In my workshops and seminars, I teach my audience to determine what the audience needs to hear and what the audience wants to hear. More often than not, the two can be as different as night and day. And yet, having a balance of both in your presentation will aid in the success of your speech.
Unfortunately, many of us have a difficult time figuring out which is which – a “need to know” vs. what is a “want to know”. Presenters usually confuse a “need to know” as a “want to know”, which is a big mistake. If your entire presentation is delivering “need to know information”, you run the risk of your audience getting bored and suffering from left-brain fatigue.
Look at it this way, as an audience member, would you prefer going into a presentation telling you everything you “need to know” (step-by-step process of a new business policy), or what you “want to know” (how new policy will give you more free time)?
The problem is that as presenters, our “need to know/want to know” filter is faulty. What sounds like a “want to know” to a presenter is actually a “need to know” to the audience”. So how can we fix our faulty filter?
You have 2 options.
Interview a potential audience member. Get it straight from the source. Say, “I’ll be speaking on X. What would you like to learn from a program that covers this?” Or, “I was thinking about covering X and Y. Which of those would be more of interest to you? Do either pique your interest?” And then, shut up. Don’t go into your speech. Don’t disagree with what they say. Just listen. You’d be surprised at how much valuable information you can learn from your audience members.
If, for some reason, you can’t get a hold of a potential audience member, you can have a friend interview you about your topic. This is another great way to find the need/want to knows. You will easily be able to tell what is interesting to your friend by the questions they ask you. Pay attention to what topics they ask more questions about. You should easily be able to discern what you should keep in your speech and what you should cut.
Can you think of any other ways to help you differentiate “want to knows” and “need to knows”?
[...] I’ve discussed in previous posts, it’s important in your presentation to have a balanced mix of what your audience wants to [...]