugee crisis is in Vienna (for example the train station in Vienna has a WIFI-network called “Free WIFI for refugees” and another one called “Free Refugee information WIFI’ to help refugees coming by train from places like Syria and Afghanistan. (A simple and brilliant idea by the way).)

I also got the privilege to hear the new strategy for the next 10 years and beyond for one of the largest car companies in the world as well as hear how an African food company had been able to turn itself around and become a huge success due to very efficient management procedures in a country famously known to be difficult to work in.

All in a little bit more than 3 days.

Being a global speaker is not for everyone.

If you hate (business class) traveling you probably should not do it.

But if you do not mind the travel, you will quickly come to realise that the travel is just a means to an end: it makes it possible for you to have a job where you can get to experience the whole world in a deeper and more diverse way than – arguably – any other job on this planet.

What other job lets you visit 3 corners of the globe (A small village in Austria, a bustling and dusty Africa and the metropolis of Singapore) in 3 days to learn and see so much?

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The business of speaking

Do not miss the One-on-one-opportunities.

By Fredrik Haren

What is the biggest perk with being a professional keynote speaker that most speakers miss?

I would say that it is our opportunity to get paid to do research.

Let me give you an example.

BMW is one of the world’s most successful companies.
A global brand ranked the 11th most valuable brand in the world (!) (And the highest ranked car brand).

A privately owned company that just this months celebrated 100 years of being in the forefront of innovation in a notoriously competitive industry.

An industry that is now getting ready to be transformed with huge disruptions such as electric engines, self driving technology and the “digitalisation” of personal transportation and where BWM are world leaders in all of those three areas.

On March 17 top managers at BMW Engine production (both petrol, disel and electric) had a global conference where people have been flying in from all their engine factories around the world to the BMW factory in Steyr, Austria.

In its Steyr factory (their largest) BMW makes more than 1 million engines per year (which turns out to be one new engine every 15 seconds…), and, as you might know, BMW started as an engine company producing engines for airplanes before they ventured into motorcycles and later cars. Engines are and always have been, the core, soul and DNA of BMW for 100 years.

But this conference tomorrow is not about the history. It is about the future. And the engines of cars (with new electric engines etc) is suddenly a very dynamic and fast changing industry.

As I hope I have been able to explain in the text below: It is hard to find a more interesting conference to speak at right now than for the global managers of Engine production and development at one of the leading companies in the rapidly transforming automotive industry.

And the only external speaker they had invited was me.

(And I am proud to say that I think it went down well. A few hours after my speech I got an email that said: “We had enormously good response to the forum. Would it be possible to order 170 books through you?”)

But back to the subject of this post. Because no matter how interesting it was to be the only external person at the conference today the highlight for me was not the conference today but the dinner last night.

You see the global head of BMW Engine, Ilka Horstmeier, decided to gift me with an almost one hour one-on-one meeting in the bar.

Now think about this: All her global managers have flown in from around the world, but she decides to take one hour of that evening to talk to me instead of them.

Of course she wanted to brief me for the speech the next day (but I had already gotten an extensive brief on phone a few weeks earlier.)

Instead most of our conversation were about broader things than just the theme of my speech.

Mrs Horstmeier is a very smart and curious woman (you do not become head of Engine at a company like BMW if you are not…)

She asked me questions about my job as a speaker, why I do it, how I do it and so on.
I asked her about her challenges and highs.

During our conversation I was able to get insights from her on what a big company like BMW is actually struggling with at the moment. And what they are working on right now. I also got interesting stories and examples that I might be able to use in my speeches.

When we were done I had actually gotten verification that one subject that I was thinking of starting to research as a potential new theme for a keynote was indeed something that BMW very much would find valuable to know more about.

These one-on-one-sessions with top managers of global companies are the number one thing I value the highest as a speaker.

And yet I over and over speak to speakers who are amazed that I do these sit downs. Because they do not.
They see their role to be at the conference to deliver content – not to collect content. Think they are there to teach (which they are), but do not also see that they could be there to learn.

There is no better way to learn about the business of business than to sit down and talk to the top global leaders in the world.
As a global keynote speaker you have that change to do that.
Take that chance.

And when you get that one-on-one -time: Do not see it as a way to sell your services or try to get new business. Don’t sell. Listen. Ask questions, interview them and learn.

It is not a sales meeting – it’s a research and mentoring session. And you are the mentee.

 

(The picture in this post is from the very picturesque Austrian restaurant where we had our meeting.)

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How to become better as a speaker

The Fundamentals of Professional Speaking

By Fredrik Haren

This post is about getting the fundamentals right.

Today I met with Michael Podolinsky CSP and Global Speaking Fellow. Mike is one of the most experiences professional speakers that I have had the privilege to get to know. He has been speaking, full time and professionally for almost four decades. Has lived on two continents (USA and now Asia), been invited to speak in 45 countries and has delivered thousands and thousands of speeches, trainings and workshops to virtually all kinds of audiences in most industries.

He is one of the most experiences speakers you can meet.

He is also a very nice guy.

For three hours today we met because he asked me to give him feedback on some of the key aspects of his speaking business.

One thing we talked about was the importance of getting the fundamentals right in what you do.

All industries have trends, hype and things that go in and out of fashion. New technologies, new ideas and new concepts come in and change, transform or disrupt industries. But beneath all those “waves” of rapid, turbulent change is always a stronger, more consistent – a more fundamental if you want – force.

To find, understand and focus on the fundamentals of our business is crucial for success. Especially if we want to keep at it for a longer time.

The fundamentals is different from the basics.

“Basics” mean: “the essential facts of a subject or skill.”

“Fundamental” means “a central or primary rule on which something is based.”

The basics is what we learn in the beginning.

The fundamentals are what keeps us successful in the long run.

The basics of chess is to understand how the pieces move.

The fundamentals of chess is to understand the strategy of the game.

The basics of speaking is to learn how to write and present a good speech.

The fundamentals of speaking is to understand what makes a good speech a good speech.

I would say that the number one fundamental for speaking is: It is never about you – it’s about the message.

When you get that right, when you always remember that, then you will be a great speaker for a long time.

When you forget it, it doesn’t matter how “good” your speech is crafted, it will not work anyway.

In a world obsessed with the latest trend, the latest technology and the newest way of doing something it is important to never forget the deeper forces that make successful people successful: their ability to stay true to the fundamentals.

 

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