Welcome to episode 96 of my podcast The Executive Edge with Robert Kennedy.

Robert is a leadership communication expert, speaker, corporate trainer, and author. A former teacher, journalist and serial entrepreneur who now works with business leaders and small business owners to up their visibility and influence using storytelling. Robert expresses that since the beginning of time, storytelling is how we have transmitted information. We share data, facts and statistics but stories that cause somebody to feel are what becomes really memorable.

When we share information, our brains begin to process how it makes the person feel, not the percentages or numbers in the story.  In this sense, we must figure out how to engage the brains of the people we are presenting to. Robert explains the meaning of instinctive elaboration as when our brains hear a question, we can’t help but answer it. Speakers can use this to get people engaged by posing a question right from the start. This starts an experience in the audience’s brain instead of just introducing yourself.

What else did we discuss?

 When we give information, particularly in a business context, we want to give it so that people do something positive with it. We want to influence people’s actions and create change or transformation. Many mistakes are made within the corporate world and the majority of those can be traced back to miscommunication or poor communication.

As we think about presenting and leading, we must think about how we can engage the audience. Robert suggests this is by understanding what they need. In order to do this, he suggests sharing something that they care about. The question you can start with needs to relate to something the audience can relate to.

Sue and Robert went on to discuss how important good communication is in business, especially when disseminating difficult information. People can get stressed quickly when they hear a message that might impact them, so doing this effectively helps. The main aim is to ensure they hear what you’ve got to say as opposed to having a struggle handling the content of the message because they’re getting stressed!