by Claire Doole | Mar 5, 2020 | Blog, Moderating
The World Health Organisation has not yet declared the new coronavirus to be a pandemic, but to some of us who earn our living from moderating at events or training international teams, we are already suffering the consequences.
Last Friday the Swiss Federal Council announced a ban on all gatherings of more than 1000 people. It looked to be curtains for the International Film Festival and Forum on Human Rights scheduled for the 6th to the 15th March.
But yesterday the organisers announced their “programme 2.0” in which a smaller number of discussions and interviews would be transmitted live over the Internet allowing the public to ask questions of the speakers.
Proof indeed that webcasting is a potential solution for event organisers as they navigate the uncharted territory of travel bans and cancelled conferences and panel discussions.
Webcasting is just one option as I outline below based on my experience as a radio and video producer, presenter and panel moderator.
Audio or video
Audio, like radio, is much easier and less expensive than video.
You can create a sense of intimacy and connection with the listener if you have a moderator with a well-modulated voice and who is skilled at animating a discussion.
The speakers must also have good radio voices and have clear opinions and points to make.
With video, it is technically more complicated as you will need lights, camera and operators depending on the size of your budget. However, people remember things best when visually presented so video can be more powerful.
Pre-record or live
Live broadcasts get more viewers, as people love the sense that they are in real-time and capturing the moment.
However they come with the risk of technical glitches, challenging audiences and online trolls.
If you have a well-developed social media strategy and significant followers, then broadcasting on Facebook or YouTube live is a good option as it is technically not complicated and relatively inexpensive.
However, you have more control over a pre-recorded audio or video discussion and can also use the material in podcasts, online and on digital platforms to maximise audience engagement.
Whether live or pre-recorded, keep the panel discussion to no more than 30 minutes. Unlike traditional panel discussions, which can be from 45 minutes to 1 hour 15, those that are recorded and watched on line need to be shorter so you manage people’s short attention span.
Logistics and look and feel
Whether you are pre-recording or going live with audio or video, you need to think about the look and feel of the discussion. Do you want people to be seated on sofas like on Breakfast TV or in high backed chairs like at the World Economic Forum in Davos or will everyone be on high chairs news presenter style? It will all depend on the atmosphere you want to create.
Here are some other thoughts:
• Do seat the moderator and speakers so that everyone has eye contact. You don’t
want them to be seated in a line.
• Keep the number of participants to 4 including the moderator.
• Check the sound quality. Tie mikes are best for video and audio, as people often
don’t hold mikes correctly.
• Dress so that tie mikes can be clipped onto a shirt or blouse with no cable
showing.
• Make sure the room or studio is sound proof. If you are recording in an office
space, turn off the air conditioners as they hum.
• Provide make up or at least powder for video as this evens out the skin tone and
under studio lights guests won’t perspire.
• Select a moderator who is used to taking instructions from a director in their
earpiece if you are webcasting. The moderator will need to pass instructions on
to the speakers such as which camera to look into.
• Have an autocue for the moderator’s opening and closing remarks and for the
questions coming in from the public.
2020.02.25 – Studio Smart Cuts
L’équipe de 120 min en studio fond vert.
Photo : Philippe Krauer / Smart Cuts Video & Animation
Use professional production houses
Check out your local video and audio production houses and their studio facilities. They can advise you on what is technically possible in terms of lights, microphones, and cameras as well as how to manage speakers remotely and handle questions from the public.
In Geneva, I have worked with Actua films and La Souris Verte and just outside Lausanne there is Smart Cuts video and animation run by a former BBC colleague.
So event organisers, and moderators, don’t abandon hope in these uncertain times. Think creatively and you will be able to hold panel discussions albeit in a different format.
by Claire Doole | Feb 23, 2020 | Blog, Storytelling
“I am not really comfortable with storytelling. I don’t see how I can use it in my work”. This is a typical response from senior managers/executives to the idea of attending a storytelling workshop. And what’s more, I understand where they are coming from. As a BBC journalist, I was a professional storyteller – every day looking for the nugget of gold that I could mine to tell a story about something that had changed in the world.
But telling other people’s stories was much easier than telling my own. Journalists don’t like being the centre of the story – it makes them, among other things, feel vulnerable. What I have learned as a trainer, moderator and coach is that storytelling is about sharing experiences – either your own or someone else’s – so that you connect and build rapport, trust and credibility with those around you.
Research shows that our brains are hardwired to listen and to tell stories. Stories are how we think, make meaning of life and explain how things work. They help us make decisions, persuade others, create identities and teach social values.
In a business or organisational setting storytelling helps to sell, educate, inspire and motivate. It is a strategic tool that can bring you closer to your colleagues, clients and peers and transform how you and your organisation are perceived.
How to tell stories
All of the above holds true if the story is well told. It needs to have a clear structure so that it is easy to follow and relevant to the audience. In everyday life, we tell stories to our friends without necessarily drawing a morale or lesson learnt. If you are telling a story in a professional context you must always have a point.
In my workshops, I often tell a personal story about how I lost the equivalent of my annual salary when I first joined the BBC, due to poor advice by a former financial advisor in Geneva. He put me in funds that were far too risky for my investment profile, and which either collapsed or were suspended by the regulator. I explain how I then tried (and am still trying!) to expose his wrongdoing. I tell this story showing that there are different structures that you can use to achieve different impacts, as well as different rhetorical techniques to make it memorable.
It is a story that shows who I am – illustrating my values – trust, perseverance and quest for justice. It is a story that I could use to show people the type of person I am and why they should believe in me or want to work with me.
But it is also a story that can be used to teach a lesson – underlining the importance of assuming responsibility for your finances. I could also tell this story to motivate change by shedding light on what is wrong about the present way Swiss independent financial advisors are regulated and the need for tougher regulation.
Everyone is a storyteller
I hope that none of you have to tell a story like this, but if you are looking for a story, one of the simplest ways is to think about a key moment in your life – positive or negative – and reflect on the lesson learnt.
I also advise people to start to build a library of stories. Think about:
• Moments that made you who you are or who clarified your values
• Moments when you discovered your voice or leadership potential
• Difficult moments in business but worthwhile struggles or extraordinary feats
• Dangerous mistakes in business
• Stories of how your company handled the past
• Stories of how the future could look bright or dark
Start to catalogue stories that might serve as powerful illustrations of your ideas, register other peoples or institutional stories (anecdotes) that could illustrate a point you want to make or think about universal myths and fables that you can use as metaphors and analogies.
We are all storytellers but we are not always aware of it. Have the courage to tell a story and you will see that it can be your most valuable asset and even give you competitive advantage.
PS If you would like to know more about the story of my financial advisor, please email me. My purpose is naturally to warn you against using him!
PPS If you are interested in learning how to become a master storyteller, I run two courses – on public speaking and on storytelling in business.
Please get in touch by email or book a 30-minute discovery call.
by Claire Doole | Dec 7, 2019 | Blog
In presentation training we refer to STAR moments – something that the audience will always remember. Normally, this is something that is unusual or surprising such as Bill Gates making jokes and opening a jar of mosquitos to infect the audience at his TED talk on the need for more investment in combating malaria.
Unfortunately, STAR moments in panel discussions are far and few between. You may agree with the Guardian writer that most panels are pointless.
Panels take time and skill to organise if they are to be productive, informative and engaging for the audience.
I would therefore like to give my gold star for the best panel discussion of 2019 to the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom.
During Geneva Peace Week they organised a panel on framing peace from a feminist perspective in which peace advocates from Nigeria, South Korea and Lebanon shared their stories of alternative paths to peace.
WILPF_Geneva Peace Week_Flyer_Web
Why does WILPF win the gold STAR?
WILPF had all the ingredients for a compelling panel discussion – editorial and creative flair combined with a dash of strategic thinking. Below is their recipe for success:
Editorial strategy
1. The event linked to one of the overarching themes of Geneva Peace Week – a global perspective on peace building.
2. It had clear objectives:
• To explain what a feminist peace looks like
• To foster a discussion on alternative paths to peace
• To showcase the work of women advocating and working towards ending conflict
• To redefine security from a feminist perspective.
3. It was designed with the audience in mind – informed, diverse and interested in learning something new and different about peace building.
4. The selection of male and female speakers, from Lebanon, Nigeria and South Korea, and the stories they told perfectly matched the objectives and audience.
Creative flair
The Secretary General of WILPF, Madeline Rees wanted the event not to be “the usual panel discussion” but to go beyond the usual thinking about peace and bring to the surface different analysis, stories, strategies and solutions. This meant it had to be done differently and creatively.
1.The communication team was involved from the start – bringing not only an editorial but design flair.
2.The event was set in “WILPF’s Peace Lounge where the speakers were invited as guests to sit and share their stories with the invited audience.
3.The team created a space where lights and voices helped the participants to think differently and listen deeply. The event started in darkness with the audience shown to their seats by flashlight. For the first 5 minutes they listened to an audio recording – scripted by WILPF -between an actress and producer about how women tried and failed to get an inclusive and just peace after WW1.
4.The moderator made the link with women’s struggle today and as she introduced each speaker they emerged from the darkness and switched on their light.
5.In this intimate atmosphere, the speakers told stories about their commitment to justice, desire to end patriarchy and belief in a feminist peace. (In my next blog I shall review their storytelling best practice).
Preparation and rehearsal
The team organised technical rehearsals checking the set, the props, the lights and sound as if it were a theatre performance.
On the day before the speakers went through a dress rehearsal – practising their stories, timing them and working out the choreography of arriving on stage and activating the lights. As a result the “performance” was slick and professional.
Audience response
As the audience came in and sat down, I heard a few mutterings that the darkness and comfy seats could be an opportunity to take a nap. Far from it! The audience was engaged, prompted by the speaker’s stories to ask personal questions such as, “Anthony how did you become the man you are today?” and “Can I take you home as an example to my teenage son?”
The organisers had to turn away dozens of people. For those lucky enough to get seats, I heard only positive comments such as ” the best event all week” and “that was different and compelling”.
Disclaimer: I helped with the audio script, voiced over one of the roles and rehearsed the speakers, but the concept was all WILPF’s!
by Claire Doole | Oct 27, 2019 | Blog
I vividly remember getting criticised on Twitter for moderating two “manels” – all male panels – during a half-day event at the European Parliament in Brussels some years ago. It would have been a “manference” – a conference where only men speak – if the organisers hadn’t remembered to invite one woman to give a presentation.
The organisation, EU Panel Watch, was right to criticise. I should have refused to moderate the all male panels. Unfortunately, moderators rarely get a say in the selection of speakers. I now advise clients on how to design panels and conferences which are diverse, balanced and engaging – these are the principles I applied when editing BBC radio and TV news programmes.
Still EU Panel Watch’s latest annual report on women’s representation and speaker diversity on policy panels in Brussels shows change is slow and much more effort is required.
In 2018, out of 1583 speakers at conferences the organisation monitored in the “Brussels bubble”, only around one third were women – this held true for panels and keynote speeches. Shockingly, 26% of panels were all men and three quarters of them also had a male moderator. At these rates, EU Panel Watch estimates we can expect to see gender parity in 80 years!
Manels Tweet
The organisation recommends that event organisers take a pledge to never organise an all male panel, and strive for a diverse list of speakers to reflect wider societal views and standpoints.
It’s a pledge that hundreds of diplomatic missions, international organisations and NGOs have taken as part of the Geneva-based International Gender Champions initiative. In their words “50 per cent of the population warrants the same visibility as the other 50 per cent.”
However, event organisers have told me it can be difficult to find women with the right expertise and status – no doubt a consequence of the glass ceiling that women experience in many professions.
At a recent medical conference where I was training moderators, women said all male panels were a systemic problem in their field. They feared this would put off young women from joining the profession and contribute to undermining the credibility of women in science in general. A fear confirmed in an analysis by Nature magazine. The piece documents eight years of medical panels and concludes by pointing out that the situation is improving, yet it is easy to fall back into old habits.
The article also points out that while it is important to invite women to speak, it is more important to listen to them.
The women at the medical conference told me about the gender discrimination happening there. One female colleague witnessed a male co-facilitator trying to muscle in both physically and verbally to take over from the female co-facilitator. In another panel, two male moderators were patronising towards the two female speakers – an observation she said were shared by other women in the sessions.
This unacceptable behaviour only underlines the importance of the moderator ensuring all speakers get equivalent speaking time and challenging those who interrupt or talk over other speakers. Men who dominate the discussion or who are sexist have to be held to account
Change can happen
A few months before Emmanuel Macron became President of France, he was on a panel I was moderating on gender parity. During the discussion, I gave him the card of a women I had met at the conference who was a gender parity expert. His team invited her afterwards to speak at his En Marche political rallies.
The current gender imbalance on panels and at conferences mirrors the gender gap in wider society. That is why UN Gender Champions asks not only for a pledge for panel parity from member organisations, but also for two commitments to move gender equality forward in their institution.
by Claire Doole | Sep 11, 2019 | Blog
Mounting an exhibition is one of the most challenging but potentially rich types of storytelling, as you have the scope to appeal to the senses of sight, hearing and, in some cases, touch. Curators must find a theme, and weave a red thread or “fil rouge” through the lives of their famous and talented subjects to create a story that gives deeper insight and meaning to their work.
Unfortunately, the exhibition “L’aventure de la beauté” about the life of Helena Rubenstein failed to bring alive the story of the woman who invented skincare and make-up as we know it.
As I went around the exhibition at the Museum of Art and Jewish History in Paris, I realised that there was no red thread drawing you in to a life that defied convention. It failed on several levels in the art of storytelling.
A logical structure that inspires interest
There are many ways to structure a story so that it is easy to follow:
• Geographically
• Chronologically
• Thematically
• Problem v Solution
• Challenge v Opportunity
The curators structured the story geographically: Krakow – Vienna – Melbourne – London – Paris – New York – Tel Aviv. This is fine as a concept, but the story became very disjointed and confusing as Helena travelled back and forth between many of these cities during her 93 years.
The titles by themselves do not say much. However, you could generate much more interest by simply adding a sentence such as “Melbourne – a fortune is made”. It was there that Helena built her multimillion-beauty empire as a result of her business acumen in selling her mother’s face cream.
Match the words and the pictures
One of the basic rules of presenting is to make sure that your slides or other audio-visual support reinforce your message and don’t detract from it.
However, as you see from the text below the curators of the museum do not follow this rule. It says that Helena used to wear a white coat when visiting her factories. Unfortunately, the image next to the text is a portrait painting of Helena wearing a red dress.
The photos of Helena in her white coat are displayed in another room further on in the exhibition. Although she didn’t have a medical degree, she knew the value of pseudo-science to boost sales!
Helena was a passionate art collector – Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse were among her favourites. The exhibition includes works by these masters as well as by Marc Chagall and Maurice Utrillo. But have a look at the accompanying text to this work by Picasso.
Are you confused? For me there are a number of problems with the text. Firstly, it only makes the link to Helena – the subject of the exhibition – at the end. Secondly, it starts by describing not the collage we are seeing – “Confidences” – but another Picasso – “Glass and Pipe”. Thirdly, it introduces the house of Myrbor without any explanation. Fourthly, the text doesn’t clearly make the link with Marie Cuttoli who commissioned Picassos first collages. And fourthly, who is Albert Barnes?
How about if we match the text to the subject of the exhibition immediately and then bring in the other points?
Helena Rubenstein bought the first edition of Pablo Picasso’s collage “Confidences” – conceived by the Spanish master in 1934. Since 1917 he had been producing collage paintings for the House of Myrbor, created by Maria Cuttoli to sell collages designed by famous artists.
Add some flavour to your storytelling
The text below says that make-up was considered the preserve of tarts and actresses in the UK in the 1920’s. It says that aware society was rapidly changing, she created a make-up line to sell in her beauty salons. It jumps from cause to effect without telling us how Helena overcame the challenge.
Yet in a fascinating article in the Daily Mail we learn that she persuaded her influential friends such as the wife of the Prime Minister to wear her make-up and they became trendsetters – the equivalent of today’s YouTube influencers!
If you really want to know about Helena Rubenstein, read the Daily Mail article extracted from the biography by Michele Fitoussi. It is an example of great storytelling with a clear angle – how Rubenstein’s success came at a terrible emotional cost as she put her career ahead of her personal relationships.
The writer leads you seamlessly through the challenges Rubenstein faced – making you want to know more about an astute businesswoman who was ahead of her time.
In my opinion and that of a couple of friends who also saw the exhibition, the exhibition was a missed opportunity; the curators had all the ingredients but served up a dish devoid of flavour by not following the basics of storytelling.
by Claire Doole | Jul 30, 2019 | Blog, Media training
In everyday conversation, we often lead up to the point we want to make but when we are taking questions after a presentation, in a job or media interview then we want to do exactly the opposite!
Why is this? Because we want to be clear and concise and show with confidence we know the answer. And in a live broadcast interview, if the journalist suspects you are avoiding the question, they will interrupt and ask why you are not answering the question. So your reputation depends on getting to the point quickly.
Recently I watched some pre-recorded interviews done by CNN Money in Switzerland. As the Geneva Conventions turn 70, the programme asked whether this is a cause for celebration or concern? The reporter did 3 interviews with experts on whether the Conventions on respecting the rules of war are still relevant.
They illustrate 3 different ways of answering a question. Which one do you think is most effective?
Leading up to the answer
It takes the interviewee 45 seconds before she answers the question on whether the
Conventions are still relevant. And by the way, she doesn’t need to say they are not respected unless specifically asked as this opens her up to a potentially negative follow-up question.
In the second question on whether the Conventions should be broadened, she introduces too many ideas in a very long answer at nearly 2 minutes. If you go over 1 minute as a rule of thumb, you are normally not sticking to the point and in danger of rambling, makingit difficult for the journalist and, most importantly, the audience to follow you.
In the third and fourth questions she is much better because she answers the questions
directly on whether Geneva will remain a humanitarian epicenter.
Leading up to the answer is often the default position of academics, lawyers and scientists as they are trained to build their case – the why and how – before they give their conclusion i.e. their main point. The problem with this technique is it takes too long to get to the point with the risk that your audience is moving on to another channel.
Putting the what before the how and why
When talking to the media or even writing for the media – press releases also follow this principle – you need to make your point first and then give supporting evidence.
The interviewee here does exactly that in the CNN Money interview.
She follows the model I use in my media training – Point-Reason-Example- Point. (PREP)A textbook example!
The third interview is a mix of leading up to and answering directly the question.
What he does well though is make clear and simple statements such as “They (The Conventions) are not ideal, but they are the best we have. However, what they are not doing successfully is fighting terrorism.” As a result, he is eminently quotable!
PREP is key
Making your point first and not leading up to it takes preparation and practice. Before you do a media or job interview prepare 3 key messages you want to get across using the PREP formula.
When asked a question if it is favorable to you then answer it directly using the formula. You will impress the interviewer with your clarity of thought, make your point clearly and concisely and run no risk of getting interrupted!
