I was at a book launch last night (the first in long long time). It was for Don't Picture Me Naked by Michelle Bowden. Michelle is an expert in and course facilitator on public speaking and presenting and her book is great manual on those topics. The friend I was meeting there was running late to I was left to work the room on my own. It turned out that the room worked me instead. Full of Michelle's colleagues and friends I don't think I've ever been in such a dynamic crowd of people making excellent introductions and strong first impressions. Men boomed "Hi" in confident voices with warm smiles. Women listening intently with head bent to the side and wondered who else in the room I'd find 'useful'.
Despite years of stand up comedy, MCing vast crowds, presenting work to clients, talking to school children and generally loving public speaking I suddenly felt ill-prepared and sheepish on my opening spiel. What should be my 'impact line'? Should I talk about my fiction writing or my commercial work first? Talking about non revenue generating activities was not an option - although in hindsight if I had mentioned I'd noticed the shop on the street below was a wool shop and that I used to knit, perhaps that would have made a more lasting first impression.
My name tag simply had my name on it. Everyone else had a motion-orientated, active verb, leadership-suggesting business under their name. At the very least I should have had, as a few others did, Bruno Bouchet, Bruno Bouchet Consulting. Still my name tag was pre-printed and spelled correctly which is usually my minimum standard for comfort. I think it was everyone else that was thrown by the lack of organisation name. I was introduced to one person who immediately asked the introducer, 'Are you not going to context him?' My introducer announced that I was very capable of "contexting" myself. I panicked wondering what that might mean and then just said who I was and what I did. It must have worked, as a business card was asked for and offered. Success! I think.
The MC for the event was a man named Rowdy - although perhaps he should have been 'Rowdiest' because the only adjectives he ever used were superlatives - I wondered whether he'd set himself a personal parlour game, get through an entire speech without a comparative or simple adjective. Having said that he did the best possible job in revving the crowd for the author, who proved she could practice what she preached and gave a warm, personal, friendly and funny speech.
It was not your typical book launch doling out warm wine at the back of a bookshop. The people might have been highly energised, but the wine, supplied by Michelle's family's winery in Mudgee, was perfectly chilled and excellent.
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1 comment:
Sounds like they are all a bit too affirmative for their own good and need to reassess their social skills. If all they can do when they meet someone they don't know is to pass you onto someone else and talk about you as if you are not standing in front of them, then I think they need to extract their heads from their proverbials.
Glad the wine was good at least.
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