Corporate and Business Storytelling Blog

As a proponent of the appropriate use of emotion in speeches and presentations, it’s been fun to see how, “emotion is the fast lane to the brain” is showing up on the campaign trail.

As the stakes get higher and the candidates get more and more desperate to create some space between themselves and their competition, the rhetoric has heated up. Romney is getting all red in the face. McCain is already red in the face. And Huckabee is cool as an ice cube in a glass of sweet tea.

Barack and Hillary are going at it with Edwards trying to get a rise out of either one of them. We all knew it would come to this didn’t we? What’s interesting is how anyone could have thought it would be otherwise. Whether the emotion is raw and angry emotion or teary and tender emotion, it gets people to pay attention.

The candidates can drone on and on about health care and immigration for hours on end, but what people are looking for is emotion. We get a handle on the candidates true personality by how they handle their emotions. Do they lose control, remain poised or give as good as they get? 

We can get a sense of what a president would be like in a crisis by how they handle being attacked in a debate. Right now, the hottest emotional fireworks seem to be between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Do we want a fighter or a smooth talker?

On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee never seems to get rattled while Mitt Romney and Rudy Giuliani enjoy the emotional give and take. John McCain has a tendency to smile when he’s mad, which makes him seem untrustworthy.

People want to see genuine emotion. Let’s see as the primaries continue, what role emotion plays in the results. My bet is on the candidates who aren’t so slick, but rather exhibit genuine emotion.

Would you like to hear me discuss my Story Theater Method? Click on the link below to listen to this audio podcast interview with Jason Steinle.

http://www.uploadexperience.com/blog/?p=111

At the recent ASTD International Conference in Atlanta, Georgia, I had the privilege of presenting two workshops on Story Theater - Using Emotional Triggers to Compel Attention and Enhance Retention. Over 400 people from all over the world attended my sessions.

In my sessions, as in all of my train-the-trainer and leadership development seminars, I had people on their feet doing basic acting exercises to experience the power of acting out actions, reactions and interactions instead of narrating them. You should have seen the room. It was a wonderful explosion of creativity and enthusiasm. People were stepping out of their comfort zones and trying things that they’d never even considered before.

To all of the wonderful people, from Canada, Asia, Europe, South America, South Africa, the UK, Australia, New Zealand and the United States that I met and had conversations with, thank you for being so generous with your praise and enthusiasm for Story Theater.

I look forward to a trip to Asia in 2008, including Hong Kong, the Philippines. Malaysia, India and Dubai. If you are interested in having me speak to your organization during my trip, please give us a call. 1-800-573-6196.