By Teresa Straub, Neuroscience Student, Washington State University Vancouver
Awkward silence looms over the formally set banquet table you’re sitting at. You nervously fidget with your hands, hoping to be blend into the background. “And what brings you to this conference?” The keynote speaker, who is sitting at the same table as you, asks. All the heads at the table turn towards your direction. “Man, an elevator speech would really help me out right now,” you wishfully think to yourself as you mumble some incoherent sentences about what you do.
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From debolina-raja-gupta.blogspot.com
At some point or another in our lives, every one of us will be given the opportunity to introduce ourselves, and perhaps even to convince a potential employer, principle investigator, or admissions committee that we are qualified and advantageous candidates for a position. The difference between being accepted or rejected could hinge solely on how prepared you are—both in content and delivery.
Elevator speeches pique interest by succinctly introducing a topic or a person in 30 seconds in a way relevant to the listener. When introducing yourself, having an elevator speech prepared helps you focus less on the content and more on the delivery. Three main components of the elevator speech include who you are, what you do, and why it matters to your listener. The first element, who you are, gives you an opportunity to establish credibility with your audience. The second element, what you do, challenges you as a speaker to be concise and to the point. One way to prepare to address this context is to list bullet points describing what you do, then revise and consolidate the list until you are left with initiatives in the context of the mission statement. The last element of the speech puts the “what you do” into perspective, into the bigger context, into a mission and values. And importantly, you put your work into the perspective of your listener, trying to relate to them person-to-person.
Presenting understandable content that the listener can follow is important, but delivering it in a natural, confident way is arguably of equal importance. Rehearse the elevator speech content to build familiarity with the structure, length, and content, but don’t allow the presentation to become rote and mechanical. Keep the presentation fresh and natural by engaging with the listener and presenting the content at a level understandable and relevant to the listener. Eye contact, smiling, and genuinity cannot be neglected in the stress of communicating the content. Remembering to connect with the person behind the name and achievements will help the elevator speech be communicated more naturally.
Meeting people and introducing yourself can be intimidating if you aren’t prepared, however elevator speeches can reduce the anxiety by equipping you with points to use to succinctly spark interest in you and what you have to offer. Next time you find yourself sitting at a banquet table introducing yourself, or in the elevator with your potential employer, you can stop stressing about content and focus your energy
on engaging with your listener.
