Speakery Notes Speakery Notes

Natalia Talkowska is an award-winning serial entrepreneur and the CEO and founder of Natalka Design.

She is a strategic communications specialist and a 6-time TEDx Speaker. Her company is trusted by the British government, the royal family, and Fortune 500.

There are two parts to today's Speakery notes. In the second half, Natalia takes us through what she loves to talk about and her experiences as a six-time TEDx speaker and supplies us with helpful tips to help any struggling speaker.

The first half, however, deals with scribbling, drawing and documenting the words and ideas of others.



You see, I first saw Natalia sitting in the audience, apple pen in hand, drawing the words that were coming out of my mouth.



We hope you enjoy this episode.

Tamar Broadbent is a writer, performer and musician. She has written and toured multiple comedy and theatre shows across Europe, North America and Australia, has written for BBC Radio 4 and was a main stage cast member at the renowned improv theatre Boom Chicago in Amsterdam.

In the corporate world, she is a charming, funny and versatile MC who can sing improvised songs about winners of company awards or chair talk-show-style meetings to be broadcast across the globe.

She has hosted everything from in-house partner conferences to large-scale forums like the Nordic Business Forum, with 7600+ attendees and special guests like Brene Brown and George Clooney.



She's an absolute delight to work with. Her insights in hosting conferences and events and her take on improvisation and presenting are gold.



I highly recommend that you book her if you're looking for a Speaker coach or a host for your event. You can contact her here at https://www.tamarbroadbent.com/ and on LinkedIn. Book her. She's aces.

Louisa Heinrich is the founder and Chief Consultant at Superhuman. As you will hear, she endeavours to put technology in the service of people. Louisa has been chipping away at the fuzzy grey coalface of technology for the past twenty-seven years. Last year, she returned to the speaker circuit with her remarkable new keynote, "⁠Not dead yet⁠, " because, thankfully, she isn't. She's wickedly wonderful, immensely talented, and on the podcast!

In this episode, Louisa shares her presentation tips and tricks, how she uses conferences as a workshop for ideas and what it was like to finally stage in front of an audience after years of being away from the stage.



Her new keynote, "Not dead yet", is powerful, insightful and highly relevant for individuals and organisations.

In this episode of Speakery Notes, I sat down with the artist ⁠Eric Drass⁠ to discuss presenting artificial intelligence, art, studio assistants and how anybody can use ChatGPT to have an argument. 

Throw a stick at LinkedIn, and you'll hit a keynote or presentation about artificial intelligence, chatGPT or Midjourney. It seems that everybody and their line manager is an expert on AI–we all know that some prompters are more qualified than others to talk about what artificial intelligence is and what it means to contemporary living and working, so I thought I'd grab an actual expert, who has an actual track record for actually using the bloody stuff: Eric Drass. 



Eric Drass is an artist making work in a range of media, from painting to music to machine-learning AI art. Some of his favourite themes are identity, consciousness, the philosophical ramifications of artificial intelligence, big data and the relationship between humans and machines. He likes to talk about these things whenever he is given the chance.

He was recently part of The Royal Insitute's Christmas Lecture, ⁠where he presented AI art to hundreds of children⁠.

He currently has two talks called AI WTF? and The Truth, Post-Truth & Nothing Like The Truth. ⁠So book him now⁠. He's incredible. Your audiences will adore him. 

Never stand in front of an audience without knowing who they are.



Take a moment, just five minutes, to jot down everything you know about your audience. Are they industry professionals, eager learners, or seasoned veterans? Understanding their interests and reasons for attending your talk – be it a conference, a meeting, or a virtual call – is paramount.



Not a big audience? Then, personalization is key, especially with those presentations and pitches that take place in smaller and more intimate settings. You know, presentations with a gathering of fewer than twenty participants.



Learn their names and delve into their professional backgrounds. A quick visit to LinkedIn could reveal a wealth of information. Where have they worked? What experiences have they amassed? It's not just about titles; it's about the journey they've traversed within your industry.



Then, challenge yourself further. What don't you know about them? This list might be lengthier and perhaps a little daunting, too, but remember, you're not just any presenter. You do your preparation. You're a storyteller and a translator of ideas; as such, you want to make sure you're sharing ideas that will work for the people sitting in front of you. 



Armed with these two lists, begin to build your presentation strategy. Transform uncertainty into clarity, the unknown into the known.



Let's assume you've been asked to speak at a conference. Make sure you're clear about what kind of conference it is. The audience of a marketing conference differs from that of an international sports or estate agent conference. Who will be in the audience? What are their aspirations, their challenges?



Your task is to answer their silent yet ever-present question: 'What's in it for me? How can you answer their "What's in it for me?" question? You'll only know how if you know who is sitting there.



To truly resonate and genuinely connect, you must understand who sits before you. It's a dialogue, a conversation, albeit sometimes silent, between you and them.

I invited Timo to the Speaker Notes Podcast because he has such a wonderfully optimistic, cheery and thoroughly cheeky approach to telling stories. Everything he makes is full of sound, music, film and text, all working together to present content and stories to a wide range of audiences. He has a skill set that makes him a great presenter, and we can learn lots and lots from him.

Who is Timo Peach? His personal passion as an arts champion and creative business encourager is to connect more of us to the possibilities found in the challenges of the 21st century – and to understand more about art's practical magic for changing the stories we think we're in.

Drawing on a lifetime of work as a distinctive performer, composer, designer, writer, events creative, speaker and presenter, his work helps leaders and change makers about difficult stuff with much more impact.

He is the bloke from Momo:tempo, the voice of Unsee The Future, creative director of Momo:zo, and author of the forthcoming book "UTF! How to think like an artist and change the world”, he is currently planning a tour for his one-person show “The Future is f****ed. So What?”. He is also developing "The Shape of Things To Hum – an electro cabaret musical to end the end of the world".

He's also a fantastic performer and a good friend of Speakery.