Patricia Fripp in the world of professional speaking, you are considered a rock star. I've watched you present many times and I'm, I'm happy too proud to say that you have been a teacher, a mentor, and a coach to me on presentation. You often work with the leaders of organizations, executives, senior executives, and CEOs. And when you work with them, often you help them become a rock star within their own company or within their industry. What are the steps that you need to go through that you go through with them to help them make that, that amazing transition?

This is episode #4 on the podcast, Your Intended Message. You can listen to this conversation here.

https://yourintendedmessage.podbean.com/e/04-patricia-fripp-executive-speech-coach/

 

And you're absolutely correct. And one client said to me, Patricia, our company doesn't have any rock stars. We want you to work with a president and you hear it yourself, George, right at ms. Speech, make him look like a rock star. You got four hours. One, one point that I try and bring out is to go back to earlier in their lives to find out what was the moment that got them on to the path that they now on. For example, one time I was brought in and they instructions were very much. We want you to work with our president. He's been here 10 years. He's only been president for seven months. He's not a great speaker. No one sees him as a leader. However, they also sees a team player and he's very ethical, but our company is at a challenging times and he needs, he needs to step up.

And when I met with him, I said, hi, How do you do? Everyone says, you're a team player in you're very ethical. Tell me about your parents. And he talked about his parents. And then I said, you're interested in sports, what sports? He said, well, when I was seven years old on the water polo team, they saw that I had leadership inclinations and they put me on the false track for the Olympics. Now I could not say to him, no one sees you as a leader. However, I made sure that that was an important part. And I had him tell me stories about training and going to the Olympics. And because although he was not considered a good speaker stories like this, he would have told his kids and at dinner parties for years. So was, you know, George,

 if you can get people to begin the speech with seven minutes of telling stories, they'd been tilling telling at the dinner table, they're already off to a good beginning, they're in the flow.

And that will carry them with the prepared remarks we have with another. This was a gentleman who was new at Oracle. And I was trying to find the moment that statistics and what you can do with the information from statistics and strategy. And I went back to his earlier education and he realized, and they all say to me, I wouldn't never thought about this. He got on the path that brought him to his leadership position and the career he had because when he was in college, one of his professors, he was a new PhD. He wasn't that much older than the students. And because he was new, he was so enthusiastic and so passionate that he got excited about what he was teaching him about understanding statistics. So that got him on the path. And the woman who said, we want a rock, turn him into a rock star, was working with this wonderful man.

And he was talking about strategy. And I said, Bernard, when was the first time you learned the importance of strategy? And he said, I was 14 years old. And I was a bull boy before the French open. And when people came in, they didn't realize the bull boys were having a match. And I was playing against my best friend and we were equally matched. However, in that case, the ball boy was his sister and she wanted her brother to win. So the way she was throwing the balls were trying to sabotage my game. And he said, Patricia, that was the first moment I understand the importance of strategy when you are equally matched with your opponent and you're at a disadvantage. And what all these leaders say to me, George. And I know they say to you to people want to hear these personal stories. And I say yes, because you always have to show the person behind the position. People will respect your title as a president, a senior vice president. However, when they see a snapshot of the person and

 they make more of an emotional connection, that's when they're likely to fight in the streets for you,

Patricia, at least two, two points jumped out at me. There one, the acknowledgement that the individual was competent and ethical, but not necessarily seen as a leader. And, and the importance that, that communication skills play in the role of a leader, a leader needs to be more than just smart and, and, and know how to do their job, but they actually need to be able to communicate and do it in a way that is better than, than, than the people around them.

Most definitely. And I was coaching a banker and he was, I asked him a question as we often do George. And I knew the answer. I said, how well educated all you and PhD, MBA and all these professional accreditations. 

And I said, well, why are you such a sloppy speaker? 

And then I took the power of our questions. See, you don't have to hold the answers, but you do have to ask good questions. And then he said, and again, a light bulb went off. He would never be able to articulate it. He said, all of the people who report to me, we were all in training together. And I said, in what you're trying to do with your sloppy language you'll toning down. Your message is to be one of the guys. I said, you're not one of the guys, you all the leader, and you need to speak the way you're capable of speaking to multiple to them. If you want to elevate your career to where I am, this is how you speak and communicate. You are, it's a disservice to try and speak down.

I find it fascinating, the power of stories and how it plays such a critical role in not only business, but in our lives. We, we, when we get together with friends, what do we do? We start telling a story you talk about, Oh, you won't believe what happened last week or, or, you know, that project I was working on here is, you know, or, or I went on a date or, you know, and so we, and when we get into business, many managers, executives forget the power of stories, or they say, I don't have any stories to tell. 

And yet it could be as simple as saying, when was the first time when you were a little girl, when you were a little boy, what do you remember about? And so you now probe for those stories and what other tips or techniques can you offer to people who are thinking, well, you know, I have to talk to the team next week. It's a quarterly meeting. What kind of story? Or how do I find a story that's relevant?

Because we've got lots of stories, but they're not all relevant. How do we find that relevant story?

You can listen to the rest of this conversation with Patricia Fripp

https://yourintendedmessage.podbean.com/e/04-patricia-fripp-executive-speech-coach/