In the 1970s and 80s in the UK, there was a famous comedy duo who had their own TV programme called ‘The Two Ronnies’. A family favourite, this hour long show ran on British television with two gentlemen – both named ‘Ronnie’ funnily enough, and it contained an amusing variety of skits, monologues, songs, jokes and sketches. As a duo, they were renowned at the end of every show for signing off with one Ronnie saying ‘and it’s goodnight from me’ with the other Ronnie replying ‘and it’s goodnight from him’.
Perhaps you may be wondering….so what has that got to do with me? Well, in the world of leadership communication, the short answer is ‘a lot’.
By way of a current example, one of my clients is a life sciences business with whom I am working, to help some of their technical leaders become more effective in their ability to influence their colleagues across the organisation. Whilst I work with professionals to hone their pitch, rehearse their opening line and handle the tricky question, we have spent a considerable amount of time in the past few days talking about the ‘sign off’. Quite simply the ‘sign off’ is the end of our message. It is our ‘parting shot’, our last impression; our verbal full stop.
In my experience, the ‘sign off’ is often extremely weak. Whether it’s the relief of getting to the end of what we wanted to say, or the prospect of not having to face the audience for much longer, all too often there is a weak ‘thank you’ or ‘that’s it’. Candidly, if we need to say ‘that’s it’, then our message isn’t sufficiently structured and obvious to our audience – and it should be.
So, quite simply we need to stop this. Instead, we need to ask the right question, or finish with the right statement, either of which signals to the audience a number of things: (a) we have finished (b) we have completed a compelling point (c) it is now the turn of the listener to speak. The possibilities are endless for what we can say, but it needs to be natural, impactful and an easy invitation which continues to move the conversation forward. ‘What do you think?’ ‘How can we do this?’ ‘I’m wondering how you’d like to move this forward…?’ Alternatively it could be a specific ‘ask’ of the audience (for a decision, action of some type of commitment).
It’s also important to mention the style of how we convey the message. I am not a fan of ‘pitching’ in the traditional sense of the word (slightly too forceful, slightly too polished, slightly too turbo charged). I’m talking about being natural, relaxed, articulate and composed in our delivery and in the way that we finish what our message.
