I was recently tapped to be part of a live You Tube "Fireside Chat". I would have
declined the invitation if not for years in Toastmasters.
The training that helped was of course the countless speeches, evaluations and talking points. The big payoff came from the leadership training. Most people don't realize that Toastmasters has a well organized parallel leadership track. It forces the member to organize events and coordinate with other members.
This case involved several parties - Crain's business, Plastics News, a major petrochemical company, a major resin distributor and little old me. After viewing the prior videos which were freewheeling and meant to be spontaneous, it was apparent a lot of preparation was needed. I became a self appointed committee of one to make this all it could be. Paradoxically, being prepared and running through some of the topics beforehand made the actual event appear spontaneous.
The actual event was about an hour. There were probably 50 man / woman hours spent in preparation - about 40 more hours at my insistence. We probably spent three hours hashing out the topics and subsets of what we would and would not say as well as who would say what. Many items had to be vetted by two legal departments. There were four conference calls, a working dinner the night prior and working breakfast.
Even with all the preparation, it was nerve wracking to be live like TV in the early 1950's. We knew the sequence of topics but did not have an exact script. The Q & A from the live audience emails was the worst part.
When clear, everyone in the studio agreed we had " hit it out of the park". We might have literally with the adrenaline pumping so much. Afterwards, we must have walked a mile up Michigan Avenue yakking the whole time.
Mae West was asked if something or other would be too much of a good thing. Her famous rejoinder was " I think too much of a good thing is - Wonderful ! "
Athletes and actors spend an irrational amount of time preparing for a relatively short event, so why should preparing for an event or a speech be any different ?
