You Are Your Product

Books. Audio albums. Video demos. CD-ROM. Interactive education
instruments. Training-in-a-box. Learn anytime, anywhere. At your
own pace.

Much is written, most of it true, about the importance of
developing your product line. For BOR sales. For your catalog.
For passive income. Let's take a look at another aspect of
product development. Let's look at the fundament. Let's probe the
foundation of your product development. Let's look at you. At
your core. At your essence. At your state of being. At your
perspective. At your sense of your accountabilities.

You know that for a structure -- whether of steel and concrete or
of wood and stucco -- to withstand the elements, a sturdy
foundation is required. There must be a foundation that is solid,
stable, rooted in the earth as it reaches toward the sky. Let's
examine the structure of your speaking business for a moment:

I've been studying my fellow speakers for close to 20 years. With
the eye of an anthropologist. With the approach of a research
specialist. With heart. With empathy. With love.

A few of us are brilliant marketers. Look at the dazzling success
of the luminous figures who come to your mind. On the other end
of the scale, some of us produce nothing more than a demo tape.

You are your product. Let's look at the most important aspect of
your product. Let's examine the keys to your impact on
productivity and profits. (That's what decision-makers want,
right?) Let's look at how you affect hopes and dreams, and
possibilities. (They are what audience members want you to
illuminate, right?) Let's look at your authenticity:

How real are you as you address your audiences? From what depth
of know-how and caring do you speak? How much timeless wisdom is
involved in your phrasings, your stories and examples? How deeply
do you look into industry conditions, competitive considerations,
and, if applicable, market-share concerns?

How many audience members and top executives do you interview as
you prepare your program? How far do you probe beneath the
surface of responses to your questions? To what degree do you
balance the concerns and interests of the sponsors of your
program, (They pay your fee), the decision-maker who hire you,
(S/he wants to look good because of this choice,) and your
audience members (whose concerns may be entirely different)?

You are your product. A few years ago, Simon and Garfunkel wrote
a song. In it are these words: "Like a bridge over troubled
waters, I will ease your mind..." These troubled waters are the
world-wide social, economic and political chaos in which we all
find ourselves.

You, with what Naomi Rhode, past-president of NSA, calls, "The
privilege of the platform," have the opportunity to ease the
minds of each of your constituencies. You can do this as you
weave your verbal tapestry of education and insights, of stories
and metaphors, of participation and involvement.

We're in this together, all of us on this earth. We have our
lives to live, our children to raise, our significant other to
love, or to find, our careers or businesses to grow. And we get
to do all this in the center of a maelstrom surrounded by
dizzying changes, tumult, threats, upheavals, and clashes of
cultures and values. Terrible consequences and unprecedented
disaster await us one trigger finger away, right around the
corner. The potential bad guys are extremists with nothing to
lose.

Even the crazy changes in world weather patterns contribute to
the uncertainties and insecurities that have become symbols of
our times. Surrounded by all this, we have our one chance to make
of ourselves what we will.

You are your product. Your ability to sort out this unrest, this
wild ferment, this ubiquitous agitation, is needed more than ever
now. How do you bring order to the multiple interests of
sponsors, decision-makers and audience members now? How do you
guide them to make sense of their worlds? How are you to help
them master their challenges today?

These people, all of them, find themselves on wild and stormy
seas stuck on a ship they no longer can control. They perceive
themselves to be far from any port. Compounding matters, they are
not at all certain of their compass readings. And, they are even
less sure of where their safe harbor may be.

They look to you for wisdom, guidance, hope, light -- and a bit
of fun. I offer you no answers, only questions. And your
attitudes, thoughts, words and actions, in response to these
questions, are important. They're important now, more than ever.
Because now, more than ever, you are your product.