What's Your Message

by Cam Barber

  Steve Jobs uses Chunk Structure in ‘Stanford commencement speech’

  Now you know how to Chunk a speech, watch Steve Jobs deliver one. Perhaps Jobs’ most famous speech, this was made to students of Stanford University in June 2005. Go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc.

  This speech holds the record as the most viewed. The top 5 TED talks have between 20 and 30 million views, while this speech has around 35 million. It’s 15 minutes long, and tells engaging stories and shares unique life lessons. It’s an interesting, engaging and inspirational speech. The reason I mention it now is that it’s built and delivered on the 3-chunk structure we have been teaching since 1999.

  There are no slides, none of the typical, beautiful visuals to support his words. It’s not perfectly rehearsed (Jobs stands at a lectern and reads the speech). In other words, it has few of the qualities that traditional experts highlight as the secret to Steve Jobs’ communication brilliance.

  When communication experts write about Steve Jobs, they often lose focus on the core of all his talks. His core is always message, structure and natural style. This gets lost in the 10 tips that include ‘prepare and practice excessively’, ‘avoid reading from notes’, ‘express your passion’ (where does passion come from - clarity), ‘sell dreams not products’, ‘introduce a villain’, etc. Sure, these techniques can add impact, however, we improve fastest when we prioritise.

  Think of the 10 or 15 tips as cream on the cake. Cream is wonderful and most of the tips are helpful. I’m just suggesting you make sure the solid foundations are mastered before getting distracted by tasty sprinkles.

  You see, Steve Jobs’ most famous speech is built on 3 simple things you can master. Message and structure to give clarity to the ideas, and natural style to add life to your words.

  Now, I didn’t coach Steve Jobs, nor am I suggesting he was reading my material (although it’s possible - I wrote to him about a marketing issue in the late 1990s), but this speech is a wonderful example of the Vivid Method in action!

  Here’s how it looks in the Chunk Structure.

  Here is the basic structure of Jobs’ speech. (By the way, this is a summary of what he said, not a full transcript. The full transcript can be found online if you want to check out the details.)

  Scene setting

  “I’m honored to be here with you today. I never graduated. This is the closest I’ve been to a college graduation.”

  Title

  “Today, I want to tell you three stories from my life.”

  Chunk 1. Connecting the dots

  Tells a story about dropping out of college but staying as a ‘drop in’. He could attend any class that interested him, not those he needed to graduate. This included a calligraphy class which seemed to have no value, but led to the first computer with beautiful typography (the Mac).”

  Bottom line point: “You can only connect the dots looking back, not forwards. You just have to trust that they will connect.”

  Chunk 2. Love and loss

  Tells the story of being fired by Apple. An embarrassing failure. Then spent the next 10 years working hard with no public success. But it turned out to be the most creative period of his life: he met his wife, started Pixar and NeXT - which Apple purchased and brought him back as CEO.

  Bottom line point: “The only way to do great work is love what you do. If you haven’t found it, keep looking. Don’t settle.”

  Chunk 3. Death

  Talks about death and his own battles with cancer, but adds that remembering you’re going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. Death is Life’s change agent reminding you to follow your own path.

  Bottom line point: “Time is limited; don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Follow your intuition.”

  Wrap-up

  He sets up his message with another story about a publication called the Whole Earth Catalog. He uses repetition and language to connect with his listeners: “it was created not far from here… They put out a final edition when I was your age. Their farewell message was ‘Stay hungry. Stay foolish’. I’ve always wished that for myself.”

  Message

  “As you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you: Stay hungry. Stay foolish.”

  Kutcher channels Jobs, gets quoted chunk-for-chunk

  As a short aside, it was interesting to see how Ashton Kutcher’s 2013 Teen Choice speech was covered in the media. Ashton Kutcher played Steve Jobs in the biographical film called simply, ‘Jobs’.

  See below how this Aug ’13 Business Insider News article transferred Kutcher’s 3 key points exactly as Kutcher wanted them to be shared. In fact, it’s got a clearer structure than most articles, simply by copying the structure of the speech. A clear structure helps make your ideas transferable - and get shared.

  HOW TO REHEARSE IN HALF THE TIME

  Let’s look at how to practice and rehearse your talk…

  Wasted effort: practice does not make perfect

  When my son was 2 years old he loved to ‘drive’ his toy car, especially after spending time in a real car. We would arrive home and the first thing he would do was jump in that toy car and turn the steering wheel hard back and forth in an attempt to get his car moving.

  Unaware that there are foot pedals to control forward motion, he worked on the erroneous assumption that turning the steering wheel propels a car forward. All he saw was 1) his dad turning the steering wheel and 2) the car moving. The more he saw these 2 things happen together, the more he thought they were linked – and the harder he tried to turn the wheel on his little car to make it move. It never worked.

  The frustration I witnessed in my son is similar to the frustration I’ve seen in people trying to propel their public speaking skills forward based on the wrong premise. You may have heard it’s all about practice, practice, PRACTICE. But that’s not the whole story. Like my son in his car, people often approach practice with an erroneous assumption: that long rehearsals and frequent practice will automatically make them better. This is only partly true.

  Of course, there are many benefits to rehearsing; you can hear how your talk sounds out loud, test the flow, and reduce uncertainty by becoming more familiar with the ideas. However, it’s the way you practice that makes all the difference.

  Without knowing what to focus on, many people see practice as a painful chore that will only end with an anxiety-ridden presentation. It saddens me to see people approach rehearsal with the look of a beaten boxer about to face another round of being thumped in the head.

  If you focus on memorising a speech word-for-word or hope that slick design will fully engage your audience, you may get discouraged when you’re still nervous or ineffective.

  With a clear understanding of what really drives (no pun intended) confidence and clarity-of-mind during a presentation, you can use a shortcut that allows you to practice for a fraction of the time and yet feel twice as certain. Practice doesn’t need to be difficult, and it doesn’t need to be time consuming.

  Of course, you should do whatever works for you. If you get better results from rehearsing 20 times, then go for it. However, if you’d like a short cut, try this…

  The 1-minute rehearsal!

  I’ve used the word ‘magic’ a couple of times in this book. That’s because many of our clients have used it over the years. Is it valid? Well, some of these techniques do seem to magically dissolve blocks, or provide an effortless way forward that previously involved a lot of time and frustration. The 1-minute rehearsal can have this magical impact. You don’t need to learn every word of your speech. You just need to get clear and practice the key points in your structure. In other words:

  1. The start.

  2. The chunk headings and bottom-line points.

  3. The wrap-up including your Message Statement.

  This will only take you a minute or so, no matter how long the speech. So, grab your 1-page chunk structure and read it out loud - skipping the d
etails. As you move through the structure, simply pause or say ‘Blah Blah Blah’ in place of the details within each chunk.

  Example of a 1-minute rehearsal

  “Hi, this presentation is about [your title…].

  In exploring this idea, we’ll cover 3 areas, firstly, [chunk 1 heading], secondly [chunk 2 heading] and finally [chunk 3 heading].

  So, let’s have a look at [chunk 1 heading]. Blah blah… Blah blah… The key thing here is [bottom line point for chunk 1].

  [pause]

  Now let’s look at [chunk 2 heading]. Blah blah… Blah blah… The thing to remember is [bottom line point for chunk 2].

  [pause]

  Finally, [chunk 3 heading]. Blah blah… Blah blah… The key point is [bottom line point for chunk 3].

  [pause]

  So, just to wrap up, [message statement].”

  Feel free to play with the wording to suit your material and personal preferences. But you probably won’t need to change the format because it suits any talk that has a structure. The basic rhythm of the 1 minute rehearsal will keep you focused on the areas you want your audience to retain and recall.

  Steve Jobs Stanford speech is 2,260 words. Rehearsing at normal speed requires 15 minutes of focus and mental energy. That doesn’t sound too onerous, does it? But consider that you’re using a rehearsal to test and tweak your speech, so you’ll stop many times and be constantly distracted from your focus on structure and key points. Now it becomes much easier to get lost in the details as your rehearsal gets close to an hour.

  However, a 1-minute rehearsal allows you to test and refine your structure and key points with a fraction of the effort. And it’s much more effective because you don’t have to hold so much information in your mind at one time (remember the neuroscience showing that there is a tight limit to the number of things that can be held in the mind and manipulated at any one time). Here’s how Steve Jobs Stanford speech would work as a 1-minute rehearsal:

  Example of Steve Jobs’ 1-minute rehearsal

  [The Start]:

  “I’m honoured to be here with you today as this is the closest I’ve been to a college graduation. I never graduated.”

  “Today, I want to tell you three stories from my life. They are about 1) Connecting the dots in life, 2) Love and loss, and 3) Death.”

  [Pause]

  “So, firstly, [Connecting the dots]:

  Blah blah… Blah blah...

  The key thing here is… that you can only connect the dots looking back, not forwards. You just have to trust they will connect. Trust your instincts.”

  [Pause]

  “Secondly, [Love and loss]:

  Blah blah… Blah blah...

  The point here is… the only way to do great work is love what you do. If you haven’t found it, keep looking. Don’t settle.”

  [Pause]

  “The third thing I want to talk about is [Death]:

  Blah blah… Blah blah...

  So remember… your time is limited; don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Follow your intuition.”

  [Wrap up including your Message Statement]

  “So just to wrap up, when I was young, there was an amazing publication called the Whole Earth Catalog, full of ideas and neat tools. On their final edition, they had the farewell message ‘Stay hungry. Stay foolish’. I’ve always wished that for myself. As you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you: [Stay hungry. Stay foolish.]”

  If Steve Jobs was sitting at his kitchen table writing this speech (which is what he did, according to the 2013 biography by Walter Isaacson), taking a minute to stand up and do a 1-minute rehearsal would give him a clear indication of the structure and flow - and whether it’s conveying the key ideas he wanted it to convey. Or he could call in his wife; ‘Hey honey, have you got a minute? Have a listen to this outline and tell me if you think it flows well…’

  When the structure is clear, refine the details

  Once you’re happy with the 1-minute version (that contains the exact words for the key points you want your audience to retain and recall), it’s orders-of-magnitude easier to refine the details and finish the speech. And you polish your speech with a feeling of clarity that makes the whole process seem fluid and effortless.

  The 1-minute rehearsal is just as flexible as the chunk structure itself. You can include an overview of your chunk headings after your title, or not. You can do a long wrap-up that leads to your message, or not. Or you can do a 2-minute or 5-minute version if you want to test some of your explanations or bullet-point your way through your content.

  You can even do a 30 second version to help you remember the key points just before you go on stage. One of my coaching clients likes to call me within a one hour window before she makes a big speech. We only chat for a few minutes as we review her focus for the speech and go through her 1-minute rehearsal a couple of times. Practicing your 1-minute version out loud a few times can fill you with confidence.

  You guessed it - say it out loud

  I know I’m ranting about testing things out loud. It’s just so powerful. Here’s an example of the difference between rehearsing in your head, and reading your notes out loud. A few years ago, a successful professional speaker asked me to help her with her new speech. She felt the new material wasn’t working on stage as well as she wanted.

  At first I wasn’t sure how to help. Her concepts made sense. She had a commanding presence and years of experience on the professional circuit. I asked a few questions to see if I could find a pivotal issue. One question was about rehearsal, ‘How do you rehearse? Do you stand in front of a mirror or a chair or do you explain in front of your friends?’

  She said, “Oh no, I rehearse in my head.”

  “Ah ha! There’s the problem,” I said.

  By rehearsing in her head, she wasn’t practicing words that would actually be spoken. She knew what she meant during rehearsal but not what she was going to say. It was this disconnect that was throwing her. On stage her explanations didn’t feel right. They weren’t as good as they seemed during rehearsal. The change to rehearsing the key points out loud made all the difference. She has since gone from strength to strength including making many television appearances.

  VIVID METHOD PART THREE: GIVE GREAT EXPLANATIONS

  EFFORTLESS DELIVERY SKILLS

  Great delivery skills flow from the clarity you have about your ideas.

  When you have messages and examples that bring your ideas to life, you also come to life. When you have genuine belief about what you are explaining, and you’re comfortable in your own skin, you become effortlessly compelling.

  Feeling prepared is the foundation for your improvement. And you now know how to feel prepared for your next speech or presentation. You know how to start, how to end, and you have a structure to guide you through the rest.

  You know you can be yourself. You know that you’ll be more effective and people will accept you more fully when you speak in a way that makes you feel most comfortable. So, a lot of your uncertainty around public speaking should be dissolved (except maybe the little bit that makes life interesting).

  Therefore, this last section is about options.

  We’ve been using the cake analogy, so this section is all about the icing, the cream, the cherries, the sprinkles that sit on top of your rich foundation. Or maybe even the delicious creamy custard that’s stuffed in the middle of the cake.

  Great explanations automatically

  After a few years of teaching this 3-part method, we noticed something interesting: when people master parts 1 and 2, they start to give great explanations automatically. Why? Because they’ve discarded the distracting ideas and contradictory advice that diffuse their energy, and they’re free to get on with just explaining their stuff, effortlessly.

  In fact, if you’re tired of reading, need to check your emails or feel like going for a walk along the beach, you can stop here.

  Put the book down.

  You already
know enough to be in the top 20% of presenters.

  Public speaking doesn’t need to be complicated.

  However, there are plenty of cool options to engage your listeners more deeply, so we might as well have a look at them.

  The best way to boost your stage presence is to use techniques that paint a clearer picture. Accordingly, the following techniques focus on ways to amplify your ideas and add flesh to the bones of your information. They don’t require acting skills, but they do offer potent ways to capture and keep your audience’s attention. Try the techniques you feel will fit with your subject matter and style.

  Remember, nothing is compulsory. There are no rules, just guidelines. So if you see a technique here that doesn’t feel like you, ignore it. However, if you like 1 or 2 of the techniques in this section, and feel they will mesh with your style… try ‘em!

  HOW TO START A SPEECH

  Both the start and end of a talk are important foundations, so it’s worth getting good at these ‘bookends’.

  The most reliable way to start is to state your title and give an overview of your chunks. For example:

  “G’day. This talk is about [title], and we’ll cover [chunk 1 heading], [chunk 2 heading] and then [chunk 3 heading]. OK, let’s look at [chunk 1 heading]…”

  …And you’re into the guts of your talk with no waffle.

  The ‘overview’ satisfies your listeners’ questions

  As simple as this sounds, it’s a powerful way to start. It includes an overview which satisfies 2 questions in the mind of your audience: 1) ‘where is this talk going?’ and 2) ‘is it relevant to me?’. The overview sets the scene and helps the audience feel comfortable and curious about your content.