Boosting Onstage Confidence with Practical AV Support

0:00 You know, you want to support your keynote speakers and your presenters on stage and make them feel as comfortable as possible. But how exactly do you do that? Well, let's get into it. Welcome to the Event Pro show, your ultimate guide to the world of corporate events. Whether you're a corporate event planner, experiential marketing pro, producer, technician, or anyone involved in creating exceptional events, this podcast is your go to resource for valuable insights, expert tips and inspiring stories from the industry's leading professionals. Well, welcome to the Event Pro Show. I am your host, Seth Macchi. I am the CEO of lemg, which is an event production company based in Charlotte, North Carolina. We travel all over the country producing primarily corporate events. And I say that because there's an issue that we need to talk about.

0:56 I think we spend a lot of time, and even on, on this show we spend a lot of time talking about the planning of events and how to execute events from the, either the planner or the technical side or maybe some other adjacent discipline within corporate events. But sometimes we forget about the actual human beings that go on our stages and have to get up in front of our audiences and talk to them. And I would like to talk about something called giving your keynote speakers or presenters the gift of creating great av. And the reason I call it that is I want to tell a little story personally of what it feels like to be on stage and present.

1:39 And I'm not, I'm not talking about professional speakers. Now. They, they do in fact, you know, a lot of professional speakers, they deal with anxiety. A lot of front people in bands, you know, they're actually, a lot of them are introverts, but they've figured out ways to be extroverts on stage and, and, and do really great. I'm talking about the type of person that is probably on your stage looks a lot more like me. So let me give you an example. I grew up doing all sorts of performing. You know, even, even I remember in third grade being in a play that was my first singing solo was in third grade or it was a duet. That was fun.

2:20 And then all throughout my life I was in choirs, I was in band and I got a little older regular bands and, and did that kind of stuff. Always was singing or talking in front of people. And then as I got into my professional career, I started to develop the ability to do public speaking. Now I would not ever say that I am a professional public speaker. I know them, I appreciate them. They are fantastic. They set the audience at ease. The moment they get on stage, they have people engaged and they do their whole thing, they walk off stage, people feel insp. And you know, some action, some great positive thing when they do it, that is not me. You know, I can get in front of people and I can speak if I need to. It's a necessity thing and I can find, you know, the ability to do that. But I pull from a lot of my background and you know, growing up, being on different stages and, and all of that, it is still uncomfortable. Now most of the people that speak at corporate events are some sort of executives, manager, someone telling story of what happened at the company, you know, or something that they are a normal employee in a company, they're not a professional entertainer or speaker, but they have to get up on your stage and they have to speak. And that is. And a lot of you even thinking about that right now gives you anxiety. The fact the thought of you getting up in front of people

3:52 gives you anxiety. And you're in a huge group of company there, a huge percentage of the United States or just people on the globe feel the same way. I did a quick Google search before I talked and so don't quote me on this, but I believe it, that it's generally true. 75% of people fear public speaking. More people fear public speaking than fear death. So a larger percentage of the population thinks more about anxiety as it pertains to public speaking than they do about their own death, which is crazy. Something like 85% experience some level of anxiety when thinking about public speaking. So you're talking about the vast majority of people. If this was a political vote, that would be a landslide. So most people feel uncomfortable on a stage. So that's the backdrop of what I want to talk about is that we can do all the planning and the room looks great, the experience is great for the attendee. But are we thinking about the journey of our speakers from before, during and after their presentation and what is that like? Well, I want to talk about four main milestones or points in time when I think that partnering with a great AV company can help address anxiety and why it's important to work with a great AV partner, if for nothing else than to set your presenters up for success. So the

5:22 first place that I would say is very helpful for a presenter is in rehearsals. So rehearsals is a time that is a set aside time when nobody's working on the set, nobody's in the room other than people maybe part of the production or part of the leadership team and the presenter can go through in whatever way makes them Comfortable their presentation. And so I've seen just like a, you know, cue to cue or looking from slide to slide. They just want to see what it looks like in the room. They get to walk on the stage. Maybe they'll put a microphone on and just hear what it sounds like to speak in a space and just get comfortable. Just get comfortable. If you have never experienced speaking in front of people, it can be such a bizarre thing. You can be as prepared as possible. You did all of your at home talking in a mirror, practicing and everything. But when you step onto a stage in a. In a unique space that you haven't been in, it could seem cavernous. If you're not hearing things well, echoes are coming back to you.

6:31 There is something very real to this fight or flight response in humans where weird things happen. You get dry mouth, you forget what you were talking about, about something that you're an expert in, and it just leaves you. Your body just abandons you, your mind abandons you. So a rehearsal is a great place to begin to get those things out of your system. You know, at least you can picture now before you come back on for your real presentation, what the experience is like once you get up there. And that alone can reduce anxiety, you know, by huge percentage, depending on the person. That can be a huge difference between feeling confident and not walking up in your normal presentation. So that's the rehearsal experience. The rehearsal experience. You get to hear things. You also get to meet the technical team if that's part of that rehearsal experience.

7:23 So not just like sound people and all of that, but you can meet the person that's controlling your graphics, work on your presentation a little bit. You get to know the people that are supporting you. So you're not just walking up and staring into bright lights. You don't know who's out there. You actually know that, you know, Julie's in the back doing audio and. And Tom is in and over here doing your presentation. You know the people so that that can set your mind at ease. Number two, it's important to focus before a presentation. So having a place that you can get in the right headspace. So attendee is, you know, you. We all go to these events. Sometimes you're speaking maybe at a networking event, and all day long you're just talking to people, Talking to people. And then if you have to go from that straight up onto a stage and do your presentation, you really haven't had a time to mentally prepare. And so if you can give your attendees, if you haven't Done green rooms before, consider it. And green rooms are not a diva experience or extravagance. What they are really is for your presentation centers to have a place to get away for a moment before they go on to focus and get ready. This is where they take that rehearsal experience. And you can internalize, okay, when I walk out there, I can visualize what the stage is going to be like and you can kind of center focus, think about what you're going to say and then go out and, and this is, it's super important psychologically for most people. Very few people

8:55 can go from like talk, talk, talk, a big, you know, all sorts of stimulus and then walk on stage and do something incredibly focused. There are people that can do that, but the vast majority of people need a time, a place that they can focus. So green rooms, I would recommend green rooms. Your AV team can help set that up as well. The second piece or the third piece and the fourth have to do with being on stage. Okay, so they've, they've been, your speakers were in a green room. They, they walk up to do their presentation. There's two things that happen. And remember I was talking about your body will betray you with that fight or flight response. You forget what you're talking about and you have a hard time hearing. You know, your senses that are always in your life have never let you down.

9:39 Sometimes things you know when you're nervous happen. And so number one, downstage monitors, they're called DSMs. These are the TVs that are at the downstage edge of the stage that are looking back at the, the presenter. A lot of you do this, some of you might not have done it. And the reason why it's important, one, you can put countdown timers there so people stay on, on track. That's good. And that keeps you on your schedule. That's important for long winded people to know when they need to wrap it up. But really it's the support of seeing the presentation that you have as you're talking without having to crane your neck and look at the other screens behind you. And that creates kind of an anxious experience if you don't, if you can't see your presentation, but if it right in front of you. These downstage monitors visually support you psychologically and also keep you on track. You know, you, your brain can kind of let out on you, but if you can see that, it helps you move forward in a calm way. These are, this is a supportive device that is helping your keynote speakers, your presenters, all the people on Your stage to feel great about being up there. Number two or the fourth piece, you know. But number two on stage that I would recommend is fold back speakers. These are the speakers that are on stage pointed back at presenters. And what that is, is they can hear themselves very well. A lot of times when you're in a large ballroom or a large arena, the bigger the room gets, the longer it takes for your voice to come out of the PA

11:11 and bounce against the back wall and come back to your ears. And it can, that echo can really throw you off. It can really throw you off as a presenter. And so having foldback speakers on stage helps you hear yourself. And then it is a necessity if you have Q and A happening in the audience. So you can have those Q and A mics coming out of the fullback speaker and your, your presenters on stage can hear what people are asking. There is nothing worse than not being able to hear yourself or your mic cutting out, or not being able to see or your presentation goes out. All of these things are things that a great AV partner will ensure does not happen. But also because we work in live events, we know that occasionally things happen, but they have a plan B. They can quickly get up there with a new mic, they can quickly help support the presenter if something goes wrong so that you can move on.

12:06 I cannot stress enough that the better you feel on stage, the better you perform, the better your event is, the better experiences it is for your attendees. Another story I could say to kind of tie that in is, have you ever seen maybe an amateur performer, maybe maybe a kid that's like, you know, just starting and they're, they're like a songwriter and they're. The first time they're on stage or something with their guitar or something and they're singing or their little keyboard, they're doing their song and it's, they're just very nervous and, and the feeling you get is you're really nervous for them, right? When they're not comfortable, the audience isn't comfortable. Now think about the last great show that you went to, and that entertainer was up there and just had the audience in the palm of their hands. They were like, they were in their power on stage.

12:57 You know, at the peak of their career, they knew what they were doing from the moment they walked out to the moment they left. You were just like having a great time. That's the difference between high confidence on stage and low confidence. And so what we want to do, because we deal mostly with amateurs on our stages at corporate events, aside from the high level keynotes that you come in, all the other speakers are not, not professionals, you know, they're not professional speakers. We want to make sure they feel incredibly supported so they can have all the confidence that they possibly can have to deliver a great experience for your attendees. This is why I call it the gift of great AV that you're giving to your presenters. You're supporting them in every way possible. There's a lot of psychology that happens when you're on a stage and a great AV partner can help you mitigate some of the weird stuff that the human body does when you're nervous on a stage. So amateurs need to feel supported and equipped. And also your professional speakers, they greatly appreciate having a well run, well oiled professional AV team because they go from event to event to event.

14:11 And they're just more grateful in my experience that okay, we're working with professionals, let's move on, let's do this. There's no drama. These are reasons why that we need to take care of our people that go onto our stages. Let's think about them just for a little bit. I know there's a lot of planning that goes on. We all plan, we all have logistics. But think about your attendees and ask yourself, am I supporting them? Or think about your presenters and ask yourself, am I supporting them in a way that, that ensures that they can, they have the chance, they have the opportunity to give their best performance for my attendees. I hope this helped. Thank you for joining us on the Event Pro Show. We release an episode once a week. We kind of do an alternating schedule where one week I have an amazing guest that is some sort of adjacent discipline to corporate events in some way. They touch that general session and I want to introduce you to them because there's just so many great people I've met along the way. And then the other week I'll give you a little bit more drilled down tips about AV and how, how it can help you produce better corporate events.

15:20 So thank you for joining us. You can go to theeventproshow.com to hear our entire catalog now of great episodes. If you need an AV provider, go to LEMG Live. We would love to help you. Or you can find me seth Macchi on LinkedIn. I'd love to chat with you about your next event. Thank you so much for spending time with us and having a great day. The Event Pro show is a production of LEMG video by Nick Barrett, audio and post production by Prince Thompson. You can learn more about us at LEMG Live.