Over the last 25+ of professional keynote speaking, I have transitioned from a speaker talking about my technical expertise to a speaker who tries the near impossible: to plant the seeds of mindset change and collective transformation every time I am on stage.
I don't think many event producers, bookers, or end clients know that keynote speaking can be not just motivational or even inspirational but actually transformational. I mean that a keynote speaker can use their 45 minutes to open up "possibility spaces" within the room and empower those in the audience to enter them.
So, in this article, I share a bit about my journey from motivational keynote speaker to transformational keynote speaker—and what a transformational keynote speaker has to do to achieve their bold ambitions to unleash breakthroughs in their audience.
The First Breakthrough: From Delivering Information To Being A Motivational Keynote Speaker
When I first started keynote speaking professionally, it was because I had been invited by companies like Unilever and Tesco—that were my consulting clients—to share my knowledge and technical expertise in disruption innovation, emerging technologies, and futuring. I didn't even know that professional speakers existed.
But I loved it!
Not being a comedian or Olympian, I focused on sharing my passion, knowledge, and craft at these most challenging of strategic activities. But it's a tough brief to inform people about such amazingly rich and difficult areas of knowledge work in a short period. I soon realized something more was needed and that it was an opportunity to develop my craft and myself in the process.
Learning from the intense experience of entrepreneurial coaching that I had been paying for as a 25-year-old founder of a fast-growing business—and inspired by various personal development courses I had attended—I added in a motivational speaker feel: aiming to leave my audience more knowledgeable but also with a sense of can-do, empowerment, and get-up-and-go to make stuff happen!
But I witnessed that the 'pzowie' feeling faded quickly after a keynote unless I generated something powerful to lock in the elevated state of the audience.
The Second Breakthrough: From Being An Inspirational Keynote Speaker To Becoming Transformational Keynote Speaker
I decided to step up again and become an inspirational speaker. I developed skills not just informing and motivating an audience but also opening up for them and, with them, a space of possibility that they could step into as individuals/organizations/industries. I would use my passion, innovation nous, and speaking power to inspire people with the opportunities that were available to them to make a world-changing difference. I elevated minds and elated hearts and got them inspired by the opportunities within the 'art of the possible', speaking on various topics.
I started to think I was still missing a trick. I was not being ambitious enough! As a practitioner (and permanent student) of transformational leadership development, complex change programs, and systemic transformation approaches, I realized that all the knowledge, motivation, and inspiration was not enough if the people in the room held on to outdated patterns of emotion, thought, and action—and if the culture of the organization or music of the system was resistant to change.
If you are a booker or event producer, read this companion piece on 7 Tips For Leveraging Transformational Keynote Speaking To Transform Your Audience.
What Makes A Transformational Keynote Speaker Different
Being a transformational keynote speaker takes everything I have got in my brain, sinews, and guts. To create the conditions for a group of people to start to experience lasting, significant (and even dramatic) positive change requires mastery of stagecraft.
As well as delivering high-quality content, to be transformational, you also have to do most, if not all, of these:
Meet people where they are—they must feel seen, hear, and 'got' to enter 'limbic resonance' with us—before taking them higher
Rapidly show them that we are 'like them' whilst maintaining the transformative potency of being an 'expert' or 'thought leader'
Share insights and ideas from our own "Hero's/Heroine's Journey" in a way that makes our gifts or 'boons' super-relevant to the audience
Use insights gleaned from the client and live in the room to unfold a narrative experience that moves from context to concepts to concrete action
As the most subtle level, emotionally 'weave' the diverse set of individuals together into a collective moment of coherence
Touch the audience in an abiding way, reminding each participant of their inherent potential—and the creative potency of all life
Speak from and embody our purpose—I dedicate each talk to the wholeness and flourishing of humankind—and let go of attachment to any specific outcome or agenda
Let go of any desire for perfection and trust that whatever comes out will fit if we are present (I take notes with a pen and paper as I go, noting down ideas, errors and typos as I go so my attention does not get sucked up by the drive to optimize)
Be responsive to the moment with a talk that is 'alive' and fits what is needed right there and then—and whatever is emerging as we gaze out to the audience and feel their hearts
Be ready to relinquish our plans and flow in a second in order to stay connected with the audience—even if that means stopping, sharing a fear, restarting, changing into a Q&A or anything else
'Hold space' for everyone in the room to go through the often uncomfortable and inconvenient experiences of deep change and transformation
Give people permission to be anxious or frustrated—but never let these emotions run amok in contagion
Presence the pain and suffering of not transforming—but focus on the joy and potential of transforming
Embody our wholeness as individuals—with all the frailties and foibles—and speak to the wholeness in others without ignoring their fragmentation
Model to the audience what it looks like to be both strong and courageous enough—and vulnerable and wise enough—to transform (without making it about us)
Pour immense amounts of "heat" into the space—to melt away "front", open up cold hearts and dismissive minds, and bring the audience into a state where transformation can happen
Open up a 'possibility space' and then invite the audience to enter it— gently yet insistently 'shepherding' them emotionally and cognitively if they are reluctant to engage
Constantly scan the room to check for people who have dissociated out of fear or habit—and "reach" out to them to bring them back in and light up their eyes
When it can make an impact, presence our own breakdowns and breakthroughs—whilst ensuring that we have 'processed' our pain so it is compelling, not overwhelming
Use sticky words, memes, movements, sounds, imagery, and more to 'anchor' in the transformative state so it can be recalled in future
Weave facts, evidence, neuroscience, examples, precedents, and other 'proof points' into an emotion-driven experience that moves people inside and then outside
Use embodiment techniques—like breathwork, visualizations, chanting, drumming, dancing, movement, etc.—to engage people at a deeper level in their guts (in their 'interoceptive' neurology)
Use versatile stances, gestures, eye sparkles, emphasis, tone, cadence, pauses, and pace to 'magnetize' the audience members to shift state
Ideally, give people tasks, suggestions, or tools to cement in the change and make it more concrete
This is quite some feat! But it is possible.
And it is beyond rewarding. It is my purpose in action!
To make it a reality, I have redesigned my materials, reinvented my examples and narratives, regenerated my speaking style, unlocked new ways of being on stage and off, and designed an onboarding and briefing process that would give me the best chance at using those amazing 40 or 60 minutes of attention to plant the seeds of transformation within the hearts, minds, and guts of as many people in the room or online as possible.
I invite you to step into your full power as a transformational speaker, harnessing a reverence for the power of being simultaneously at one with an audience—and a humble yet powerful catalyst of transformation within all.
If you want to understand how to deliver new formats of keynote speaking, like experiential/immersive keynotes or genuinely interactive keynotes, read this article.
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