Giving TED-Style Talks

Doug Bruce of the Epicenter Deployment Support Unit (EDSU) presented a COEM talk at the Colorado Emergency Management Association Conference in February 2022. Bruce delivered “The Future is Experiential: Preparedness Outreach Learnings from Some of the World’s Biggest Brands,” a seven-minute talk on how emergency managers can apply learnings from experiential marketing to their outreach activities.

It takes a lot to “put yourself out there” and present a unique idea. When I decided to present “The Future is Experiential…” at the CEMA conference, I knew I had value to add to the larger conversation at the event, but that didn’t make it any less nerve-wracking. I know, though, from my years of experience in emergency management and experiential strategy and marketing, that everyone has at least a couple great stories in them. The key is making it relevant to the audience. I had a great story, but I had to make it relevant. The task was clear.

I began preparing for my talk 6 or 7 months earlier. My process began with the pitch. I started by brainstorming for myself, both in an outline and as a story. At one point, I was driving across Colorado and started dictating to my phone as I was thinking about aspects of like to include.

What is the end idea? What’s the key point I’m trying to convey? What’s the tone? Should it be authoritative or curious? If I use humor, will it land? If I’m speaking in a series, will what I work present well with the people before and after me? Am I fitting my content into a message that both aligns with the conference themes? Is my content “more of the same” or am I challenging assumptions, telling a good story, and highlighting something that needs to be heard? What happens if I ruffle feathers; wait, is that the point of conferences anyway?

Eventually my 2000+ word rambling essay to myself was shaped in the edit and the scraps were left on the cutting room floor.

I worked on my transitions; fluidity is key for audience retention, like the way a radio DJ has a unique way to extemporaneously transition between relatively unrelated news stories. And callbacks, references to previously introduced content, became important pivot points to keep my audience engaged. Tying the beginning to the end, creating a narrative loop, was the goal for the arc of my story. I practiced until I could easily recite it, almost like a song.

Telling an engaging story for seven minutes isn’t as easy as it looks–especially in a world where the longest social media content seems to be 15 seconds. Words matter and it seems that less is usually more. If it takes too much to explain the components of the concept, the audience won’t follow.

In the end, I’m grateful for the opportunity to speak and I’m glad that I did. Like I said, it takes a lot to “put yourself out there” and present a unique idea. But the benefit of engaging your industry peers and continuing important conversations far outweighs any temporary embarrassment we might endure.