[video] VISION 216 - === [00:00:23] Simon Vetter: Welcome to "The Vision Architect." I'm excited about my guest today, Michael Davis. In first grade, he got humiliated in class when he spoke. For 25 years, he didn't wanna speak in front of a group. And then he worked as a financial planner and his manager said, "You have to give presentations, otherwise you're out." He became a, speaking coach and has coached executives, TEDx speakers, and has written multiple books on how to give compelling presentations. His latest book is called The Story Trio. We'll dive more into it. Michael, welcome to the show [00:01:09] Michael Davis (2): Thank you, Simon. you know, I've enjoyed working with you and our time together the last couple of years, and, was thrilled that you asked me to be on today [00:01:16] Simon Vetter: Yes. Looking forward to our conversations. So you didn't have a very healthy relationship growing up with speaking . What was the pivotal point [00:01:26] Michael Davis (2): it was that moment you mentioned in the opening where I was, humiliated by my first grade teacher, in a way that caused me to think, "I will never stand in front of people ever again." And for the next 25 years, I never voluntarily stood in front of any group, 'cause it was just, it just planted that seed in me that this is a terrifying experience, ' cause I didn't wanna be laughed at or humiliated. and it wasn't until I was 31 years old and I was a financial planner, and I was asked to go out and give workshops and presentations. You can imagine that was quite a combination, that terrifying fear and this, "Well, I have to go do this." And one day I sat down with my boss and he said, "I've been getting some feedback from your workshops, and, Michael, you- suck at presenting. You need to fix this or you're out of here." He was a real touchy-feely kinda guy. So, that's what, where I found Toastmasters. That was back in 1994 [00:02:22] Simon Vetter: And what happened at the beginning? I mean, how did you start to become comfortable speaking in front of a group? [00:02:31] Michael Davis (2): Well, the key to Toastmasters is, and it's like any other fear we have, you just have to keep getting up and doing it. So I, I, I volunteered a lot. I, I went in thinking, "I'm gonna go to two or three meetings, pick up some tips, and I'm gonna just save my job." But I very slowly began to discover that some of the myths and misconceptions I had about speaking were just totally not true. Like, you have to be born to be an effective speaker, that speaking is all about just getting up there and talking, talking, talking, talking, talking, not really having any structure, just talking. that's not true. You need structure. You need frameworks. And I mean, it took me several years to start to feel like, "Okay, I can do this." But it wasn't until 1998 when I was sitting in a workshop as an attendee, and I saw somebody at the front of the room who said, and I thought, "Well, I'd like to do that." But then a little voice came in right after that and said, " Who'd wanna listen to You You haven't done anything." So immediately I shot it down. But that voice kept coming back over the years, and some point I decided I needed to listen to that voice [00:03:44] Simon Vetter: You mentioned Toastmasters. I joined Toastmasters in San Diego in 1997 when I got here. A friend said, "You should join Toastmasters." And I became a member for 18 years. And I remember the first few times I had a very, very heavy accent. And as you said, I got up, I practiced, I failed a lot . And what I love about Toastmasters, it's a safe environment. It's encouraging. And when you make mistakes, people support you moving through that. And I used Toastmasters to practice and make mistakes to get better. , You get better when you practice. And I believe Toastmasters is the driving range for golf pros for speakers [00:04:33] Michael Davis (2): Oh, I love that. It's a terrific analogy. I haven't heard that one before. you're right. Here's the thing about speaking, tell me if you've, if this has been your experience, Simon, is that a lot of people think that the best speakers they just get up there and they start talking And they don't make mistakes They have to be perfect, and that is absolutely not true [00:04:53] Simon Vetter: And what I see, especially in golf, the easier the swing looks, the more time and practice and sweat they have put in . Easy, smooth, chances are the more they put in to become that speaker [00:05:11] Michael Davis (2): Yes. It, it, this just happened to me 'cause you know I did a TEDx talk back in August, and I, it's not out yet, but I got to see the raw footage, and I watched it and I thought, " That guy looks like he's having a conversation with the audience." And to your point, it's because I, I did over 250 reps on that story. By the time I hit that circle, it was like, you know, I'm just having A, conversation with some friends. But that takes the swing over and over. Make adjustments, tweak this, tweak that, put emphasis on that word. There's no replacing that. You have to put in the time [00:05:47] Simon Vetter: I coach a lot of executives, and often I coach them on presentations, and they spend a lot of time on PowerPoint and rely on PowerPoints, and most of them , they don't practice, they don't rehearse. What have you seen are the big downfalls of executives when it comes to presentations? [00:06:07] Michael Davis (2): Well, number one you just hit is they will not practice, and I get it, they're busy. However, how much is it worth to you to, to become seen as a high-level communicator? second is they believe that a presentation is giving them information. Give them the quarterly report, break down this data, bring, bring in the slides. Look, I can get that on a s- a PDF, or I can just go now to AI and say, " Tell me in two minutes, what's this all about?" I don't need information from you. What I need is your interpretation of that information and how it applies to me, my team, my division. That's what people are desperate for today, and, executives keep just glossing over that. And I think it comes back to that basic human fear of standing in front of others and risking being humiliated [00:06:55] Simon Vetter: Yeah. What makes a powerful, compelling speech? [00:07:00] Michael Davis (2): Someone who is being real, someone who will get up there and talk about a relatable challenge, relatable problem, share their experience where they struggled, they had strife, they had setbacks, and then ultimately, if they overcame it, how did they do that? I see this a lot. You and I have talked about this in our work together. So many people want to rush by the struggle in their story, but that's where the emotional connection is made. That's where you're sending the signal. No matter what your title, I'm just like you. I'm human. I've had these struggles. May still be struggling with it, but here's how I was able to manage that problem. That's what makes a speech? or presentation compelling, is when you're able to, I like to call it take off the armor, take off the title, And just say, "Look, here's my s- here's what I did. Here's what I went through. If I went through it, you can too." [00:07:53] Simon Vetter: And they're able to connect with the audience and what you said the audience can relate to the speaker [00:07:58] Michael Davis (2): Yes. one of my good friends has a phrase that I just love. It is, "Be relatable to their pain and relevant to their goals." Because When You're relatable, you're showing them, " I get you. I understand what you're going through, and I have a solution to help you overcome it," which is being relevant to their goals [00:08:16] Simon Vetter: And that also requires courage to talk about our own pain [00:08:22] Michael Davis (2): Yes. I don't deny that it is scary to get up in front of people, and the higher you are up in the corporate hierarchy or within an organization, there's a little voice inside of you saying, " You can't do that. You're gonna be showing weakness." That's old school thinking. That is not true. I mean, we have the neuroscience behind this, so this isn't just some pie in the sky feel good about... No, this is not that at all. This is proven science that when you are willing to share relatable, painful experiences, people are drawn to you. They don't run from you. They don't look down on you. They, they actually think more of you because you're not trying to impress them [00:09:02] Simon Vetter: Yeah. Yeah. You talk from a human to a human [00:09:05] Michael Davis (2): That's exactly it [00:09:07] Simon Vetter: Yeah. Let's dive into your latest book, [00:09:11] Michael Davis (2): Hmm? [00:09:11] Simon Vetter: Story Power Trio. I start reading it and I love it because it's, it's a different approach to presentation. You talk about the three important stories. Can you give a, a brief overview and then we can dive into each of the three stories? [00:09:25] Michael Davis (2): Sure can. Sure can. it was just born out of an observation I made that, yeah, there are a lot of people talking about storytelling today, and yes, the, the, all the frameworks are out there, the hero's journey, and you pick a framework. All speech and story coaches have one. I do. But something wasn't happening. People weren't getting through with their stories, and it occurred to me one day it's because there are two other stories that people aren't addressing. The first one, I think the most critical one, is what's the story we're telling ourselves? And these stories are typically born or they're, accepted when we're young. One of mine was, "Don't stand in front of people." It's terrifying because what happened in first grade. I had an even deeper story that it took me almost, you know, over five decades to uncover that I absorbed when I was two years old that was, "You're not worth sticking around for." That's because my father walked out on my mom and me when I was two and never, never saw him again. So we absorb a lot of stories? and we don't realize it, and if we're not clear on those, it is going to impact how we communicate. It impacts our energy, the way our body shows up, our voice, all of that, and it also sends messages on holding us back from taking certain actions. Now, Simon, in full confession, it took me over five decades to discover that the one story that had been holding me back. it won't take you that long if you're willing to do the work and say, "Okay, what, what are some potential messages I picked up as a child?" And it's not always the spoken message. It was actions you observed as a child. Children are incredibly observant, and if they start to see patterns, they create a story in their mind, and they absorb it [00:11:01] Simon Vetter: I had a similar story growing up. I had a lot of energy, a lot of enthusiasm, and I wanted appreciation. I want appreciation from my classmates, my parents, and, the way I try to get appreciation is being active and loud and, and in class, it's, yeah, I raised my hand all the time and a few times I messed up and people laughed at me and then I put my hand down. I didn't speak up anymore. So to your point, it created a deep impression, and it was an unconscious impression that I didn't realize and, and through self-awareness and inner work, I had to first realize I gotta change that story [00:11:48] Michael Davis (2): Yeah. what was specifically the story you think you absorbed? [00:11:52] Simon Vetter: If you raise your hand, if you take risk, chances are if you don't are perfect, then you get criticized. People laugh at you [00:12:02] Michael Davis (2): Yes, and that hurts [00:12:04] Simon Vetter: That's hurtful and [00:12:06] Michael Davis (2): So I'm not gonna do that anymore [00:12:07] Simon Vetter: Yeah. How do you help your clients uncover that? [00:12:11] Michael Davis (2): Well, I ask them to think about messages they got growing up, and if, and it's not always easy. I mean, I've often been asked when I share this information, "Well, how do you do that?" Well, let's look for specific messages you got, and if you can't remember any, think about actions that you observed as a child. What was your family like? And then ask a third question. That's what could the message be? You've got hints at it in your life. It's, it's, if I work with a lot of salespeople, it's like, "Why aren't you picking up the phone? Why aren't you going to networking events? Why aren't you meeting people?" Well, let's talk about why you hesitate. And by the way, there's a great story in there for everyone, right? We all have those narratives in us that can help others. But I'm trying to help them get to the core message, and it sometimes takes a while. Sometimes it jumps out. It just, you just never know. there's no timeline on this. But I just dig and dig and see. And usually it happens where they'll just throw something out, and that's usually they, th-they, they're so used to that experience or that? message they got that they don't think anything of it, but that's usually what we're looking for [00:13:17] Simon Vetter: And one of the core obstacle is fear. [00:13:21] Michael Davis (2): Yes [00:13:22] Simon Vetter: And fear helps us not to get hurt, and fear also prevents us to get out, to speak up, to stand on a stage. fear is natural and it's a safety measure, but it's also avoiding [00:13:36] Michael Davis (2): Well, it is. And then when it comes to speaking, and again, I'm, I'm not talking about professional speakers, which you are and I are in that world, but leaders who stand up and speak, and that happens a lot. There is a natural fear of speaking, which a, a lot of sociologists have traced back to our earliest ancestors. If you stood out from the crowd, you put the tribe at risk, so you had to be very careful. and I mean, it could get you kicked out of the group, which meant death. So there's a story that's been passed down subconsciously over the generations is, "Don't you stand out." But the way modern society has evolved, we need to stand up and speak and, and get messages out. so yeah, there's a natural fear, but you can overcome it. You don't get rid of this, by the way. You know this, Simon. Being nervous before you speak is perfectly natural, and it's a good reaction. It shows that your body is in tune, it's ready to go. You don't want it to paralyze you. That's when it becomes a problem [00:14:32] Simon Vetter: I did a presentation in a big university hall, 150 people. I had a suit, I looked sharp, and I was sweating. I was trenching underneath my coat because I was so nervous. And then a friend of mine said, "This is good. You are ready now. You're prepared." You don't have that. A friend of mine, uh, said, " If I'm not gonna be nervous I'm gonna give up speaking." So To your point, it's natural to be nervous, but you don't want to be fearful. So there's the big difference [00:15:02] Michael Davis (2): Right. And there's a series of exercises I have people go through, questions they ask five to 10 minutes before they go on, which helps a lot. but I just realized that you asked me to go quickly through the three stories. I went right into the first one. So I'll give you the second story we need to tell, which is the story our audience, whether an audience can be one or 1,000 or 1, what is the story they're telling themselves? Because if we're not clear on that, I don't care how good your story is, it won't break through their barriers. Now, one-to-one like we're doing here, is pretty easy. I can ask you questions and dig down and, and try to find those stories. What about when we're leaders speaking to a large group of our, in our organization or your speaker standing up in front of an audience? Well, AI has made it possible to very quickly find out what are some common concerns that audiences have, the people sitting in front of you. You can do the demographic search. You can find out, what are common issues within this organization, challenges they have. AI will go in and look at social media posts, Glassdoor reviews, all of that, and it can very quickly tell you these are the common challenges, and you can build that into your presentation so that you can show I'm relatable to your pain and relevant to your goals [00:16:21] Simon Vetter: What are some tips to better understand the story of the audience and not only using AI? What are some of the questions? [00:16:30] Michael Davis (2): Well, I'm going to ask what are some common concerns? What are just fears that people-- I'm just gonna pick an industry. I was in the financial industry for years. What are common concerns that financial advisors have today? Well, definitely AI is a concern, that it's going to replace them. also, maybe their commissions are being cut. So I'm, I'm gonna go find out specifically what are the top three concerns they have right now, and then what are some challenges to their day-to-day operations. Concerns and challenges will be very different. What I'm trying to do is do a deep dive, and I'm not gonna use all of this in my presentations, but I'm going to try to get those points that I know are common concerns or issues so that they can say, "Okay, this guy is relatable to my pain. He understands me." I'm also going to, if, and this is something a lot of speakers do, is see if I can talk to five to 10 people who are gonna be in my audience and just ask them those same questions. What are your three biggest concerns? What are your biggest challenges? what's going well? I don't, I don't wanna ignore that too because we wanna point out what's going well, too, because as a speech and story coach, I often tell people, "I wanna know what's do- you're doing well because if I don't point it out to you, you'll stop doing it." So we wanna point out both sides of the coin for folks, but show that you understand their day-to-day [00:17:53] Simon Vetter: Yeah. And the third story [00:17:55] Michael Davis (2): Third story is the actual story we go there to tell, which again, there are a lot of story and speech coaches out there, many good ones. the challenge is I don't see them addressing the first two. And there are certain elements that need to be in every story that have been proved neurologically. The work of Dr. Kendall Haven, a fabulous storytelling coach, actually former military that got into this, the science of, of this. And there are eight elements we need to have in a particular order to have maximum impact with our stories [00:18:27] Simon Vetter: Can you give a brief summary of that? [00:18:31] Michael Davis (2): Sure can. first is you have to have a relatable character, someone you can see yourself in that? character, in relatable circumstances. Now, that character has a goal, and there is a motive behind that goal. If we don't understand the motive behind the goal, as an audience, we won't buy into it. We'll just say, "Okay, that's entertaining," and move on. then we have to have conflict. Something risks or something comes up as a risk to this character achieving the goal. And then we have to know what's at stake. If this goal is not accomplished, what will this character lose? And when you're structuring your story, you have to make sure all this is relatable to the audience. if I'm talking to a group of financial advisors, I need to make sure that all my examples follow in, uh, kind of track their world. I don't wanna talk about an, an Olympian who was struggling to get the gold medal after missing the first two times, right? That's not gonna be quite as relatable. so we've got The conflict, and we ultimately need to show that this story has been resolved. Now, that doesn't always mean the goal is achieved. Sometimes it isn't. However, there's still a lesson learned in the pursuit of that goal, and that's the gift to the audience. You share this experience, and then here's what I learned from this [00:19:50] Simon Vetter: The key I take out here is there's a tension, there's a conflict, there's a challenge, there's a pain point. pain point has an impact, and that impact, the higher the stake, the more we can get people's attention and grab their- [00:20:06] Michael Davis (2): Yeah. You, you grab them at a deeper emotional level and they can sit there and say, "Wow, that sounds like my experience." The sub- the subliminal message to them is, " I get you. I understand you because I've been through this. I know you're going through this too." [00:20:24] Simon Vetter: And then you give them a lifeline. To get Them out of that conflict [00:20:28] Michael Davis (2): Yes, and show them that there's hope. See, I think the, there's two purposes, there are two purposes to telling a story. Number one is to give people hope. [00:20:36] Simon Vetter: Mm-hmm. [00:20:37] Michael Davis (2): To say, "Okay, you're not stuck here forever." The second one, and, and some people push back on me on this one, Simon, I think the purpose of a story is to get people uncomfortable because people don't change unless we push them out of their comfort zone. If everything's okay or good enough, they're not changing. I need to show them what's possible, or if they don't change what they're doing, why eventually they're gonna be in pain [00:21:04] Simon Vetter: What's at stake? [00:21:05] Michael Davis (2): What's at stake? And this gets into what you talk about in your work so beautifully is this vision. It's creating a future story to say, "Okay, you're okay now, but let me tell you What's coming." And you need to create a new vision, and we're gonna create a new story based around that. But yeah, we need to show what's at stake? if you stay where you are right now [00:21:24] Simon Vetter: Let's talk about the future story. How do you craft, articulate a story about the future to get people compelled about that future? [00:21:36] Michael Davis (2): yeah, it's, it's an excellent question, and it's take the e- eight elements we just talked about and, and create two stories. One where this is almost like the, ideal situation that, here's a character who's living an ideal life, and they overcame this challenge, and this is the lesson they learned. And then you show a, a parallel story of somebody who didn't make changes. What you're trying to show is, here's the future we see coming if nothing changes, so you put those eight elements in. And then here's a view of the future if we make these changes. It's not forcing it on anyone. I'm just saying, "Here, you choose. Which future do you want? The one where we have outcome A, which is positive, or outcome B, which is negative?" [00:22:20] Simon Vetter: So you basically show them two scenarios [00:22:23] Michael Davis (2): Two scenarios. Yeah [00:22:25] Simon Vetter: One, if you keep doing what you're doing, if you're not using AI, you risk to become invaluable, and that's a path. Scenario B, AI will be there if you get on the train, if you start using it, if you become relevant and valuable, you have a, a bright future to compete and have a job [00:22:49] Michael Davis (2): Yes, and I'll take that one step further. Also, go in and understand what are the misconceptions and myths about AI, 'cause clearly there's so many. Go down and find what's the reality of AI. I, was just arguing with one earlier today that I work with trying to create a video, and I'm like, "This thing's not taking over the world. It can't even understand a basic instruction." So there's a myth that it's taking over. No, it's not. I'm not saying it's not a risk, because there are some concerning things going on with the AI companies. I'm not blind to that. But let's not give it total power when it can't even get a sentence right sometimes still. but yeah, to your point, point, show both sides of it. I, I discovered this when I was a financial advisor. I'd sit down with so many couples, Simon, who thought, " Oh, we're in good shape." And when I painted a picture for them, if you keep doing this, this is where you're going to end up, that was pretty scary. Now, that wasn't manipulative sales tactics. All I was doing was saying, "Based on what you've given me and said these are your goals, this is where you're going. Are you okay with that or do you wanna change it?" And then we would create a new story based on the changes that they said they wanted and what they had to do to get there [00:23:58] Simon Vetter: Now take AI or the future we live in, the, the reality we live in. There's a lot of uncertainty and we don't... There's a lot of assumptions, a lot of things we make up about the future. How do we Distinguish what is noise and what's relevant signals to pay attention to, and how do we integrate that into the storytelling? [00:24:22] Michael Davis (2): Well, I think we have to strip it down to what do we absolutely know with certainty? And that's not a lot, frankly. But we can work off what we know with certainty. What is AI? It's large language models, and this is what we know it can do. It can help us plan our day. It can help us, you know, fill in the blank. That's what we know. All the other noise we have to just put aside and say, "Don't even worry about that. We can't control that. Focus on the elements you can." And the way I parallel that with storytelling? and tell me if I'm answering your question here, you and I have done this before where we felt like one of your stories was getting a little bit too convoluted. So what we did, is I said, "Simon, let's go back to the basics. What are the basic elements? Who's the main character? What's the goal? What's the obstacle? What was the conflict? And then how do we resolve it?" And often we need to strip our messages down to the bare essentials The challenge that you and I and you watching this have is we know our stories so well That we make assumptions. We start filtering our own stories because we think we know the important parts. We don't my recent TEDx experience was a perfect example of that. I had my opening two lines were meant to be very serious, and the more I practice it, every time people are laughing at those first two lines. I'm like, "Okay, it's not about me, it's about them." I need to take that feedback and change the tone of the opening, and it did have the humorous two lines, and then I hit them with the third line serious. But I wouldn't have known that if I didn't keep my mind open to say, what, what are they telling me? So we can't assume that we know our stories, are gonna have the impact that we think they should because we know it so well, and that's why I strip stories down to their basic elements. Let's take out the assumptions. Let's get what really happened, what was the conflict, the emotion you experienced, and what was the lesson learned [00:26:14] Simon Vetter: I worked with you and you helped me practicing my stories and that was helpful. You practiced your TEDx talk 250 times. What was your process to make it a little bit better? [00:26:26] Michael Davis (2): First of all, I had a coach, 'cause you can't coach yourself, and she's wonderful. so I came with my first version, which ultimately, I think I just recently checked this, I think s- 23 perc- no, not even 23% of the original version was in the end. So you don't change it in huge chunks. You look at certain pieces, you look at the flow. Does the flow make sense, first of all? Is the message clear? With TEDx, you gotta have an idea worth spreading. So am I clear on the idea? get that straight, and then work on what is supporting that idea. What stories, statistics, research do you have in? what is confusing to the audience? It was clear to me, wasn't clear to them, so my coach helped me see what parts weren't clear. But we didn't do this all at once. 250 rehearsals yielded, I'm gonna have to look at the numbers, Simon, probably 35 different versions of that story. But they weren't 35 major shifts. I think there are eight, major changes to the structure of it, but each one had four or five within it a- as I went along. So it's incremental change. Sometimes it's th- the wording of the message. Sometimes it's just placement. Does this phrase belong here or later in the talk? and it's just little by little. And you and I have done this. Sometimes even as a coach, I'll see something different the fifth time as the first and say, "Okay, now I see why it's not making sense." But you can't change it all at once. It's just too much [00:27:54] Simon Vetter: Yeah. The outcome is a powerful story, but also you learn the skills and next time telling a story becomes easier. [00:28:03] Michael Davis (2): Yes. That's an excellent point [00:28:06] Simon Vetter: and that's what I see about the visioning. a lot of people talk about, "Oh, this is my vision." Even if they have one, oftentimes they're not able to articulate it. And to practice to articulate, think about the vision, the future, the better we become at visionary skills. And, I think it's like with presentation, you made a, a men- tremendous commitment to invest in your presentation. Oftentimes we don't invest that commitment because we don't see what's at stake [00:28:40] Michael Davis (2): True. Story elements come in. And I'm fascinated by the work you do with visioning because and, and a parallel idea here is when you sit down with somebody and they throw out a first vision, that's not the end vision, Right It's a starting point. [00:28:53] Simon Vetter: Right [00:28:55] Michael Davis (2): with each iteration, they get clearer and clearer And say, "Well, that part of the vision doesn't make sense. Let's throw that out. [00:29:00] Simon Vetter: Right [00:29:01] Michael Davis (2): This new part makes sense. Oh, maybe we need to change the order up." It's just like writing a story. It is a story, right? You're writing a vision story, but they constantly have to adjust it because their vision makes sense. what's that old saying? Mike Tyson, right? Everybody has a plan till they get punched. So the vision gets punched, and they gotta go and tweak And then conditions in the world change, so they're constantly changing that vision story, aren't they? [00:29:25] Simon Vetter: And those three stories apply. The first is like, what is my own story about the future? And we have to uncover that. Just like, what is my story about how I speak? And so it takes self-awareness and understanding of self. And okay, how do I approach the future? Do I come more from a, from a fearful approach, or where do I see hope? And then who is the audience? If I am a leader and I talk to my team, I gotta make that vision relatable to them. [00:29:59] Michael Davis (2): Yes [00:30:01] Simon Vetter: the audience and what's in it for them, and how they look at the future, and how, what's their pain point. And so I think that second story about understanding who I speak to and who I tell the sto- the, the vision. And then the third one, what is the vision? [00:30:17] Michael Davis (2): Mm-hmm. [00:30:18] Simon Vetter: It is power trio applies very well, about Division [00:30:22] Michael Davis (2): Yeah, what you're saying makes me think-- I've done a lot of work with, military veterans, and one thing I've discovered about the military is that when there is a mission, it's the leaders who are very clear about the mission and say, "Here's the objective." Like, they call it commander's intent. "We gotta go capture that hill." They don't micromanage it. They say, "Here is the story. We're on top of that hill. You're gonna have to change the story as you meet the enemy and make changes, and you gotta change how we get there and, and how we're gonna fight back." It's very similar [00:30:55] Simon Vetter: I did a podcast with, Pete Logan. He was 26 years in the Navy. [00:31:00] Michael Davis (2): Yeah [00:31:01] Simon Vetter: And we talked about the commander's intent, which [00:31:03] Michael Davis (2): Okay [00:31:04] Simon Vetter: has three points: the mission, why do we do what we do? And in the military is keep our country safe. What are the tasks? What do we need to do? What are specific steps? And the third one, most importantly, what is the desired outcome? When we come back from a en- engagement, from a mission, what do we want? We want everybody to be safe. We want to have captured this. We want to have invaded this. And so that desired outcome is that future state, which is the picture. And I think it's such a powerful concept that we can apply to our life and, and our work [00:31:41] Michael Davis (2): Well, and it, it creates the same image in, in companies, corporations, organizations, is that so many leaders think they're being clear on what are we doing here. And the, and the rank and file's like, "I don't know what the heck we're doing. Why are we doing this? This makes no sense." And it's the ivory tower concept. I'm gonna sit up here and dictate what you do." Well, y- your troops are not gonna fall in line, Right As opposed to, "This is what we're doing, this is why we're doing it, and this is why your specific team needs to do this." Well, now that I understand it, I'm buying in [00:32:15] Simon Vetter: Right. Yeah [00:32:16] Michael Davis (2): it's, it's create that vision. By the end of quarter two, we are gonna be X. I don't know if we have certain number of sales or we're gonna be first in the world, whatever it is, be specifically clear about the goal. But then how are we going to measure that? How will we know we've accomplished the goal? This is why s- most storytelling or most stories fail, because we don't have a clear goal that the audience can root for the main character to accomplish. So we don't even know what's accomplished [00:32:45] Simon Vetter: There's an ele- there's an element about that end state. And there's been studied on that when leaders use more sensory rich emotional language instead of business jargon, they significantly engage their audience better. So the story has to address the person's senses, the hearing, the seeing, the, sensing, the tasting, and address the emotions to your point, address the conflict, the tension, the pain point. And so people relate to that. And oftentimes that emotional component is missed in a business environment. And then people, "Why, why don't people get it?" [00:33:29] Michael Davis (2): Well, Yeah. and that's how you, you mentioned the emotion. I've been studying this A- lot the last couple years. There's this mistaken belief that emotions don't belong in business. It's like, are you kidding me? I mean, th- they, they've done the science on this, that when we are in any situation, our bodies have the initial reaction, our emotions are then triggered, and then our thought process is triggered. They're all combined. We cannot treat business like emotion doesn't belong here. You're dealing with emotional creatures. Like it or not, human beings are emotional. And if we don't... Yeah, go ahead [00:34:05] Simon Vetter: the story people tell themselves about, yeah, emotions don't belong into executive [00:34:11] Michael Davis (2): And if you're not clear on the story that you want people to have when you're done presenting, they're gonna create one themselves, and you're not gonna like that story most likely [00:34:22] Simon Vetter: Yeah. Let's talk about your... What do you do? What are some of the exciting things that you're working on or towards? [00:34:31] Michael Davis (2): right now I'm working on just getting this Story Power Trio out into the world. I mean, I've been doing this for 15 years, Simon, as far as the coaching and speaking for 30, and once I found this trio, I felt like this is what I'm supposed to be out sharing with the world because I'm constantly seeing people not effectively communicating. This is my way of doing it. I wrote the book. TEDx Talk is coming out. These are my keynotes. These are my workshops, and I just get jazzed. But when I see people, the light goes on, it's like, oh my gosh. If I get clear on what I'm telling myself right before I go into a presentation, I know what they're thinking, my audience, we're gonna have great communication. One of the thing, and I'm an entrepreneur, my parents were entrepreneurs, and one thing I hate to see is somebody who has a fabulous idea that doesn't get it into the world because they're not effectively communicating to themselves, to their audience, or getting that story across, that future vision of what my product, service, or idea could do for the world, and that's what I'm driven by now. I think I'm gonna spend the rest of my life doing this. [00:35:36] Simon Vetter: I wanna do a shout-out to your book, The Story Power Trio: Master the Three Stories That Win Trust, Close Sales, and Increase Influence. What I love about it, it's only about 85 pages, a very easy read, but it's very insightful, and, so thank you for writing this. [00:35:54] Michael Davis (2): Oh, thank you, Simon. Appreciate that were giving advice to your 20-year-old self, knowing what you know now, what would that message be? Ignore that message that speaking is scary. Go and learn as fast as possible. Learn everything you can about communicating with others. not just speaking, but becoming a better listener and negotiator and understanding humans. I would dive deeper into human communication much sooner [00:36:23] Simon Vetter: Yeah. And joint token [00:36:24] Michael Davis (2): And joined Toastmasters 10 years sooner than you did. [00:36:27] Simon Vetter: Yeah, wonderful. Michael, any other final recommendations to the audience regarding what we've discussed? [00:36:35] Michael Davis (2): Yes. I'm gonna pull a l- like the, the through line for my TED Talk. the through line is you're not stuck, you're scripted. wherever you are in your business journey, leader, sales, doesn't matter what the title is, there are messages in you that may be restricting you, and it feels like those are permanent conditions, like they're carved in stone. They're not. They're more like sticky notes that somebody wrote a message on and got stuck to your brain, and you believe that for years or decades. They're not permanent [00:37:08] Simon Vetter: Mm-hmm. [00:37:09] Michael Davis (2): You're not stuck, you're scripted, and scripts can be rewritten [00:37:13] Simon Vetter: Yeah. And speakers are not born, they are taught and they [00:37:18] Michael Davis (2): Excellent [00:37:19] Simon Vetter: Michael, this has been such a wonderful conversation. Thank you so much. Where can we find you more if you are interested in your [00:37:29] Michael Davis (2): You can, yeah, you can jump in on my, website speakingcpr.com. I spend a lot of time on LinkedIn, and I would love to connect with you there. And then you can reach out to me, michael@speakingcpr.com [00:37:41] Simon Vetter: I'll put all that into the show notes . Again, Michael, thank you. I appreciate you you. Have a great day . [00:37:49] Michael Davis (2): Appreciate you, Simon. Thanks