3 pro tips: Strategic communication for executives eager to shine on panels and fireside chats
Even the most polished executives on a panel or fireside chat can lose an audience if they slip into bad habits – like diving deep into complexities, giving long-winded answers and delivering responses that sound like lectures.
Strategic communication for executives is essential if you want to shine on panels and fireside chats.
In this post are three pro tips that tell you how to do just that.
If you want to be confident and ready the next time you’re handed the mic during a panel or fireside chat – read on.
A few years ago, I prepped four CEOs for a panel on how a top business development program had fueled their companies’ growth.
The facilitator and I were purposeful in our planning, tuned in to what our audience of business owners wanted and needed to know as potential participants in next year’s program.
Our planning for the panel included one foundational question, six priority questions (so each panelist could choose their top three) plus a closing question to capture the program’s impact.
We asked our CEO panelists to review the questions, reflect on their experiences in the program and draft their responses ahead of a virtual rehearsal two weeks before the event.
Despite all our careful planning?
This rehearsal was a disaster!
All the sins were laid bare:
- Pontificating
- Rambling
- Lecturing
- Meandering
- Burying (the point)
- Sidetracking
- Boasting
- Digressing
- Overexplaining
- Grandstanding
- Repeating
- Drifting
- Confusing
- Preaching
The facilitator and I knew that the consequence of continuing like this would be tragic: a disoriented, disinterested, distracted, disconnected and disengaged audience.
So halfway through the rehearsal, we stopped.
Asked for a do-over.
And offered three pro tips to get all our panelists back on track.
Here’s what we told them.
Pro tip 1: Strategic communication for executives eager to shine on panels and fireside chats
Keep it SIMPLE.
Getting into the weeds on a panel is the fastest way to turn your audience against you.
And when you’ve lost your audience? You’ve lost everything.
Instead, make clarity your superpower. If you are clear, you will stand out from everyone else since today, clarity is rare.
As you prepare your responses to panel questions, check yourself:
- Acronyms? Skip the alphabet soup.
- Buzzwords and jargon? Swap with everyday words.
- A complex framework? Stay high level. Sum it up.
- Tangents? Toss them out.
Lead the audience on a straight and narrow path – then take them where you want them to go.
Be the panelist who’s easiest to follow:
- Answer one question at a time.
- Share one idea at a time.
- Define one term at a time.
- Explain one concept at a time.
- Make one point at a time.
- Offer one solution at a time.
Pro tip 2: Strategic communication for executives eager to shine on panels and fireside chats
Keep it SHORT.
Padding your answers with prefaces and prologues, introductory phrases and qualifying clauses, and long strings of adjectives and adverbs won’t make you sound important or smart.
Just the opposite.
Long-winded responses will make you sound unintelligent – and worse, unprepared.
Panels move fast on purpose. The best facilitators want to cover a lot of ground by offering different perspectives from different panelists on stage.
If you keep talking, you risk monopolizing the discussion (which endears you to no one: neither the audience nor your fellow panelists).
What’s more, if you keep talking, you chew up precious time intended for other important questions and answers (which cheats your audience by robbing them of the richest possible experience at the event).
Instead, know your timing, do the math and make space for others.
Aim for zero padding on the front and back end of your answers – and zero drifting along the way.
Be the panelist who knows how to nail an answer – in 60 seconds or less:
- Get to the point.
- Give an example (tell a story, please!) or briefly explain.
- Bow out.
That’s it.
Because the more you say?
The less they’ll remember.
Pro tip 3: Strategic communication for executives eager to shine on panels and fireside chats
Keep it SWEET.
Pontificating, lecturing, boasting, preaching and grandstanding are not the sweetest of sounds. They are not music to anyone’s ears.
They are, in fact, forgettable.
And on a panel?
Forgettable is unforgivable.
To keep it sweet on a panel or a fireside chat means to make what you say unforgettable by making it memorable.
What will audiences remember from you, as a panelist?
- A word of praise
- A clever turn of phrase
- A revelation you share
- A retellable tale
- A sticky soundbite
- A picture you paint
- A surprising twist
- A powerful nugget
- A lighter moment
- A grateful heart
- A future full of hope
All these are sweet because they create an emotional connection between you and your audience – not only at the event itself but also well beyond.
Be the panelist or guest at a fireside chat who not only keeps it SIMPLE and SHORT.
But also keeps it SWEET.
Strategic communication for executives (how that CEO panel turned out)
The pro tips we shared and modeled that day with our CEO panelists – keep it SIMPLE, keep it SHORT, keep it SWEET – transformed them.
At the event, they delivered answers that were clear, concise and compelling.
Instead of giving canned answers and predictable, often conventional advice, they shared colorful stories as examples to make a point.
They had connected with the audience.
On that day, instead of seeing an audience disoriented, disinterested, distracted, disconnected and disengaged – we saw folks inspired, united and energized by what our CEOs were sharing.
By keeping it SIMPLE, keeping it SHORT and keeping it SWEET, these CEOs created a STANDOUT EXPERIENCE for everyone in the room.
And now – you can, too!
Need help ensuring your remarks on a panel or fireside chat will resonate?
Contact Teresa Zumwald: a 21-time winner of the Cicero Speechwriting Awards who delivers custom speechwriting services, plus executive speech coaching, executive communication, and speaking and training.
