Everyone has an expertise; some are not recognized as experts though. Look for interesting people that you are interested in, regardless of their credentials or tenure.
This allows you to be in conversation mode instead of presentation mode. One of my students recently said this made the biggest difference for her with the experts I invite to my classes at Loyola University of Chicago’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies. By asking personal and professional questions these experts come in with their whole self and not only a piece of their ‘expert-ness’! Keep it human.
Give the audience an opportunity at the end to tell the interviewee what they liked, learned, and appreciated about them. I call this the ‘secret sauce’ since it allows the interviewee to understand their impact in a concrete way. If you are the interviewee all you need to say is “thank you!” Always have the audience tell them with you at the end wrapping it up. Even hardnosed experts get very soft hearing their impact in real time.
Larry King did this on every show and I’ve often found the audience questions are better! I’ve done this with every interview in every program for the past 30 years and I’m continually impressed by the questions that I had never even thought of. If you are the interviewee, be as honest as you can be. Start by asking their name (this makes it more personal) and then address their question with a ‘thank you’ and their name at the end. This is very useful on radio or live Podcast interviews…personal is always preferred over the anonymous voice.
Dr. Rudolf Dreikurs advised that a word, a phrase, a pause will often reveal even more below the surface. Ask that next deeper question. If you are the interviewee listen closely to that next question and go as deep as you wish. How would you respond to these?
- A top administrator says, “I really got this job accidentally”
- A successful CEO says, “I sleep pretty well except for the times I don’t”
- A novelist says, “I do love my characters and sometimes to me they are even more real than real ones I meet.”
There’s gold to be found there…so dig!
I try to never assume about jobs, countries, culture, etc. Let the interviewee be the one in the know. If you are the interviewee, be ready to make plain what your country is like, what your job entails, etc. Never assume, even when you are in front of a professional audience that they all understand the same…some are distracted, some wondering when lunch is, and of course many are emailing, or thinking about emailing!
It’s even more fun when you teach the audience something. I was interviewing a professional and the topic of arranged marriages in parts of India came up. I registered some confusion and he said, “Kevin you marry the one you love; we love the one we marry…and you are going to have to do that anyway!” Boom, mic drop moment!
Sometimes an interviewee will choke up discussing their parents, siblings, or an event with deep meaning for them. In this case as the interviewer, just wait. Allow the interviewee to get themselves together…usually only a moment or minute or two. If you are the interviewee, take a deep breath and allow yourself to say what you want. The audience will always, always be on your side. They’ve felt the same way!
Paraphrasing and an empathic statement can help here to cut the tension. If it is abusive, you as the interviewer need to jump in and respond directly and assertively to the abusive one. Remind them of the purpose of your work today and the way everyone will conduct their work. If you are the interviewee, take a deep breath and paraphrase with some empathy also (this can help defuse and create some connection) and then provide your best answer without the fight and without an attitude. The audience will side with you. One method to diffuse the situation is to ask for the person’s name and then use it in your answer…this creates the human connection versus the hit-and-run experience. Work to understand their deeper question which is often built on fear or hurt.
Some hosts go on about how much they know the person they are about to interview, where they met, where they work, how great they are, etc. Even the hosts with great reputations do this. One recent well-known host took the first 9 minutes talking about the guest instead of talking to and with the guest. Don’t be that guy! If a host does this to you make your first comments about the audience and the topic instead of more chit-chat about your relationship with the host.
Ask the question your audience is wanting you to get to right away. “Many here wonder if this is a merger or a takeover?” is better than softer questions. Get right to business! If you are the interviewee decide for yourself what you think the audience wants to hear and get it out even if the interviewer is going soft. Address the issue whether it is the elephant in the room or the pesky mosquito in your ear!
Even experienced newscasters make the mistake of asking multiple questions, especially on the radio. After their question they continue with “is it about xxx, or is it xxx etc.” Not only does this constrict the interviewee, it can confuse them. Instead ask the question, and then go quiet. It’s their turn, not yours. For example, “What are your thoughts on the situation in the Ukraine?” is a better question than “Do you think we will have to go to war, or engage, or do you think diplomacy will work? I mean is this a Cuban Missile Crisis kind of thing?” Yikes!! If this happens to you when you are the interviewee you could:
- Respond by ignoring their prompts (it’s best just not to listen to them)
- Paraphrase the question again
- Say “Well actually it is none of those…here is what might be more useful.”
Don’t feel your questions have to be smart or even informed. Allow your curiosity to be your guide. And know that some audience members are not experts. When someone tells me what they do for a living, I don’t assume that I know. I ask, “If I followed you around all day what would I see you actually doing?” This answer is far more interesting than their title!
Some interviewers go on and on and on about themselves. Nobody cares. Allow your expertise to show through your thoughtful questions. Some interviewees do the same; nobody cares! The interviewer wants to improve their condition; they want YOU to help solve their problem. Your self-bio is the least of what they need. They will patiently wait for the ego to unfold but what they really want is what you’ve got for them, not who you are to yourself.
My final tip in this series is something I've learned from experts in negotiation. When it is obviously a bad deal a key technique is to “Walk Away”; it's important that you recognize when it is time to decline, and reassess. This always reminds me of the famous 1968 hit by the Four Tops, ”Walk Away Renee”. Why don't you take a moment to enjoy this masterful group here.
My next series will be on ideas for when you are being interviewed and when you are interviewing. Watch this space!
It will pay big dividends to write ‘that letter you were always going to write’ to your clients, colleagues, friends, children, spouse or partner. Maybe you could also include a former professor, the physician who encouraged you to follow your specialty, that special person who doesn’t really know they are special. Consider a handwritten letter verses an email. Either is better than not doing it, but the impact of a handwritten one really lasts!
This may be just me, but I have a visceral negative reaction to self-described “opinionated people.” I really don’t want to know their opinion, especially when it begins with “Well here’s my opinion about that!” It often feels superior, competitive, and rigid. An alternative might be a question, an affirmation of the other, an encouragement, a discussion. But this is just my opinion!
Consider asking every attendee to bring a problem that they need help with to a meeting, instead of a report. To save time have them write it up in under 200 words and publish it at the meeting. Give a time period not to repeat the problem (we’ve seen it already) but to answer questions and take suggestions, without comment, only for consideration. This is important because otherwise you’ll have defensive debates. At the end of each you might conclude with, “Is there anything there that intrigues you and might get things more on the right track?”
This is the title of one of my books co-authored with Cyndi Maxey CSP. We heard recently that someone was teaching our book with closed-ended questions and lectures! As an author all I could think was “Fantastic!” with a big grin. When you facilitate, get others talking and your content will emerge in the same way as when we mix ingredients for that stews and cakes.
Put your colleagues into small groups of three and have them focus on one question for 5-8 minutes then move to a new group. After a few moves ask, “What did you just learn from your group members?” Always avoid the deadly, boring, mind-numbing “Let’s all report out!” or “What did everyone say?” What they learned, leads to others learning, which is the whole point of any meeting. In fact, on Zoom I learned the Chat Box Waterfall from Caelan Huntress. Simply ask everyone on your Zoom call to go to the chatbox then say “I’m going to give you 45 seconds to type, but don’t hit enter until I tell you so. Here is your question _____...now type…don’t hit enter.” Then I go quiet (we can’t type and listen at the same time!) and after 45 seconds I say, “OK hit enter!” You’ll see a cascade of participation! Then simply pick a person and have them share, then they pick a person and so on. No need to do everyone. Save the chat and distribute.
You know which one it is! For me it was presenting at @ACHE 2021 Congress without slides. I’m not a huge fan of PowerPoint or Keynote anyway so I thought I’d give it a try. I took the advice of professional speaker Catherine Johns to look ‘through’ the camera (not ‘at’ the camera). I had a few notes like Lester Holt has for @NBC Nightly News does, an outline of major ideas on a flip chart behind the camera, and I envisioned my invisible audience loving every minute! It was a risk, but I’d already seen so many presenters who ‘shared their screen’ and then it was slide after slide after slide, sometimes every word narrated by the speaker! How about you? What would be a small risk for you? About how:
· A meeting with only chairs in a circle.
· An electronics free meeting…no computers, no cell phones, no slides.
· Sitting with each patient you visit instead of standing.
· Asking your nurses the best question I learned from Char Wenc: “What do you know, that I don’t know, that I should know?” A great, great question for every executive or parent to also ask!
· Inviting your “Dr. Evil” to coffee just to chat. (Every organization has one. Maybe this person is isolated, lonely, and in need of you!)
· Treat your kids to ‘dessert first’ next time you are out for a family dinner. Quite literally order dessert first prior to the entrée. (Your children will love you forever! One of my physician clients did it at Denny’s with his four kids and his wife. Yes, she was surprised! He told me with a lump in his throat, “Kevin it was the best dinner we ever had…we talked! No iPads, no phones…we talked!”)
· During your next “I am losing this argument” moment just say “I need to go to the bathroom, I’ll be right back.” Then get your act together and return with “Now, where were we?” Notice the change that always happens in mood, communication, and cooperation.
· Marina Bluvshtein a professor from Adler University in Chicago advises “Try to win an agreement instead of an argument!”
· Negotiation expert Derek Arden from the UK advises that people love a good talking with, rarely a good talking to!
Risks taken never feel that big after all!
Be careful about the letters after your name and the ones after theirs. Let them see yours but focus on theirs. Ask about their PhD and their thesis. Ask how medical school was for them. Notice the MBA and other Master’s degrees and inquire about what they learned. Be impressed with @Harvard, @Loyola, as well as the schools you never heard of before with equal curiosity. Physicians love to talk about how they chose their specialty; healthcare executives love to talk about the latest innovation; chaplains about their latest patient or family; and students really like to talk about a favorite professor. Ask, paraphrase, listen. Be more about their ‘alphabet soup’ than your own.