Spectacular performance vs unspectacular preparation
Aug 23, 2016So I’m sitting in the Orlando lounge with Sooze, surrounded by bags of Disney gifts for the kids, talking about what a fantastic International Maxwell Certification live event it was. On the drive up from Jupiter we compared this training to the last one and it reminded me of something John Maxwell had said.
It was on day 3 of the last training when I was filming with John in the morning. The filming went really well and Susan, John and I were all sharing a laugh at the end when Susan said as a passing comment, ‘You’re always so busy, I wish we had time for lunch.’
Straight away John said ‘Great idea! Let’s have lunch today!’
So at 12 noon we met John and went for lunch. We chatted for about an hour and a half about property, relatives, God, Speaking and Arnold Palmers of all things! Time spent with John is always so precious and very enlightening.
Towards the end of the lunch I said ‘John when am I going to see you deliver the Eric story? I’ve heard you talk about it so many times, I can’t wait to see it.’
‘I haven’t shared that story for about 10 years.’ He said. ‘I used it to wrap up every conference I spoke at for a long time. I knew every tiny little nuance, hand gesture, every pause and facial expression.’
Charlie Wetzel was also with us. ‘I have a recording of it.’ Charlie said. He then played it on his computer. ‘The only version I have now is one that someone set to reggae music!’
So we listened to John telling this fantastic story, with reggae music in the background. I was great to see John’s face as he relived the story. At the end he said ‘I think I’m going to finish up the conference with it this afternoon.’
‘Excellent!’ I said. I was really dying to see that and capture it on video. 6 months before I recorded him telling the Troy story (Eric’s brother) which is another great story, so I felt I needed the Eric story too!
Then after a few minutes of thinking about it John said ‘You know what, I think I need to think about it a bit first. I need to go out and walk the dog, share it with a few audiences, get my timing back where it was. I think I’ll get it ready for a future event.’
I sat there and watched John and thought to myself, isn’t that interesting! He thinks so much about the 1,800 people in the audience, that he would only ever give them his best.
It was on day 3 of the last training when I was filming with John in the morning. The filming went really well and Susan, John and I were all sharing a laugh at the end when Susan said as a passing comment, ‘You’re always so busy, I wish we had time for lunch.’
Straight away John said ‘Great idea! Let’s have lunch today!’
So at 12 noon we met John and went for lunch. We chatted for about an hour and a half about property, relatives, God, Speaking and Arnold Palmers of all things! Time spent with John is always so precious and very enlightening.
Towards the end of the lunch I said ‘John when am I going to see you deliver the Eric story? I’ve heard you talk about it so many times, I can’t wait to see it.’
‘I haven’t shared that story for about 10 years.’ He said. ‘I used it to wrap up every conference I spoke at for a long time. I knew every tiny little nuance, hand gesture, every pause and facial expression.’
Charlie Wetzel was also with us. ‘I have a recording of it.’ Charlie said. He then played it on his computer. ‘The only version I have now is one that someone set to reggae music!’
So we listened to John telling this fantastic story, with reggae music in the background. I was great to see John’s face as he relived the story. At the end he said ‘I think I’m going to finish up the conference with it this afternoon.’
‘Excellent!’ I said. I was really dying to see that and capture it on video. 6 months before I recorded him telling the Troy story (Eric’s brother) which is another great story, so I felt I needed the Eric story too!
Then after a few minutes of thinking about it John said ‘You know what, I think I need to think about it a bit first. I need to go out and walk the dog, share it with a few audiences, get my timing back where it was. I think I’ll get it ready for a future event.’
I sat there and watched John and thought to myself, isn’t that interesting! He thinks so much about the 1,800 people in the audience, that he would only ever give them his best.
This was an 8 or 10 minute story that he had told literally thousands of times. He could easily have remembered the story and the audience would have loved it. But it wouldn’t have been his best. For it to be his best he needed to think about the story and think about the delivery of the story. Then he needed to practice the delivery of the story with several live audiences in order to perfect his timing. When he’d done this, then, and only then, was it ready for his audience!
John could easily take shortcuts, but he never does.
Spectacular performance is always preceded by unspectacular preparation.
John could easily take shortcuts, but he never does.
Spectacular performance is always preceded by unspectacular preparation.
Until next time ..
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