Boost Your Influence – Know When It’s Time To Throw Out the Script!

Earlier this week, I’m about to present the sixth and final session of a storytelling workshop series for a group of high producing financial professionals. I’ve prepared an hour-long presentation, complete with slides and handouts. It’s going to be highly impactful conclusion to our course.

But as soon as the session began, one of the members — the hardest working and one of the most successful members of the group — makes an unexpected confession.

“Michael, thinking about telling stories, especially my personal struggles with my health issues, freezes me up. I’m terrified. It’s like my brain shuts off. I don’t know what to say, and I am so scared that people are going to judge me and not want to work with me because they think I’m weak.”

Whoa. I didn’t see that coming.

A Chance To Practice What I Preach

This woman is hard-working and tends to be a perfectionist, but she caught me off guard.

She then tells us that, “I feel like if my story isn’t perfect, I can’t share it. It’s not good enough. Maybe… I’M not good enough.”   

Then, another member, also highly successful, jumps in. He says, “Yeah, I’m going through the same thing. I’m really struggling to work on this because I have a lot of self-doubt.”

One by one, the group starts opening up about their presentation fears, their anxieties, and their sense of imposter syndrome.

Now, this isn’t what I’d planned for. Ten minutes in, I make a decision. “You know what? We’re not going through the prepared presentation today. This conversation is too important.”

This isn’t the script I’d written, issn’t the slides and carefully crafted handouts, I’ve  prepared.

But it IS the presentation they need.

“Throw Out The Script”

And it’s why I decided to ‘Throw Out the Script.’

This is a concept I’ve taught for years, but rarely used.

Most presenters mistakenly believe that our job is to present information. That’s a small part of what we do, but the most important role we have is to understand the emotional temperature of the people we’re speaking to.

Most of the time, we’re able to determine this before we prepare our presentations. Conversations with the meeting planners, management, or team members can help us gauge where they are and what they need.

However, from time to time, you walk into a room (or virtual arena) and gain an unexpected perspective on what people need in that moment. When they open up and give us new insights, we’re at a critical decision point.

Do we put our egos aside and listen?

Do we forget about the hours we put into creating, preparing, and rehearsing?

You already know the answer. If we’re committed to serving the people in front of us, we’ve got to be willing to throw out the script and lean into the moment.

Here’s the irony… when we do this — give people the space they need to share their fears and struggles — we build trust in a way that slides and rehearsed words never will.

the right to be in front of them again at some future point. When we do get that opportunity to share our insights, we’ll have much more impact because they are more open to hearing us because they know we’ve heard them.

Presentations delayed are not presentations denied, if we’re willing to give our audiences what they need.

The next time you’re in front of a group and you sense that the conversation is going in a different and more important direction, don’t be afraid to set aside your presentation.

Serve them where they need you most, and you’ll make an impact that lasts far beyond the session.

Let’s Hear From You

What’s been your experience of situation’s where you had to ‘throw out the script’?

Let me know in the comments—I’d love to hear your stories.