How to prepare for a talk in just 7 minutes

A couple weeks ago, I was in L.A. for a conference. I was outside taking a break and an organizer (Sidd) stepped out and asked:

Sidd: “Hey, a time slot opened up to speak. You want to go up? You’d be next, so you got like,” he glanced at his phone, “7 minutes!”

Me: “Uhh, Yeah! Let’s do it!”

I was in front of 300+ people! I want to share what helped me give a talk that received really positive feedback. One person shared, “Your talk made me think, shed a tear, and laugh” — I’d say that’s a success.

Loved your POWER presentation! You’re an inspiration to us all brother — from the heart, honest, and authentic. Go Mr. Adidas!! – Sheryl Surprenant

So that you have some faith in my perspective, for credibility’s sake, here’s some of my experience: I have spoken at over 12 schools including the University of Texas and Drexel University, I was invited to speak at the White House and the Austin Chamber of Commerce on education, I was a teacher and campus director for a software engineering school, and I’ve hosted 10+ events with 400+ people (e.g. culture shows, weddings).

7 tips that should help you prepare for a talk

1. Outline it

Example:

In the minutes leading up to a talk, (1) I look over an outline, (2) I try to remember it and (3) I walk around doing parts of the talk in my head. In the past, I have personally tried and have witnessed many others try to memorize a talk. It has often resulted in getting stuck while trying to remember the exact next line. It’s helped me to have #hashtags make up the outline like “#credibility” as it serves as a reminder: credibility — talk about what gives me credibility like selling a company and overcoming severe injuries from getting hit by a car.

2. Write a lot

Before I did this talk, I wrote three pages of notes on anything that came to mind that was related to the topic. I did it wherever I was — whether I was in a coffee shop, on a train, or sitting on the can. I wrote stuff down even if it was repetitive. Outside of preparing for this exact topic, I had written 7 related blog posts on Medium (e.g. “how I fell into depression” and “why I’m happy I was hit by a car.” All of this prior writing helped me speak on stage. I was able to speak naturally because a lot of my thoughts were sitting in the back of my head.

Not comfortable blogging? You can take notes on Google Docs, Evernote, or write emails (to yourself or others — whatever works for you).

I have different Google Docs open where I have a notes on different topics.

Have a job, Interviewing? Try emailing a friend, writing in a Google Doc, or write a blog post on Medium with a response to why did you choose this company/hospital/school or tell me about yourself.

3. Be brief

Be brief. Get to the point. No one wants to hear you talk too much.

— Umang Desai

I tried not to talk too much. And I tried not to repeat stuff. I started to practice being brief after my good friend Umang gave me this advice before emceeing a wedding.

4. Practice

You talkin’ ‘bout practice?! Practice?! — Allen Iverson

Speaking at this conference was probably the 60th time I have spoken in front of an audience larger than 30. It wasn’t my first rodeo. As Malcolm Gladwell says, it takes 10,000 hours to mastery. I have a long way to go, but, at the least, I know I have more than a 100 hours of presenting and 300+ hours preparing for those talks. Getting practice from leading a classroom and volunteering to fly around the country to speak at classrooms and conferences has all helped me improve my public speaking.

But what do you do if you don’t have speaking engagements or classrooms to practice in?

An engineer friend of mine, Neha Jain, goes to random public events such as career fairs, networking events, after parties, and whatever other event she can attend to practice talking to strangers and groups. Ultimately, this makes her more comfortable talking about “tell me about yourself” or other topics — she gets to a point where she doesn’t have to think twice when responding.

5. Speak to one person

I was at a conference with 280 people in the main room and 80+ live streaming. There were youngins like myself (I’m 29) and there were people up to their late 50s. Males were a minority. I imagined I was communicating to one 37 year-old Caucasian woman. This allowed me to simplify my communication and reduce my fear of a big audience. I am also lucky that big crowds don’t bother me at all anymore. This “speak to one person” strategy helped me early on to get to my current comfort level.

5. Start strong

Establish credibility so people have a reason to trust your perspective. I realized this after my friend Zee was like, “before dissecting my workout, you could have told me you’ve seen 9 trainers and you workout 2 hours a day. I would have trusted you a hella lot more.” Remembering the importance of stating my credibility, I tried to establish my credibility by opening with:

“Over the past 2.5, I started a company, was invited to the White House, faced clinical depression 3 times, almost committed suicide, nearly died from getting hit by a car, and sold a multimillion dollar company.”

The opening set the stage that I have relevant experience. If you’re talking to a friend and want to share dietary suggestions, it may help to share how much weight you’ve lost, what you’ve read, what professionals you have seen, etc.

Share the objective (example below). This concept was emphasized by my former business partner and Teach for America alum, Harsh Patel). After establishing credibility in my talk, I shared the objective of my talk:

“Because of all that, I try to make health my number one priority even though it’s often easy to forget. I hope after this talk you are inspired to focus on improving your health more. I will share two stories on experiencing that particularly shifted my perspective: one where I experienced clinical depression and another where I was hit by a car.”

6. Be present. Everyone be present.

When my grandpa eats dinner, he eats dinner. When he watches my brother play kickball, he watches my brother play kickball. He doesn’t talk. He doesn’t look at his phone. Before he engages in something new, he takes a few deep breaths or other some meditation to settle his mind and to focus on what’s to come. Similarly, when I was speaking I wanted to focus on speaking and the audience to focus on listening. At the beginning of my talk, I had everyone take three deep breaths. It was pretty awesome. The room went from kind of quiet to completely peaceful. I learned this technique from professional speaker Rich Litvin an hour before I spoke. And it worked!

7. Hit all emotions

If you laugh, think, and cry, that’s a heck of a day.” ― Jim Valvano at the 1993 ESPN ESPY’s Awards

I tried to give a heck of a talk: have people laugh, think, and cry. I shared a pretty emotional story that evoked a range of emotions:

I was in Vegas earlier this year at a bachelor party. It was day 2 and we spent $300 for another night of bottles at some ass boogie club in Vegas. I ended up deciding to stay back. Instead of chasing girls and pounding shots, I was standing on the 32nd floor of a balcony contemplating suicide.

The 7 tips: #outlineit #brevity #writewritewrite #hitallemotions #bepresent #talkinboutpractice?! #onlyoneperson

Edited by: Neha D. Jain