Speakers tend to fall into one of two camps:
Every talk is unique. You customize every speech to match the audience and the context.
Same talk every time. You have a ‘standard’ talk – one that you know line by line, like an actor reciting a play.
Neither approach is ideal:
A standard talk makes for a great delivery – but it also makes you inflexible and vulnerable to interruptions. It can also get boring for the speaker.
Custom talks require preparation and slide building every time. Worse, giving a new talk every time means you never get truly great at delivering it. (For one, you’ll often struggle to end on time.)
There is a better way: Using what I call the Module Method.
Modules explained
A module is a self-contained segment of your talk, typically around 5-8 minutes long, offering the audience a single useful idea.
A 30-minute talk called “Key Lessons for Startup Founders” might contain three modules, like this:
Using modules offers a lot of benefits:
Extreme flexibility. You can quickly build talks of any length, from a 5-minute panel opener to a 60 minute solo talk.
Strong delivery. By reusing modules, you get really great at delivering them – and you only need to create slides for them once.
End on time. Chunking your talk into modules makes it easy to stay on time.
Adjust on the fly. Did the previous speaker go over time? Simply cut out one of your modules.
Low-risk testing. You can test a new module safely: slot it in between two well-known ones.
Versatility. Once you have created 5-6 modules, you can mix them to create a lot of different talks.
To be clear, this is not the only way to do keynotes. It is, however, a method that works. By using it, you can develop good content very fast – and it will save you a lot of time down the road.
I’ll say more on how to create good modules in the upcoming posts.