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- Herausgeber: Liberties Press
- Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016
As The Pitch Coach for the Irish TV programme 'Dragons' Den', Catherine Moonan has coached more than 500 contestants, helping them to gain over €4 million in investment. In this practical and informative book, she provides all the skills and techniques you need to pitch yourself, your idea or your business. In the book, Catherine interviews a wide range of industry experts on pitching, presenting, interviewing and public speaking. She combines their tips and advice with her own experience of training and coaching in effective communication and presentation skills since 2002. This book is ideal for anyone who needs to speak in public, especially anyone with a fear of public speaking – whether they're presenting themselves at a job or media interview, pitching their start-up business, presenting an idea to their CEO or delivering a speech at an important event. It will guide you, step-by-step, from a blank canvas to a positive end result.
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The Pitch Coach
Your Guide to Presenting, Interviewing and Public Speaking
Catherine Moonan
This book is dedicated to the memory of my dear dad, Tom Moonan (R.I.P., 1 December 2014), who showed me that life is good and anything is possible.
Contents
Preface
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
—Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love
Fear often holds us back and prevents us from doing or being what we are supposed to do or be. So what are we afraid of? Perhaps we have had a bad experience in the past, either in an interview, or during a time where we have had to speak in public. Perhaps it did not go as well as we would have liked. Well, that was then and this is now. We cannot change the past, but we can change our thinking around the now, which will determine the future. However, we have to start by believing we can change: to stop being afraid. By eliminating our fear, we are unstoppable. It would be such a shame to allow a fear of public speaking to prevent your light from shining to the world. Eliminate your fear, and the world will be a better place for it. It is your duty to yourself, the people around you and the world at large. Shine bright like a diamond.
Acknowledgements
I want to express my heartfelt thanks to each and every one of the industry experts who kindly contributed to The Pitch Coach. Their interviews provide wonderful insight into the art of pitching, presenting, interviewing and public speaking.
Thank you to Larry Bass, CEO of ShinAwiL, for his support in every way with this book. I am delighted to be part of series seven of ‘Dragons’ Den’ in 2016. Thank you to Richard Curran, journalist and presenter of ‘Dragons’ Den’ for writing the foreword. My thanks to the four former ‘Dragons’ Den’ contestants for sharing their experience of pitching in the ‘Den’; John Joyce, CTO at Yvolution; Siobhan King-Hughes, founder of Swift factory; Tara Dalrymple, founder of Feelsright; and Ollie Fegan, co-founder of usherU.
My thanks to Caitlin O’Connor, innovation strategist and networking expert; Eibhlin Curley, head of enterprise at Local Enterprise Office Dún Laoghaire Rathdown; John O’Sullivan, senior portfolio manager with Enterprise Ireland; Colm O’Maolmhuire, programme manager of the New Frontiers Programme in IT Tallaght; Wayne Murphy, CEO and programme director of Start Planet; Bill Liao, European Venture Partner with SOSventures and co-founder of CoderDojo; Eamonn Quinn, investment analyst and chairman at Kelsius; Orla Rimmington, a partner with Kernel Capital; Seán O’Sullivan, managing director at SOSventures; George Zachary, general partner at Charles River Ventures; David Tighe, head of innovation at the Bank of Ireland; Brian Daly, programme manager at Techstars Berlin; Joshua Henderson, vice-president of Springboard Enterprises in Washington DC; Andy Shannon, Head of Startupbootcamp Global; Naomi Fein, founder of Think Visual; Joseph G. Lannig, sales director with Disney-ABC Television Group, New York; Orla Gallagher, HR specialist and executive coach at ESB; Brian Bowden, director of HR operations at Aer Lingus; Ken Cowley, recruitment consultant at Headhunt International; Garrett Taylor, fleet captain at Aer Lingus; Graeme Slattery, managing director at Notorious PSG; Simon Cocking, senior editor at Irish Tech News; Pamela Newenham, business journalist with the Irish Times; and Victoria Mary Clarke, author, broadcaster, journalist and media coach.
Thank you to Annie Birney and Bridget Sheerin, education officers at Glasnevin Cemetery Museum; Lawrence Bernstein, managing director at Great Speech Writing; Caroline Keeling, CEO at Keelings; Eamon Keane, CEO of Xpreso; James McElroy, co-founder of HouseMyDog; Gail Condon, founder of Writing For Tiny; Sinéad Kenny, CEO of DiaNia Technologies; Olive O’Connor, founder of MediStori; and Andrew MacFarlane, CEO of CareZapp.
My thanks to Peggy O’Regan, my former speech and drama teacher, and Sam Young, my meditation teacher, two inspirational people who helped to form the direction my career would take.
I am very grateful to my good friend, Catherine Gavin, for being my first official reader before I sent it to the publisher. My thanks to the publishing team at Liberties Press, particularly, Seán, Sam, Zoë and Karen.
A note of thanks to all my wonderful friends and family for their constant love and support, particularly my cousin Patricia from New York, and my good friends Edel and Mary, who helped me to plan, design and deliver my biggest ‘Perfect Pitch’ workshop to date, to 300 women in business as part of National Women’s Enterprise Day 2013.
Thank you to my brother Seán and his wife Katrina, and to my mother-in-law, Patty. Finally, thanks to my mother, Carmel, whose prayers work miracles, to my husband, Gary, whose sense of humour also works miracles and to my three beautiful daughters, Alannah, Clíona and Ella, for being just the way they are.
Foreword
Richard Curran
Groucho Marx once said that a man who sounds well does well, but a man who looks well does better. If you want to pitch in the world of business, you have to give both your best shot.
Walking into the ‘Dragons’ Den’ is not easy. I have always had admiration for those in any of the 500 or so pitches I have seen over the course of six series of the RTÉ television series. Some make it look easy. Some make it look difficult. But whether they are selling a wonderful business concept or something they dreamt up with a friend in the pub a few months earlier, it takes real guts to do.
‘Dragons’ Den’ is both a slice of reality and a hugely popular television programme. The reality part of the show is that contestants are pitching genuine businesses to genuine investors, which may result in genuine deals.
It is how business works, yet it takes place in the most public of circumstances. Can you imagine walking into a job interview that you knew would be broadcast on national television?
I am always surprised by how many of those pitching in the ‘Den’ say they were nervous at the start of the pitch, but then became relaxed when the questions began.
The questions are the toughest and most gruelling part of the experience. So many people have a mental block when it comes to summarising, to an audience, something that they know inside out. They feel more confident about fielding gruelling questions for thirty minutes than summarising their business in two.
Naturally, some people are more nervous than others, but the good news is that many of the skills required to get that pitch right and provide the best possible chance of a good outcome can be learned.
Presenting has become a huge part of business, career and educational life. Many of us might think that we have never made a pitch in our lives. The truth is, we all pitch. If we have not pitched a business then we have still pitched ourselves, our skills and our employability many times. If you have ever looked for a bank loan, you have pitched. If you have ever been through a job interview, you have pitched.
In the world of business, pitching is becoming ever more common and ever more important. It involves everything from college-project presentations to winning a contract, from applying to a bank manager to securing a sizeable investment for your business. It might be delivering a talk at a conference, or being interviewed on radio or television. Yet those who are listening will make a judgement call about whether they would buy shares in your company, or even simply whether they would buy your product.
In a world with so many voices competing for attention, good pitching has had to change. It has to be succinct, clear and attention-grabbing, and it has to say something distinct about you. We all admire a good storyteller, someone who can be entertaining and engaging. A story well told draws us in, and often tells us something about who we are. By the same token, society values those who can communicate a message comprehensively, and with great attention to detail.
These used to be two very different skills – one engaging, the other authoritative. A good modern business pitch needs to do both, and in a relatively short period of time. Time constraints mean that the presenter has to make decisions about what facts are most important to their audience.
But do not worry. Many of these skills can be taught. While not everyone can write and deliver a Martin Luther King ‘I Have a Dream’ speech, you do have to deliver an impressive and professional business pitch.
Catherine Moonan’s book, The Pitch Coach is a practical guide to understanding and delivering a solid pitch. It has been written by someone with enormous experience. She tailors the book to a variety of potential ‘pitchers’, and uses the insights of a range of interviewees to crystallise the key ingredients of a good pitch.
Among the many interviewees is Seán O’Sullivan of SOSventures, and formerly of ‘Dragons’ Den’. He is someone who has pitched to investors multiple times as he tried to secure backing for some of his early business ventures. He has also been pitched to hundreds of times.
Entrepreneurs like O’Sullivan provide great insight into what works and what does not work when compiling and delivering a pitch. Catherine also talks to venture capitalists and professional investors, some of whom see 300 pitches a year.
Readers of the book will get an understanding of what someone in that position is looking for in a pitch. You will also get a clear sense, as you pull your pitch together, of what works and what does not. What information should I include and what should I leave out? Should I make a joke? How should I stand, how should I sound and how should I look?
I have seen contestants go into ‘Dragons’ Den’ and win over the ‘Dragons’ in the first sixty seconds. A great pitch alone will not land you the investment, but it gives you a great start. ‘Dragons’ on the show have often commented on how someone’s pitch can leave them cold at the very start, which leaves the pitcher with an uphill battle.
One of the ‘Dragons’ said to me that choosing to invest in a business on the show was not easy because of the relatively small amount of time they have to digest what is being said before making a decision. He said it was like having somebody drive a car past you at thirty miles an hour, and having to decide, purely on that basis, whether or not you would buy it. Getting your pitch right is important as you may only have one chance to make the right impression, no matter what the circumstances.
Catherine Moonan draws on her own career path, and extensive experience in pitch training. She has delivered a practical and easy-to-read book which benefits everyone, from the start-up business person to the individual who wants to improve their presentation skills in work or in college.
Introduction
This book is designed to help anyone who would like to communicate their message more effectively when pitching, presenting, interviewing or speaking in public. You might be a start-up business pitching to a customer, client, supplier, business partner or investor. You might want to improve your presentations for work or college or you might have a formal speech to deliver at a corporate event. Perhaps you have an important interview coming up, or maybe you just have an interest in the content as it is not something you have ever thought about before. In this book, I share my own experience as a pitch coach, together with those from a myriad of industry experts. Whatever your reason for reading this book, I know you will get some valuable insight from the range of entrepreneurs, journalists, accelerator programme directors, corporate professionals and venture capitalists who have kindly given their time, and shared their unique knowledge and expertise in the art of pitching.
I have developed what I call the ‘Perfect Pitch’ workshop, based on coaching over 500 contestants on ‘Dragons’ Den’ to date, in addition to the entrepreneur and corporate training that I have also been doing for a number of years. I have found that people tend to overcomplicate and over intellectualise their pitch or presentation. As a result, some people make life more difficult for themselves, and increase the stress often associated with public speaking. If they follow the steps in this workshop, I believe it will help to clarify the message they want to communicate. After all, if they are not clear in their own mind about the message they want to communicate, how can they expect the audience to understand the message clearly?
I initially developed the workshop to help start-ups to design and deliver their investment pitches. I was asked to develop a workshop for thirty people at UCD’s Innovation Academy. I had been thinking of trying out a new technique for a while. As the Innovation Academy promoted creativity, I asked if I could incorporate mindful breathing meditation, music and colour into my workshop. The programme managers were happy for me to try it out. It worked beautifully. By the end of the workshop, everyone in the room was able to stand up in front of the group and deliver a sixty-second pitch.
I quickly realised that I could use the same workshop to help corporates with their business presentations. I have used it myself to develop a clearer vision for what I wanted to deliver in this book.
The objective of the workshop is to provide people with the framework for their pitch, presentation or speech. Their actual pitch, presentation or speech may well be five, ten or twenty minutes long, but this framework will help to clarify their message, and they can then expand on the various points they wish to make. Consider the sixty-second pitch as an executive summary. Imagine someone missed your pitch or presentation and then bumped into you afterwards, maybe in the elevator, and said, ‘Sorry I missed your talk earlier. I heard it was great – what was it about?’ You do not have those five, ten or twenty minutes to re-cap on everything, but you do have sixty seconds. It is amazing what information you can get across in sixty seconds.
I have outlined that workshop in this book. The fact that you are not limited to any workshop time frame means that you can spend as much or as little time on it as you want. I once managed to deliver this workshop to 300 business women in one hour and fifteen minutes, as part of a networking event for National Women’s Enterprise Day 2013. By the end of it, 300 women were able to deliver a sixty-second pitch about their business. I have delivered it to many senior managers and directors at the corporate level, as well as to start-up and accelerator programmes all over Ireland and the UK. I have also delivered the workshop at Women in Business and Chamber of Commerce networking events, as well as to the national finalists of the Ireland’s Best Young Entrepreneur competition in 2014 and 2015. You can do it in less than an hour. Just work with whatever time frame you have. Try it. It’s simple, but it works.
Chapter One
LIFE’S A PITCH
We are constantly pitching our ideas, ourselves, our points of view. However, pitching is an art, not a science, and it is certainly not rocket science – there is no exact formula.
Like all art forms, you can start by understanding what techniques increase the chance of a positive outcome. After this, it comes down to practising the delivery of your pitch, then reviewing your pitch and going back to the drawing board, taking what you have learned, and working towards a better pitch next time. Pitching is a learning-by-doing process; the more often you do it, the better you become. Pitching is also personal. No two pitches are the same, nor should they be. Your pitch is ever-evolving. The pitch you deliver today will be different to the one you deliver next week and next month. Your pitch will change depending on changes in your team or your product, new clients, receiving investment. The best way to think of your pitch is as a story. It is your unique story. Your story is ever-changing, and so is your pitch. There are still certain elements to your story that need to be there, particularly for an investor. We will go into that in more detail later on. Ultimately, though, the way in which you tell your story is very important. Regardless of how technical your idea, product or service is, your story must be simple and engaging. It must be made real and tangible to anyone listening: a) they must be able to understand what you are talking about, and b) you have to engage them. If your pitch has done both of these things, you have made it memorable – you have, by doing this, made it easy for your audience to remember your idea, product or service, and to be able to tell someone else about it.
Your pitch should be from the heart as well as the head. You need to find that emotional connection between you and the audience by bringing in the human element, and making your audience care. It is not just about facts, figures and statistics – you need to make your pitch relevant to your audience. It is not a one-size-fits-all, but needs to change depending on the audience. Your pitch to an investor, for example, will be different from a pitch to a customer, client, supplier or business partner.
I use the name ‘Perfect Pitch’ for my workshop, but what is perfect? Is there any such thing? Facebook uses the slogan ‘Done is better than perfect’, which I think is brilliant. I have borrowed it here. Quite often, as you may well know, we put off showing something because it is not perfect. We are afraid to pitch our idea, because we feel that it is not quite there yet. Well, remember: ‘Done is better than perfect’. Take the leap. I like to combine that slogan with the Nike slogan ‘Just do it’. Practise makes perfect, and you learn by doing.
Glossophobia
I had often heard of a fear of public speaking, but I never realised that it affected so many people. It is called ‘glossophobia’. Research carried out in the US claims that it is people’s number-one fear. Studying speech and drama from the age of five, until I earned my teaching diploma helped me to build my self-confidence by regularly having to recite poetry and prose in front of exam adjudicators, and even acting out excerpts from plays. Taking part in a school play or musical can really help children to overcome any fear of public speaking – or ‘performance anxiety’ – from a young age. Debating in school is also a great way to develop public-speaking skills. However, many students leave school having never taken part in a school play or debating team and, as a result, it comes as a shock to the system when they must stand up and speak in front of a group of people. I have met several people through my training and coaching who strongly dislike any form of public speaking. For some, their dislike is as a result of a bad experience. One very successful businesswoman I spoke with said that her first presentation ever was in her first year in college. It went so badly for her that she was thirty-five before she did another one, and that was only because she had to. Even an interview situation can prove to be quite challenging for some people.
I use the expression ‘shock to the system’ because that is what it can feel like. I worked with a manager once who could not thank his staff at the Christmas party without the sweat dripping from his brow and his hands shaking. He was more than competent in his fields of finance and IT, yet something as simple as standing up and saying thank you to his colleagues incapacitated him.
Public speaking can do that to people. It is called the fight-or-flight response, and it is an automatic, physical response, designed to help us take rapid action when we feel that we are under threat. Of course, public speaking does not pose a physical threat. If anything, it is an emotional threat, but the brain does not seem to be able to distinguish between the two.
When thinking about setting up my own business, I recalled that manager and his struggle with public speaking. I knew there must be others like him. I also realised that this could be perceived as something negative. ‘Well, if he cannot stand up and present his ideas clearly, is he also incompetent at his job?’ Not at all. However, effective communication and presentation skills are essential not just for managers, but for all employees within an organisation. Effective communication is a life skill.
We all need to be able to stand up and speak clearly about the message we want to share with others. It may be a pitch, presentation, interview or speech. It may be advocating for a sick child or an elderly parent who cannot speak for themselves. In either case, this is not the time to be shy. It does not serve you well. The world needs to hear your message, loud and clear.
I decided to combine my experience as a manager in Compaq Computers with my previous experience as a French and German secondary-school teacher, and set up Communication Matters in September 2002. I sent out sixty letters to various organisations at the time, and received one response, from the Bank of Scotland (Ireland). After several meetings with the communications manager, he booked me for three dates that November to deliver training in effective communication and presentation skills to their senior managers and directors from Ireland and the UK. I think it was my speech and drama experience that won him over. They hired the Carolan Room in the National Concert Hall, which, I was told, they use for the President. I hired a video-production company for the day so that each participant would get a copy of their own presentation on video. I had never done this before. I had eight weeks to prepare for this training. Was I worried? I was terrified.
Call to Journalism
All you need is one good recommendation or testimonial, and you are in business. Thankfully, I got that with the Bank of Scotland (Ireland), and I followed it with trainings and testimonials from An Post and BUPA Ireland. In addition to delivering training in presentation skills to corporates, I also started teaching a pitching module on the Dublin Institute of Technology’s Hothouse Programme for Entrepreneurs. Then, in 2007, I decided to apply for the MA in Journalism in Dublin City University. It was my third attempt. I had applied twice when I first left college in the early 1990s. When I was not accepted, I ended up doing the Higher Diploma in Education in Trinity College, Dublin, which qualified me as a French and German teacher.
My interest in journalism had always been niggling in the background. Seventeen years later, after reading The Right to Write and The Artist’s Way, both by Julia Cameron, and doing a course on The Artist’s Way with a wonderful man called Sam Young, I applied a third time to do the MA in Journalism. It is all about timing. This time, I was accepted. As part of the application process, I had to have had something published. By chance, I had written my very first article earlier that year, about confidence-building for women returning to work after years being at home with the kids. That morning, I had heard a caller on ‘The Gerry Ryan Show’, a woman who had spent nine years at home taking care of her children, and was now returning to work outside of the home. She was very anxious. The discussion that ensued between Gerry Ryan and that lady inspired me to write the piece, which I sent to the Irish Independent’s ‘Mothers and Babies’ section. It was published, and I received a cheque for €200.
When I was finally accepted onto the full-time MA in June of that year, I had my own business, and was married with three young children. No pressure. I loved the course, and the highlight for me was a work placement as a researcher in RTÉ’s ‘Prime Time’ after a gruelling interview process. My dissertation was a forty-minute radio documentary, ‘Angels’. I subsequently pitched it to a television production company, and we produced a seven-minute television piece on ‘Angels’ which aired on RTÉ’s ‘Capital D’ in June 2009. Meanwhile, I had pitched an article to the Irish Independent ‘Health and Living’ supplement about going back to college full-time with three young children. They published it, along with over twenty more feature articles in the next five years.
In 2014 I started working on a community radio station, Dublin City FM, where I reviewed the papers and had two interviews on ‘Good Morning Dublin’ on Thursday mornings. One of my interviews ended up being with an old classmate from the MA, Pamela Newenham, the Irish Times business journalist. She had contacted me about her new book, Silicon Docks, which I read before the radio interview and loved. A few days later, I was sitting in my kitchen admiring every aspect of the book – the cover, the font, the paper – and looked to see who the publisher was: Liberties Press. I looked up their website and sent them an e-mail, pitching a book on pitching. They replied the next day requesting a meeting. We met, and the end result is in your hands. Literally.
