Okay, this might be the bravest or dumbest thing I’ve done on this blog but I feel quite well motivated, so I’m going to do it now, before I “bottle-out” as we say in the UK.
I’ve read in many places about the TED presentations (such as Garr’s Presentatation Zen blog) and I have to confess I’ve not (yet) watched them all, but I have watched the one by Tony Robbins. For those of you who haven’t heard of him, he’s described variously as things like “the world’s leading motivational speaker”. For me to critisize him is pretty presumptive, but I’m going to risk it.
His presentation was apparently a good one at first sight, no doubt about it. Certainly the audience loved it – if you don’t get bored and stop watching, you’ll have seen the standing ovation at the end…. and yet I can’t help but feel that this ovation was in part at least, set up for him by previous speakers. Watch the other presentations and you’ll see what I mean: by comparison to thier content, TR was just a wind-up act.
His voice was high, in the chest and rough: all of those contribute to a sense of urgency and excitement in the audience, certainly, but also to a (longer term) feeling that he doesn’t actually mean what he says… which is ironic because for the second half of the presentation at least he was talking about emotions. Heaven alone knows what he was talking about for the first half of his presentation – I’ve forgotten already and I only watched it a few minutes ago! A victory of presentation style over presentation substance.
There is a sad but wonderful irony here too, that the second half of his presentation didn’t really even make sense overall – sure, each sentence and paragraph individually was sensible (even if it was nothing more than a hyped up re-packaging of Maslow’s pyramid of motivation with sexier wording) but the overall presentation structure didn’t hold water. (Watch the presentation yourself and see!) Why not?
Because he made the biggest mistake that presenters can make! He forgot to keep an eye on the time he had left for his presentation! Given that there was a great big count-down timer on the floor at the front of the stage, that takes some doing! So why did such an experienced presenter as TR make such a basic mistake – a mistake that meant his presentation lost focus, rushed, skipped things and ultimately just stopped and finished un-satisfactoraly for everyone?
Well, I’m probably biased because I’ve heard lots of bad things about TR and this is the first of his presentations I’ve ever actually witnessed for myself but it seemed to me that the clue lay in how well his presentation was being received…. very well indeed at the time.
I believe that’s because his presentation became a “self-presentation”. He, TR, became the focus, instead of his content. He’s a great presenter, no doubt about it, but that’s a basic mistake: perhaps a less powerful presenter would have retained the necessary ounce of self-doubt to be just that little bit more humble in his/her presentation.
A presentation is not about the presenter, it’s about the message. It seems to me that TR forgot the basic mantra of presentations:
A presentation is not about telling people what you know. It’s about telling them what they need to know, in the way they need to know it.
Go through the video again, and count the number of times you hear the word “I”.
So why is he successful?
Does it mean you you can be a bad presenter if you have a good message?
Does it mean you you can be a bad presenter if you have a good PR machine?
Does it mean if you just spout meaningless rubbish that people want to hear it doesn’t matter how well or badly you present it?
On a more parochial note i have seen Thomas Power present live and he is truly bad, do a critique of him Simon, that would be interesting, yet Thomas runs the highly successful Ecademy and makes it successful by being, like Tony Robbins a ‘personality’.
Tongue in cheek answers are
Dunno.
Sometimes.
Yes.
Yes, sadly.
I’ve never seen (or even met Thomas) so I can’t comment but I must admit I’ve not heard good things about his style. I’ve read the transcripts of his a couple of times though and I must admit they weren’t inspiring.
S
Hello,
i do not know about which video or presentation you are talking or referring to so it’s difficult to judge what you say.
i only can tell you the following ; Anthony Robbins is by far the best motivational speaker and coach in the world. He has coached the last three presidents of the USA, Lady DI, Nelson Mandela, Michael Gorbatjov, etc… This is not because he is just a good presenter. He knows very well what he talks about and he masters the psychology ofg human beings as no other person.
If you want to experience his knowlegde and skills and find out how it can impact your life, you should attend his Unleash the power within seminar. There is one at the end of the month in London Excell.
Don’t worry about your money, Anthony Robbins is so sure about the fact that you are going to like it taht he gives you an 100% Satisfaction guarantee.
The only thing you have to do is have an open mind and go there to learn something about yourself! You’ll be surprised what you might find out about yourself and your limitations and possibilities.
Nobody learns something from critisising other people. And by the way, if you have the impression that Anthony Robbins forgot about the time…very good, then he got you because Anthony Robbins does everything with a purpose and an outcome in mind.
I can know…
I wish you an outstanding day
Eric Eraly
Hi Eric – my bad – I should have put a link in my original post. I was referring to his presentation linked in Garr’s blog at
http://presentationzen.blogs.com/presentationzen/2006/06/if_your_ideas_w.html
Perhaps I’ve not been clear enough in my implications – I’m basing that on how strongly you jump to TR’s defence (as if he needs to be defended from the likes of mere me! :) ). I’m not saying he’s not one of the best at what he does – I was saying that even though he’s one of the best he still got it wrong here.
Cheers…. Simon
good material thanks
Hi Simon.
I’ve just come across your review. Not sure whether you still hold the same opinion as the above was posted a number of years ago.
I’ve watched this presentation a number of times in the past and found myself most definitely impacted by it. I’ve studied Tony’s work for quite a while now and agree with those that say he’s a master of marketing amongst other things.
My understanding is that his presentations are usually extremely well prepared and there’s a very good reason behind everything he does – one that isn’t always obvious to his audience or critics.
Since practicing NLP myself I’ve realised that there are many occasions where clients may not fully appreciate why something is said or done in a particular way. You have to have a deep confidence in yourself, your knowledge, skill and experience and what you’re ultimate objective is. Much of time, in this line of work, it is not only the conscious mind that is being communicated with, it is the subconscious mind also – the place where the really profound changes can be made and lives transformed for the better.
I guess what I’m saying is, it doesn’t really matter in Tony’s line of work whether the traditional rules of presenting are followed or not. The objective is to make positive changes at a deeper level, and the man certainly succeeds in doing this with people who are serious about taking on the challenge.
I wonder if that classic old rule is dominating here – you weren’t taken by his speech, forgot the content rapidly and found only errors in his method – could the reason for this possibly be because this is what you were looking for? (Seek and you shall find!)
Thank you for the review however. It’s always interesting to hear other people’s opinions and you’ve highlighted to me that it’s okay to give it your all and do your absolute best and trust that the results will come. If even the greats like Tony Robbins, can be less than perfect and attract criticism, and still give their clients the amazing service they pay for – then it’s quite okay for the rest of us to be the same!
With thanks and respect,
Mayuri Goodhand.
Hi Mayuri – I can’t tell any more as the video in question gives a 404 error. How did you manage to watch it?
Being a bit more robust (and only slightly tongue-in-cheek) if I wasn’t “taken by his speech, forgot the content rapidly and found only errors in his method” who’s fault is that? Sure, it could be as you say that this is all I was looking for. Alternatively it could be because he was borrowing from someone else’s work without recognising that fact and was rude enough to the other speakers not to finish on time….!
That said, you could be right, in that I don’t have much time for what he does: I’ve heard far (far!) too many stories about they hype exceeding the content, so it is very possible that I arrived at the video in a sceptical frame of mind.