We can speak to a group and then there is another level, where we try to captivate our audience. What makes the difference. The content could even be the same but in the hands of one person it is dry and delivered in a boring manner. Someone else can take the same basic materials and really bring it to life.

The quality of the argument we are going to present is important. We definitely need to design two powerful closes, one for the end of the speech and an extra one for after the Q&A. Importantly, we start from this point when designing the talk. We work out what is the most compelling message we want to leave with our audience and we start working backwards structuring the speech from here. Once we know what we what to say, we need to be gathering evidence to back up that assertion.

In a thirty minute speech, there won’t be so much time, so we might get through three or four of these key points and that is it. Now we make sure that the evidence is super strong, offering really compelling proof, to build credibility for our argument.

Next we work on a blockbuster opening. This has to compete with all the things running through the minds of our audience. We have to smash through all that obstruction and clear a path so that they will hear our message. The first words out of our mouth had better be compelling or we will lose the battle for today’s minute attention spans.

We want our visuals on screen to be clear and comprehendible within two seconds. Let’s keep the colours to an absolute maximum of three. Photos are great with maybe just one word of text added. If we use graphs, we should have only one per screen wherever possible.

Every five minutes we need to be switching the energy levels right up, to keep our audience going with us. Naturally, we have tonal variety right throughout the talk, but we need to be hitting some key messages very hard, around that five minute interval. This needs to be combined with some powerful visuals on screen to drive home the point.

We are meticulously sprinkling stories throughout the speech to highlight the evidence we want to provide for our key points. Data by itself is fundamentally dull, but stories fleshing out the data are so much more scintillating. We sketch out physical locations, describe colours, talk about the season, mix in people they may know, explain the why of what is in the story.

Our final close after the Q&A has to go out with a bang and not a whimper. We want a strong call to action.

We need great structure, evidence, visuals, stories, pacing, energy, passion and belief in our presentation. The delivery is going to rock because we make it rock through rehearsal after rehearsal, until we have refined the whole thing into a symphonic triumph. That is how we need to be thinking to captivate our audience when we start constructing the talk. Begin with audience capture in mind.

Jan Carlzon many years ago published a tremendous guide to customer service. He had the job of turning around SAS airlines and captured that experience in his book “Moments Of Truth”. I was reminded of Carlson’s insights when I was recently checking into my hotel in Singapore. While going through the check-in process at the hotel, a waiter from the adjoining restaurant approached me bearing an ice-cold glass of freshly squeezed juice. Singapore is very humid and trust me, that ice cold beverage went down very well. I thought this is really well thought through customer service by this Hotel.

One of Carlzon’s observations about customer service however was the importance of consistency of delivery. For example, visualise the telephone receptionist answers your call in a pleasant helpful manner and you are uplifted by your exposure to the brand. The next staff member receiving the transferred call however, is grumpy and unfriendly. Now both your mood and positive impression plummet. You are suddenly irritated by this company, who have just damaged their brand by their lack of an ability to sustain good service across only two consecutive touch points with the customer.

So back to my story. As I get to my room, in good spirits after unexpectedly receiving my ice-cold juice, I find out the television isn’t working. After a forensic search for the cause, including a few harsh words with the television controller, I discover the power is not on. There is a card slot next to the door that initiates the power supply to the room. Yes, I worked it all out eventually, but the thought occurred to me that the pleasant young woman checking me into the hotel, failed to mention these two facts to me. Sustainability of good service has to be the goal if you want to protect or grow your brand.

When you are the leader of your company, you presume that everyone “gets it” about representing the brand and that the whole team delivers consistent levels of service. You expect that your whole team is supporting the marketing department’s efforts to create an excellent image of the organization. After all, you have been spending truckloads of money on that marketing effort, haven’t you?

But are all the staff supporting the effort to build the brand? Perhaps they have forgotten what you have said about consistent customer service in the past or they are a new hire or a part-timer who didn’t get properly briefed.

As leaders, we should all sit down and draw the spider’s web of how customers interact with us and who they interact with. We should expect that nobody gets it and determine that we have to tell them all again, again and again.

First impressions count, but so do all the follow-up impressions, if we want to build a sustainable, consistent positive image with our customers. Consistency of good experiences doesn’t happen automatically. We have to look again at all of our touch points with our customers and ensure that everyone in the team understands their place in maintaining the excellent brand we have built up.

“Born to lead” is nonsense. Many things shaped that person in order for them to achieve credibility with others. Of course, we can become a “leader” as part of our company designated hierarchy. We sit somewhere in an organizational chart above others, with various reporting lines elevating us above the hoi polloi. We know many people with that august title of “leader”, who we would never willingly follow in a million years – pompous, tiresome, incompetent jerks!

Can we become someone who others will follow when all the paraphernalia of leadership pomp and circumstance has been stripped away? How do we become a charismatic leader, whom others willingly wish to follow?

The starting point is critical. If your desire for leadership is driven by personal aggrandisement and ego, where all good things must flow to you, this force of will factor is not attractive. Good leadership is differentiated by the followers desire to want to follow, when there is no coercion, structure or impetus to do so. We gravitate to these charismatic leaders because of how they make us feel.

Effective leaders are good with people. There are some key principles they embody, which make us like and trust them. This is not artful manipulation, where they fake these principles in a cunning way. That approach exists and will ultimately be revealed as hypocrisy. What we are talking about here is having correct kokorogamae (心構え) - true intentions.

Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves

Bossy people often love to brag. Instead, build the trust by focusing your conversation on them not you. As you stop dominating and start listening, you uncover areas of shared desires, values, interests and experiences which are magnetic in their properties and bind us more closely together.

Try honestly to see things from the other person’s point of view

Often we are egocentric - it always about me, me, me. Having listened, we uncover the context behind their beliefs and arrive at a greater appreciation for their views and positions. We can more easily get on each other’s wavelengths. When this happens, we become more mutually simpatico, supportive and powerfully bonded.

Ask questions instead of giving direct orders

The inclusive, humble promotion of self-discovery unleashes powerful forces that encapsulates our shared direction. We become the catalyst for their self-belief. We all want to be around people who make us feel good about our better selves and with whom we share common goals.

People will willingly follow us when we apply these principles. We must sincerely switch from a “me” focus to an “our” focus. Change our approach and we change our results. We will become a charismatic leader.