Every speech (briefing; presentation) is an interaction between a speaker (someone with something valuable to say) and an audience (folks who think, “remind me; teach me; inspire me; persuade me.”)

In essence, the audience says to the speaker, “I have some questions I want you to answer.”  You may want to edit this list, or expand on it, but at this moment in my thinking, I think these are the three questions every audience asks of a speaker.

Question #1 — What do you want me to know?

Question #2 – How do you want me to feel about this?

{Here are some possible “how do you want me to feel about this?” responses:

• This is interesting – I want to know more.
• This sounds actionable – I’ve got to get to work.  (This one leads to question #3…)

and

Question #3 – What do you want me to do about this?

Aristotle famously delineated the three primary means of persuasion.  Two are especially important here  (the third is “ethos,” the “ethical appeal,” the character and the credibility of the speaker).  Here are the two to remember as we ponder these three questions:

Logos – the logical appeal (the content of the argument). — This speaks to the “What do you want me to know?” question.

Pathos – the emotional appeal (this has a lot to do with engaging with the audience.  If the speaker and the audience both “care about this” information, there is much higher engagement). — This speaks to the “How do you want me to feel about it?” question.

So, if the speaker successfully delivers useful and usable answers to these three questions, then the audience members leave saying:

• I heard this
• I understood it — I got it
• This connected
• I’m going to put this to use

You know, when a speaker has a “captive audience,” this is time too precious to waste.  When you are giving your next speech/presentation, think about these three questions.  Keep them top of mind.  And diligently strive to answer them for your audience.