I was seated in the back of a large room with approximately 60 people in the audience that day. I wasn’t the speaker that day.  Instead, I was a member of the audience.  The leader made an announcement that they would begin in a few minutes. He left the stage and made his way to the back of the room where he was surprised to see me. “Russ! I didn’t know you were going to be here today. I tell you what, why don’t I kick things off and then I’ll give you 10 minutes to tell the audience what they can expect in your upcoming workshops, okay?” My heart rate immediately shot up.

I’m a speaker and speaking is what I do, but I had no intentions or preparations to speak that day! Now I had only minutes to prepare a 10-minute presentation for this group. Here’s the real kicker, I would be teaching this group effective speaking skills in my upcoming workshop. So, if there was ever a presentation I needed to knock out of the park, it would be this one!

Spontaneous Presentations

We’ve all had moments when we’ve been asked to speak on a topic we know well, but we’ve been given very little time to prepare. Maybe you’re sitting in a team meeting and you’re manager asks you for a project update. Maybe you’re on a conference call with a customer and put on the spot when they ask for a review of the recent server outage. Maybe you’re at a local city council meeting representing your neighborhood and you’re asked to fill in because the president of your neighborhood association is stuck in traffic.

Any of these situations are what I call spontaneous presentations. You know the subject, but you have very little time to prepare the delivery of your message. (If you do have more time, start here.) Here are two of the most popular quick-start message structures I teach.   Both are simple to remember and quick to implement.

Structure 1:  Situation – Action – Results

This template works great for project reviews. Whether you’re reviewing something you did in the past or if you’re talking about your next steps, it provides a simple structure to your response. It gets applied like this. Here is the SITUATION we were looking at back then. This is the ACTION we decided to take. These are the RESULTS we generated.

This template can also be used to look toward the future. Here is our SITUATION today. Based on where we are today, we’re suggesting we take this ACTION to move forward. If we do, we expect to achieve these RESULTS. This method is also an oversimplified storyline template used by Hollywood for making movies. They show us the characters in a difficult situation, let the characters take some action, then give us a good result in the end.  If you’ve ever heard someone say, “I want my data to tell a story.” This is the tool to make that happen.

Quick-Start Models

Structure 2:  What – Why – How

This second template is probably the most popular template I teach. It is called the What – Why – How and it answers three questions for the audience. All levels of an organization from accounting to engineers to senior executives can use it. Looking into the past, this template sounds like this. Here is WHAT happened. We did an initial triage investigation and we found out WHY it happened. Based on what we found, this is HOW we will make changes so it doesn’t happen again. It’s another method for giving a project review on what happened and where you are going from here.

The group I see using this model the most are the leaders. Instead of looking to the past, they use it to look forward, to cast their vision. Think back to any leader you’ve seen speak recently about big plans and this may sound familiar. Here is WHAT we are going to focus on this next year. This is WHY it is so important to our organization. Now, this is HOW we are going to get it done. Aristotle’s Rhetoric teaches us that when we shift our language toward the future, we are able to make a positive difference because only the future has choices. What – Why – How can be your template for showcasing your future vision.

So what did I do with my spontaneous presentation that day?  I used the What – Why – How structure and I guess it worked because they all showed up for my workshop two weeks later.

Which of these templates would be most helpful to you?

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