May 02, 2022
The guest today is Brenden Kumarasamy. Brenden is the founder of MasterTalk, he coaches ambitious executives & entrepreneurs to become top 1% communicators in their industry. He also has a popular YouTube channel called MasterTalk, with the goal of providing free access to communication tools for everyone in the world.
Topics explored in this podcast:
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Communication in the workplace
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Team communication exercises
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Relationship building
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Presenting with confidence
Questions asked in this podcast:
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What are the greatest challenges to great communication?
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How has remote work affected our communication style on the job?
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How do you build relationships with employees while working remote?
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How can we learn to communicate better in teams?
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How do we measure the success of effective communication?
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What role does facial expressions, gestures, and pauses play in communication?
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What are some exercises you can do to practice public speaking or communicating?
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How do you learn to communicate in the board room?
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How do you practice presenting in front of large groups of people?
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If you could give one piece of advice to anyone who struggles to communicate, what would it be and why?
Brenden is available via:
web: MasterTalk - https://www.mastertalk.ca/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendenkumarasamy/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendenkumarasamy/
Download free HR resources designed to make your work life a little bit easier.
Employer Brand Budget Template, Cost of Unfilled Jobs Calculator, Diversity Statement Examples, Creative Recruiting Strategies and more... https://proactivetalent.com/downloadables
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PODCAST ARCHIVES
PODCAST TRANSCRIPT
Jim Stroud (1s):
Hello, listeners. Good morning or good afternoon or good evening, I guess. It all depends on when you are listening to this podcast. Welcome to another episode of TribePod. Today, I have a very interesting guest to share with you. His name is Brenden Kumarasamy. Now, Brenden is the founder of MasterTalk and he coaches ambitious executives and entrepreneurs how to become the top 1 percent communicators in their industry. He also has a popular YouTube channel called MasterTalk with the goal of providing free access to communication tools for everyone in the world. I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation.
Jim Stroud (41s):
I actually took notes and I think you will too. Brenden Kumarasamy is up next on TribePod. You are listening to TribePod, a podcast series of interviews of interest to the HR community. It is hosted by Jim Stroud, sponsored by Proactive Talent, and enjoyed by you. Today's episode begins right after this.
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Jim Stroud (2m 43s):
For more information on Proactive Talent, visit them online at ProactiveTalent.com or click the link in the podcast description. Hello, and welcome to TribePod. Today, we have a very special guest. Special guest, tell us who are you and what do you do?
Brenden Kumarasamy (2m 59s):
Absolutely, Jim. Fantastic to be on the show. So my name is Brenden Kumarasamy. I'm the founder of MasterTalk. It's a YouTube channel I started to help the world master the art of communication and public speaking. And I'm also a public speaking coach for executives in the corporate space and entrepreneurs as well, so that they can become top 1 percent communicators in their industry. It's fantastic to be on the show.
Jim Stroud (3m 21s):
Thank you. Wow, that was so nice how you said that.
Brenden Kumarasamy (3m 24s):
I better say it nice, Jim. If I can't who in the world is going to hire me for coaching if I can't communicate better than the people I help.
Jim Stroud (3m 34s):
Definitely, definitely. So what would you say are some of the greatest challenges when it comes to great communication?
Brenden Kumarasamy (3m 40s):
Yeah, so there's definitely a lot, but I'll simmer it down to three main ones, Jim. So the first one is motivation. The second one is direction and the third one is technique. So motivation is the simple one is if we're not motivated to do something, we're not going to do it. And the problem with communication is a lot of us don't have a sense of urgency when it comes to practicing in the first place. So the first question I have for your audience to think about is how would your life change if you were an exceptional communicator? A lot of us don't really think about this question. And if we really focus on in the context of our roles as executives, our roles as entrepreneurs, or maybe our roles as fathers and mothers, when we really start to think about that, we can really start to reflect on how would life change if we were much better at communication.
Brenden Kumarasamy (4m 26s):
And that gives us a sense of motivation. That's number one. Second one is direction. A lot of us have goals with most areas of our life, health, finances, career. Very few of us think about our communication goals. How would life be different if we had communication goals? And when we start to prioritize specific tangible communication goals, we start to get the results that we're looking for. So most people are listening to the show probably don't have communication goals, or if they do they're generally very vague, like speak clearly. It won't get us very far. So instead what I would encourage people to think about is what's something specific that you really want. Is it a pave raise? Is it a specific role you want an accompany that really, you need communication.
Brenden Kumarasamy (5m 7s):
I'll give an example. If you want to be C-level executive, as you probably know this, Jim, yeah, you got to know to communicate for as your team. So have that clear direction. Last piece is technique. I encourage you to have strategies, exercise to work on your technique on a consistent basis. One example, I can give us the random word exercise, pretty simple, pick a random word, like bus, doorknob, computer, and create presentations out of thin air. And this helps build momentum with your technique.
Jim Stroud (5m 33s):
Interesting. Interesting. I have never heard of that before setting a speaking goal. When you said that, I thought, what could that be? Could that be to one day, I don't know, be a news commentator? I mean, when I think of great speakers, I'm thinking of news commentators, I'm thinking of politicians, I'm thinking of smooth operators in the club who just can walk up to women and pick them up. That's interesting though, that that could be something to think about really.
Brenden Kumarasamy (6m 3s):
Yeah. I can give them more context as well. So, yeah, you're absolutely right. Communication goals are not easy to set because they're not as measurable as any other goal. Let me give you an example. Let's say the goal is to grow our business by 10 percent. Let's say the business is doing half a million. You want to grow to 550 as an example. So when we take that as an example, it's very tangible. We know by the end of the year, if we made it to 550 or not, we just look at the bank account. We look at the numbers, it's obvious, but in communication that goalpost is not as clearly defined. So the way that I've done this with clients is pick a communication goal where you're comparing yourself to other speakers. That's the easiest way to do it. So essentially what you do is you pick three speakers that you want to be, that you admire.
Brenden Kumarasamy (6m 44s):
Let's say, Barack Obama, a CHRO of a company, let's say we take Claude Silver, the CHRO of VaynerMedia, right? And Lindsay Lohan, I don't know, maybe like Simon Sinek or something. So just three people you admire. And then what you do is then you create two different boxes. One box is one strength of that speaker that you really admire and the second box is one weakness. What's one point of improvement that you would give that person? And what this does is it helps you really think in a way where your mind has never thought before. I never really thought about strengths and weaknesses for key speakers that I admire. Usually, I just watch them speak and just clap it in one. And that helps us gain a little bit more depth than this and understanding about how we set specific goals for success.
Jim Stroud (7m 29s):
So, in doing this, let's say, let's go with the Barack Obama example. If I wanted to speak as well as he does, should I start changing my mannerisms and my hand gestures and the words that I choose to mimic him so that in mimicking him, I become a better speaker like him, or should I look for my own particular style?
Brenden Kumarasamy (7m 51s):
So there's a couple of things there. Let me break that down because it's a fantastic question. So what I would do is communication is like juggling 18 balls at the same time, Jim. One of those balls is smiling and other ones is pausing. Another one is vocal tone variety. And if we try and pick up all the balls at the same time, naturally all the balls will fall down. We won't be able to hold it. So Barack Obama is the same thing. Don't look at everything. I would focus on one specific quality that you want the most from Barack. And for all of us, that quality will be different. One person might save voice projection. Another person might say structure of speech. So figure out what that quality is for yourself and only pay attention to that one thing you want from Barak.
Brenden Kumarasamy (8m 31s):
The best way to learn communication at the highest level is you take the one quality you like from a hundred different speakers and you apply all of those hundred things to yourself. So you become your own speaker. So that's the way that I always like to think. It's kind of like a buffet, right? Pick what you like. You don't have to pick up the things you don't want.
Jim Stroud (8m 49s):
Yeah. I guess you can do the same advice to somebody who wants to be a great singer. Look at different singing styles and pick up with different singers do and create your own style based on various singers you look up to. Very good advice. Interesting. I was thinking of also other ways to measure it as you're talking about that. So if I'm a worker and I want to improve my communication style, one way I may quantify that might be the number of projects that I take on. So let's say I'm beginning to feel undervalued as a worker and I really want to be involved in more projects. So in addition to working on the quality of my work, I may want to focus on speaking up more in meetings, you know, and then at the end of the year, I'll say, "Hey, I worked on so many projects, more projects this year and last year in part because I learned to speak up and communicate better."
Jim Stroud (9m 39s):
Would that be a fair way of quantifying?
Brenden Kumarasamy (9m 42s):
Oh, yeah. I think the key is really figuring out the metric that works for you. They're the only caveat I'd add is if someone feels undervalued, I changed the metric to number of job interviews that year.
Jim Stroud (9m 55s):
Fair enough. Fair enough. How do you think remote work has affected communication styles on the job? Because the world of work suddenly changed as you know, with the pandemic and everything.
Brenden Kumarasamy (10m 6s):
Yeah, absolutely, Jim. So there's three key differences between communication in person and communication online. So let's touch on that. So the first one is eye contact. So let's say we're looking at people in a boardroom, in person we're selling a deal, we're talking to teammates. We're moving our head around to talk to each individual person, look at them in the eyes, but online, whether there's one or 10,000 people on a Zoom call or a Teams meeting, all you have to do is look in one area, which is the camera lens. And if you look in that one direction, it gives the illusion that you're looking at everyone at the same time. So that's a key difference between the in-person world and the online. Online, you actually want to keep your eyes in one direction, as much as possible.
Brenden Kumarasamy (10m 50s):
The second difference is energy. That one's pretty obvious. When it comes to energy, it's a lot easier to be energetic when it's in person. I mean, I have sweatpants on right now. It's just no one could see it, right? So if there's an interview at 10:00 a.m., you could wake up at 9:30. It doesn't matter. But in person, you can't do that. There's a lot more pressure for you to succeed. There's a lot more, oh, I got to show more energy. So the trick actually is to present the same presentation offline and then online. It's actually very difficult to replicate the same level of energy. And the only reason I'm able to do it on this podcast is because I've already done it in person. And I knew what energy I need to bring back, even if we're not in the same room right now.
Brenden Kumarasamy (11m 31s):
So that would be my second piece, energy. Third piece is accessibility. So when you're in person, it's really easy to get feedback from your audience because there's a lot less friction. Let's say you give a team meeting. You just get lunch with them after, get their thoughts, get their comments, ask them questions. Not as easy to do in the online world because there's a lot of friction. So the only way to get that sorted is to force the relationship. You should get on calls with two or three of them proactively before your meeting, you should have a call with one or two of them after the meeting's done so you can get your feedback from them and make your presentations better. So those are the three key main differences to remote and in-person.
Jim Stroud (12m 10s):
Interesting. As you say that, it makes me wonder too about relationships, which is the cornerstone of any business. You know, people want to do business with people. It makes me wonder how do you build relationships with employees while working remote?
Brenden Kumarasamy (12m 24s):
Very good question.
Jim Stroud (12m 25s):
Yeah, yeah. Or coworkers. I said employees, but just everybody.
Brenden Kumarasamy (12m 29s):
So let's elaborate on that in the context of your question, which I think is great. For a strategy, super simple. Send video messages to people on your team. When was the last time, this is more of a rhetorical question, when was the last time, people are listening to this podcast, as your corporate employee that you received a video message from one of your managers or supervisors to just say, "Hey Jim, hope you have a wonderful day. I want to just appreciate the work that you're doing, whatever that thing is and wishing a happy holidays," or something. And most people I talk to have never had that happen once in their careers, right?
Jim Stroud (13m 4s):
Right, right. I'm trying to think if it happened in my career.
Brenden Kumarasamy (13m 8s):
You've been at the business for a while too.
Jim Stroud (13m 11s):
Yeah. Yeah. I don't think it has.
Brenden Kumarasamy (13m 13s):
Exactly. So that's one easy way to differentiate yourself. I actually forced some CEOs I work with just as an example to show people how extreme I am. He's managing 40 people right now. So what I had him do, I had him block out an hour of his life, literally one hour of his precious time, open your dang phone and send a 32nd video to each of your employees, all 40 of them. And he did that. And it didn't matter what the quality was, how it came off. You just do it. And most of them are crying. They're like, "Oh, my God, like, this means so much to me." So that's an easy 80/20 strategy to create rapport. The other thing that you can do is, and this is more just for your direct reports or else it's too much of a burden.
Brenden Kumarasamy (13m 55s):
Let's say, you're managing a team of five to 10 people directly. Let's say you're a VP managing like managers or something. What I would do is I would make a list of those five people and write down their top three goals for each of them for the year. So that when you go into feedback meetings that you're having discussions with them, you're always talking to them in the context of their goals. This is something I haven't seen a single manager or vice president do at the executive level. If you just think about that, it'll mean so much to your direct reports, especially with the competition war on talent right now. It's an easy way for you to differentiate yourself. That's strategy number two. And then strategy number three is write down something that you really appreciate about them. Something that you really love about them. It could be hobbies, passions, and keep a tally in the backend for your five, 10 reports and send them a gift to their house.
Brenden Kumarasamy (14m 43s):
That could be under 50 bucks, super easy. You don't have to buy them a Lamborghini. Just show them you care. For example, let's see we're talking, let's see you're managing me and you find out I like Skittles, you send me $10 worth of single Skittles. It's nothing. It costs you nothing, but it means everything to the person. And they'll always be loyal to.
Jim Stroud (15m 1s):
I like that. I like these examples. And I'm thinking, I think a lot of them, they are taking notes actually, as we speak. But so far, a lot of these examples are sort of one-on-one, me talking to someone else. How can we learn to communicate better in teams? Because that's a different dynamic when you're talking to a bunch of people at once.
Brenden Kumarasamy (15m 18s):
Yeah. I would say a bunch of people at once it would depend on the context of the meeting, but I'll give you kind of easy, easy stuff that applies to any situation.
Jim Stroud (15m 25s):
Okay.
Brenden Kumarasamy (15m 25s):
I'd say the most important thing, let's say it's a presentation to your team about work or your CEO talking to your group, pick the highest impact presentation of your quarter. What is the most important one? Journal leads a status update meeting for how the company's growing, status report, maybe it's a big sales. Pick that one presentation, but the next time you go into it, practice it very differently. If we are working on a puzzle, which pieces would we start with first? And the answer is the edges.
Jim Stroud (15m 55s):
Yeah, the corners. Yep.
Brenden Kumarasamy (15m 57s):
Oh, so you seem to be a puzzle expert. Well, why would you start with the corners?
Jim Stroud (16m 2s):
I start with the corners because those are easier to fit than the ones in the middle. I tend to be able to find those faster.
Brenden Kumarasamy (16m 13s):
Absolutely. Exactly. Perfect. You actually got it right, Jim. You're absolutely right. Easy to find it at the box. Easy to put together. Kind of like an outline and then work your way into the middle. But we don't that in communication. Communication, we shoved a bunch of content or presentations. We start the middle first. We rambled throughout the whole thing. The last slide sounds something like this. Thanks. I guess, it's resonated with you. So, yeah, not the right approach, right? So instead, what I encourage people to think about, Jim, is practice presentations like a jigsaw puzzle. Start with the edges first. Do your introduction 50 times.
Brenden Kumarasamy (16m 55s):
Not two times, not three times, not five times. Do it 50 times, just the intro. Yeah, and I know what you're thinking. I know exactly what you're saying. Fifty is a big number, Brenden. I'm a big-time executive. I don't have time for 50. So let me convince you otherwise. Your introductions, one minute, right?
Jim Stroud (17m 13s):
Wow, okay.
Brenden Kumarasamy (17m 13s):
It'll take you 45 minutes. And by the way, this is what I always like to say. If you apply just 10 percent of anything I say in the podcast, you'll get a hundred percent of the result because I'm a loose coaching with the frame of how to be the best in your industry. If you want to be middle pack then, yeah, if you did 10 percent of what I say, you'll get the result. So going back to this role, when we think about puzzle pieces, practice the introduction 20 times, okay. Let's compromise. Most people haven't done that yet. Do the same with the conclusion. What's a great movie with the terrible ending? Last time I checked terrible movie. So same thing. Do the conclusion 20 times and only an hour of practice, you'll already have built more momentum than presenting the same presentation over and over again, because your introduction, your conclusion will be so refined that you'll have that momentum.
Brenden Kumarasamy (18m 0s):
So now let me tackle the middle with some confidence. And that's the way you want to approach practicing.
Jim Stroud (18m 6s):
So when I restate the intro 50 times, am I saying it exactly the same way? Am I saying the same thing differently?
Brenden Kumarasamy (18m 14s):
Oh, good, good question. What I respond to that, I always say we don't get rewarded based on how well we do something in my books. We get rewarded on how many times we do it. So for me, I don't really worry too much about, does it sound different? Do you want to change the language? I see it more as reps. So you don't necessarily have to make it the same. You can adjust it as you go, but really just focus on presenting your introduction, whether it looks completely different on the 50th time or it looks the same.
Jim Stroud (18m 44s):
Interesting, interesting, interesting. What role do facial expressions, gestures, and pauses play in communication?
Brenden Kumarasamy (18m 52s):
Absolutely. So there's definitely a lot of implications, but I'll keep it simple for today. Think of communication like a mirror. So I'll throw out an analogy here for us to understand this better.
Jim Stroud (19m 2s):
Okay.
Brenden Kumarasamy (19m 2s):
What's the first thing that we do when we wake up in the morning?
Jim Stroud (19m 8s):
Yawn.
Brenden Kumarasamy (19m 9s):
That's cool. That's the next level. And then after we yawn, we probably go to the bathroom, right? So I should probably say this confused other people in the future. What's the second thing that we do? The second thing is that we generally go to the bathroom and, you know, brush her teeth, look at the mirror, but fair enough, touche. Touche. Sure. So there's two types of people will show up that day, Jim. First, the number one will sound something like this. Wow. Today's day is amazing. I got to talk to Brenden today about communication. And then I have some meetings with my amazing team members that have dinner with my family. Life is amazing. So that energy is how we show up that day.
Brenden Kumarasamy (19m 50s):
But the opposite is also true. This day sucks. I talked to this Brenden guy. Geez, he's yelling at me. What's wrong with him? Then I have to have dinner with my family. Obviously, I know you don't think that, but the key is, is the way that we show up matters. But here's the punchline, Jim, is that the mirror we look at it in the morning, isn't just an object. It is the very thing that we are because as mirrors or rather as speakers, we are mirrors. We reflect our own emotions onto the people that we speak to. So the question for your audience is this, which emotions will you choose?
Brenden Kumarasamy (20m 31s):
Will you choose boredom like most speakers? Will you choose excitement, reassurance, and above all passion? And I'll leave that choice up to everyone on the call.
Jim Stroud (20m 41s):
Cool, cool. I like that. What are some exercises I can do to practice public speaking or communicating? I guess standing in front of a mirror and practicing is one, such an exercise that I imagine I could do? There's something else I can do?
Brenden Kumarasamy (20m 54s):
Yeah. I'll give three easy ones. So the first one is the random word exercise that we talked about earlier. So pick a random word and do it every single day. Like three to five times. A lot of people downplay this exercise, especially execs, they think is childish. So let me paint the burning bridge. They're burning bridge is this, if you can make sense out of nonsense, you can make sense out of anything. A lot of executives, they go into meetings, Jim, and they're like, yeah, I'm worried about this. I'm talking to a bunch of C-level clients. So when I have them talk about avocados and churros and McDonald's, they start to panic. But once they start getting used to the random word exercise, they can talk about anything in the boardroom because they've been working at the same company, the same industry for like 5, 10, 15 years.
Brenden Kumarasamy (21m 37s):
So no one's going to ask them to make a presentation on their favorite color. They're looking for the same stuff that they asked them last week, just for a different client or a different account. So it's the same thing. Practice the random word exercise three to five times. And I always like to say this, Jim. There's only probably less than 1 percent who will ever do it a hundred times in their life. But here's the thing, Jim, it only takes two hours to do the exercise a hundred times. So are you willing to give me two hours out of your life? Not out of your day, not out of your week, not out of your month, but out of your life to be in the top 1 percent of your industry? And that's really decisions that people have to think about.
Brenden Kumarasamy (22m 17s):
That's the first exercise. Second exercise, the question drills. Questions drills, super simple. Have we ever been in a situation where an executive is asking us a question on a steering committee or in corporate, and we don't know the answer to the question? So the way that we approach it, the way that I like to approach it is every day you wake up when you have high-stakes meeting, ask yourself this question. What is a question that they'll ask me for sure in this meeting? And start thinking about it for five minutes a day. And if you do that for 30 days, let's do the presentation is in 30, you have 30 questions that you've already thought of in advance. So you come into that meeting very well-prepared. That's the second exercise I recommend it only takes five minutes a day.
Brenden Kumarasamy (22m 59s):
Third exercise I recommend is more of a reflection exercise. And the reflection exercise is going back to the question we talked about earlier, how would your life change if you were an exceptional communicator? Don't just write the question down, really reflect on it because it matters a lot more than you might think, because if you don't reflect on how your life would be different, you won't do any of the tactics we suggested in today's episode. You won't do the random word exercise. You won't do the question drills. You won't do the puzzle. You won't send the video messages. It would take like 30 seconds. Like it's simple, just not easy. It's not rocket science, but the reason people don't do it is because they don't have that motivation. So reflect on that for yourself.
Jim Stroud (23m 35s):
Speaking well in public haves has clear advantages, no matter where you are on the corporate totem pole, whether you're in the C-suite or you're a worker. I definitely see the advantages of it, but I know that there are some hoolish thing will say it's just not for me because maybe I stammer or maybe I stutter, or maybe I just get too nervous or I'm confident as long as I'm sitting down. But as soon as you stand me up in front of a room full of people, as I go. Could give just one piece of advice to someone like that who's already self-sabotaging themselves by saying how badly they are as a speaker? What would you tell them?
Jim Stroud (24m 15s):
What advice would you give them?
Brenden Kumarasamy (24m 17s):
So since this is an executive group, I'm usually a lot more softer with people, but this is like VPs SVPs. A lot of these people are directors and managers. I'll paint a different story, Jim. I'll say how good are your dreams? How big do you want to play? Like all of you who are listening to this podcast, you've already had a lot of success in your life, right? You are managers, you're directors, you're VPs, the question is, how far do you want to go? And if the response is, I don't really want to go that far, then I have no feedback to give you. But if the goal is to become a CHRO one day, right, chief human resource officer, if the goal is to be a chief people officers, if the goal is to be a chief culture officer, we need to understand that being a great communicator is not optional.
Brenden Kumarasamy (25m 1s):
It's mandatory. And the reason it's mandatory is because most of your time as a C-level executive is spent on strategy at people management and brand. Strategy, people management, and brand. Why do I say that? People because you're always constantly trying to recruit top talent and the way that you do this at scale is by doing podcasts like this, it's by going to panel on conferences, going to sponsored events that your company does for you. Let's say you work at IBM and you're a change management consultant. You're going there and you're speaking about the company. You're speaking about the vision, especially if you're a C-level. So you are attracting people. The other reason why it's important is for brand, right?
Brenden Kumarasamy (25m 40s):
Eminence, executive eminence is the cornerstone that differentiates a VP from an SVP from a C-level executive. What are you known for in the business? What are you known for in the industry? Like let's say we use HR, which is the context of today. Let's say we take Bersin and Deloitte, right? Bersin is very well known in his industry because of his brand. Same thing with the Laszlo Bock, right? The previous SVP of People Ops at Google. He's really well known because of the books that he writes, the eminence that he creates, the way that he speaks on a podcast. And that's what you need to play if you want to be in the top level of this game. And the third piece is relationship building. Most of your time as a C-level, not only you're communicating the vision, you're recruiting, you're attracting talent towards going to network.
Brenden Kumarasamy (26m 25s):
You see who are the talented people here that I need to bring back into my companies. That's a huge requirement at that level because you need to play an active role in recruiting the best people, because people run everything else, especially on the HR side, obviously. So that's the key, Jim. I wouldn't force anyone to do anything. I think I would just ask the question how big are the dreams? That's all.
Jim Stroud (26m 45s):
Very good answers. Very good answers. You've done this before. I can tell. I've thoroughly enjoyed this conversation and I'm sure our listeners have as well. If they wanted to contact you and learn more about what you offer, how can they find you online?
Brenden Kumarasamy (27m 2s):
Yeah, absolutely, Jim. What a wonderful conversation. Excellent questions as well. I would say two easy ways. So the first one is my YouTube channel. Go to Mastertalk, in one word. You'll have access to hundreds of free videos on how to communicate ideas effectively. And the second one, for those that are interested in coaching, you can come to one of my free training. So I host a live free interactive Zoom call every few weeks, and you can register for that at rockstarcommunicator.com.
Jim Stroud (27m 29s):
Brenden, thanks again for being a guest on TribePod. You are appreciated.
Brenden Kumarasamy (27m 40s):
Likewise, brother.
Jim Stroud (27m 40s):
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you a thousand times. Thank you for listening and subscribing to our podcast. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please send them to us. You can reach us at TribePod that's T-R-I-B-E-P-O-D at ProactiveTalent.com. We look forward to hearing from you.
Hello, listeners. Good morning or good afternoon or good evening, I guess. It all depends on when you are listening to this podcast. Welcome to another episode of TribePod. Today, I have a very interesting guest to share with you. His name is Brenden Kumarasamy. Now, Brenden is the founder of MasterTalk and he coaches ambitious executives and entrepreneurs how to become the top 1 percent communicators in their industry. He also has a popular YouTube channel called MasterTalk with the goal of providing free access to communication tools for everyone in the world. I thoroughly enjoyed our conversation.
Jim Stroud (41s):
I actually took notes and I think you will too. Brenden Kumarasamy is up next on TribePod. You are listening to TribePod, a podcast series of interviews of interest to the HR community. It is hosted by Jim Stroud, sponsored by Proactive Talent, and enjoyed by you. Today's episode begins right after this.
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Jim Stroud (2m 43s):
For more information on Proactive Talent, visit them online at ProactiveTalent.com or click the link in the podcast description. Hello, and welcome to TribePod. Today, we have a very special guest. Special guest, tell us who are you and what do you do?
Brenden Kumarasamy (2m 59s):
Absolutely, Jim. Fantastic to be on the show. So my name is Brenden Kumarasamy. I'm the founder of MasterTalk. It's a YouTube channel I started to help the world master the art of communication and public speaking. And I'm also a public speaking coach for executives in the corporate space and entrepreneurs as well, so that they can become top 1 percent communicators in their industry. It's fantastic to be on the show.
Jim Stroud (3m 21s):
Thank you. Wow, that was so nice how you said that.
Brenden Kumarasamy (3m 24s):
I better say it nice, Jim. If I can't who in the world is going to hire me for coaching if I can't communicate better than the people I help.
Jim Stroud (3m 34s):
Definitely, definitely. So what would you say are some of the greatest challenges when it comes to great communication?
Brenden Kumarasamy (3m 40s):
Yeah, so there's definitely a lot, but I'll simmer it down to three main ones, Jim. So the first one is motivation. The second one is direction and the third one is technique. So motivation is the simple one is if we're not motivated to do something, we're not going to do it. And the problem with communication is a lot of us don't have a sense of urgency when it comes to practicing in the first place. So the first question I have for your audience to think about is how would your life change if you were an exceptional communicator? A lot of us don't really think about this question. And if we really focus on in the context of our roles as executives, our roles as entrepreneurs, or maybe our roles as fathers and mothers, when we really start to think about that, we can really start to reflect on how would life change if we were much better at communication.
Brenden Kumarasamy (4m 26s):
And that gives us a sense of motivation. That's number one. Second one is direction. A lot of us have goals with most areas of our life, health, finances, career. Very few of us think about our communication goals. How would life be different if we had communication goals? And when we start to prioritize specific tangible communication goals, we start to get the results that we're looking for. So most people are listening to the show probably don't have communication goals, or if they do they're generally very vague, like speak clearly. It won't get us very far. So instead what I would encourage people to think about is what's something specific that you really want. Is it a pave raise? Is it a specific role you want an accompany that really, you need communication.
Brenden Kumarasamy (5m 7s):
I'll give an example. If you want to be C-level executive, as you probably know this, Jim, yeah, you got to know to communicate for as your team. So have that clear direction. Last piece is technique. I encourage you to have strategies, exercise to work on your technique on a consistent basis. One example, I can give us the random word exercise, pretty simple, pick a random word, like bus, doorknob, computer, and create presentations out of thin air. And this helps build momentum with your technique.
Jim Stroud (5m 33s):
Interesting. Interesting. I have never heard of that before setting a speaking goal. When you said that, I thought, what could that be? Could that be to one day, I don't know, be a news commentator? I mean, when I think of great speakers, I'm thinking of news commentators, I'm thinking of politicians, I'm thinking of smooth operators in the club who just can walk up to women and pick them up. That's interesting though, that that could be something to think about really.
Brenden Kumarasamy (6m 3s):
Yeah. I can give them more context as well. So, yeah, you're absolutely right. Communication goals are not easy to set because they're not as measurable as any other goal. Let me give you an example. Let's say the goal is to grow our business by 10 percent. Let's say the business is doing half a million. You want to grow to 550 as an example. So when we take that as an example, it's very tangible. We know by the end of the year, if we made it to 550 or not, we just look at the bank account. We look at the numbers, it's obvious, but in communication that goalpost is not as clearly defined. So the way that I've done this with clients is pick a communication goal where you're comparing yourself to other speakers. That's the easiest way to do it. So essentially what you do is you pick three speakers that you want to be, that you admire.
Brenden Kumarasamy (6m 44s):
Let's say, Barack Obama, a CHRO of a company, let's say we take Claude Silver, the CHRO of VaynerMedia, right? And Lindsay Lohan, I don't know, maybe like Simon Sinek or something. So just three people you admire. And then what you do is then you create two different boxes. One box is one strength of that speaker that you really admire and the second box is one weakness. What's one point of improvement that you would give that person? And what this does is it helps you really think in a way where your mind has never thought before. I never really thought about strengths and weaknesses for key speakers that I admire. Usually, I just watch them speak and just clap it in one. And that helps us gain a little bit more depth than this and understanding about how we set specific goals for success.
Jim Stroud (7m 29s):
So, in doing this, let's say, let's go with the Barack Obama example. If I wanted to speak as well as he does, should I start changing my mannerisms and my hand gestures and the words that I choose to mimic him so that in mimicking him, I become a better speaker like him, or should I look for my own particular style?
Brenden Kumarasamy (7m 51s):
So there's a couple of things there. Let me break that down because it's a fantastic question. So what I would do is communication is like juggling 18 balls at the same time, Jim. One of those balls is smiling and other ones is pausing. Another one is vocal tone variety. And if we try and pick up all the balls at the same time, naturally all the balls will fall down. We won't be able to hold it. So Barack Obama is the same thing. Don't look at everything. I would focus on one specific quality that you want the most from Barack. And for all of us, that quality will be different. One person might save voice projection. Another person might say structure of speech. So figure out what that quality is for yourself and only pay attention to that one thing you want from Barak.
Brenden Kumarasamy (8m 31s):
The best way to learn communication at the highest level is you take the one quality you like from a hundred different speakers and you apply all of those hundred things to yourself. So you become your own speaker. So that's the way that I always like to think. It's kind of like a buffet, right? Pick what you like. You don't have to pick up the things you don't want.
Jim Stroud (8m 49s):
Yeah. I guess you can do the same advice to somebody who wants to be a great singer. Look at different singing styles and pick up with different singers do and create your own style based on various singers you look up to. Very good advice. Interesting. I was thinking of also other ways to measure it as you're talking about that. So if I'm a worker and I want to improve my communication style, one way I may quantify that might be the number of projects that I take on. So let's say I'm beginning to feel undervalued as a worker and I really want to be involved in more projects. So in addition to working on the quality of my work, I may want to focus on speaking up more in meetings, you know, and then at the end of the year, I'll say, "Hey, I worked on so many projects, more projects this year and last year in part because I learned to speak up and communicate better."
Jim Stroud (9m 39s):
Would that be a fair way of quantifying?
Brenden Kumarasamy (9m 42s):
Oh, yeah. I think the key is really figuring out the metric that works for you. They're the only caveat I'd add is if someone feels undervalued, I changed the metric to number of job interviews that year.
Jim Stroud (9m 55s):
Fair enough. Fair enough. How do you think remote work has affected communication styles on the job? Because the world of work suddenly changed as you know, with the pandemic and everything.
Brenden Kumarasamy (10m 6s):
Yeah, absolutely, Jim. So there's three key differences between communication in person and communication online. So let's touch on that. So the first one is eye contact. So let's say we're looking at people in a boardroom, in person we're selling a deal, we're talking to teammates. We're moving our head around to talk to each individual person, look at them in the eyes, but online, whether there's one or 10,000 people on a Zoom call or a Teams meeting, all you have to do is look in one area, which is the camera lens. And if you look in that one direction, it gives the illusion that you're looking at everyone at the same time. So that's a key difference between the in-person world and the online. Online, you actually want to keep your eyes in one direction, as much as possible.
Brenden Kumarasamy (10m 50s):
The second difference is energy. That one's pretty obvious. When it comes to energy, it's a lot easier to be energetic when it's in person. I mean, I have sweatpants on right now. It's just no one could see it, right? So if there's an interview at 10:00 a.m., you could wake up at 9:30. It doesn't matter. But in person, you can't do that. There's a lot more pressure for you to succeed. There's a lot more, oh, I got to show more energy. So the trick actually is to present the same presentation offline and then online. It's actually very difficult to replicate the same level of energy. And the only reason I'm able to do it on this podcast is because I've already done it in person. And I knew what energy I need to bring back, even if we're not in the same room right now.
Brenden Kumarasamy (11m 31s):
So that would be my second piece, energy. Third piece is accessibility. So when you're in person, it's really easy to get feedback from your audience because there's a lot less friction. Let's say you give a team meeting. You just get lunch with them after, get their thoughts, get their comments, ask them questions. Not as easy to do in the online world because there's a lot of friction. So the only way to get that sorted is to force the relationship. You should get on calls with two or three of them proactively before your meeting, you should have a call with one or two of them after the meeting's done so you can get your feedback from them and make your presentations better. So those are the three key main differences to remote and in-person.
Jim Stroud (12m 10s):
Interesting. As you say that, it makes me wonder too about relationships, which is the cornerstone of any business. You know, people want to do business with people. It makes me wonder how do you build relationships with employees while working remote?
Brenden Kumarasamy (12m 24s):
Very good question.
Jim Stroud (12m 25s):
Yeah, yeah. Or coworkers. I said employees, but just everybody.
Brenden Kumarasamy (12m 29s):
So let's elaborate on that in the context of your question, which I think is great. For a strategy, super simple. Send video messages to people on your team. When was the last time, this is more of a rhetorical question, when was the last time, people are listening to this podcast, as your corporate employee that you received a video message from one of your managers or supervisors to just say, "Hey Jim, hope you have a wonderful day. I want to just appreciate the work that you're doing, whatever that thing is and wishing a happy holidays," or something. And most people I talk to have never had that happen once in their careers, right?
Jim Stroud (13m 4s):
Right, right. I'm trying to think if it happened in my career.
Brenden Kumarasamy (13m 8s):
You've been at the business for a while too.
Jim Stroud (13m 11s):
Yeah. Yeah. I don't think it has.
Brenden Kumarasamy (13m 13s):
Exactly. So that's one easy way to differentiate yourself. I actually forced some CEOs I work with just as an example to show people how extreme I am. He's managing 40 people right now. So what I had him do, I had him block out an hour of his life, literally one hour of his precious time, open your dang phone and send a 32nd video to each of your employees, all 40 of them. And he did that. And it didn't matter what the quality was, how it came off. You just do it. And most of them are crying. They're like, "Oh, my God, like, this means so much to me." So that's an easy 80/20 strategy to create rapport. The other thing that you can do is, and this is more just for your direct reports or else it's too much of a burden.
Brenden Kumarasamy (13m 55s):
Let's say, you're managing a team of five to 10 people directly. Let's say you're a VP managing like managers or something. What I would do is I would make a list of those five people and write down their top three goals for each of them for the year. So that when you go into feedback meetings that you're having discussions with them, you're always talking to them in the context of their goals. This is something I haven't seen a single manager or vice president do at the executive level. If you just think about that, it'll mean so much to your direct reports, especially with the competition war on talent right now. It's an easy way for you to differentiate yourself. That's strategy number two. And then strategy number three is write down something that you really appreciate about them. Something that you really love about them. It could be hobbies, passions, and keep a tally in the backend for your five, 10 reports and send them a gift to their house.
Brenden Kumarasamy (14m 43s):
That could be under 50 bucks, super easy. You don't have to buy them a Lamborghini. Just show them you care. For example, let's see we're talking, let's see you're managing me and you find out I like Skittles, you send me $10 worth of single Skittles. It's nothing. It costs you nothing, but it means everything to the person. And they'll always be loyal to.
Jim Stroud (15m 1s):
I like that. I like these examples. And I'm thinking, I think a lot of them, they are taking notes actually, as we speak. But so far, a lot of these examples are sort of one-on-one, me talking to someone else. How can we learn to communicate better in teams? Because that's a different dynamic when you're talking to a bunch of people at once.
Brenden Kumarasamy (15m 18s):
Yeah. I would say a bunch of people at once it would depend on the context of the meeting, but I'll give you kind of easy, easy stuff that applies to any situation.
Jim Stroud (15m 25s):
Okay.
Brenden Kumarasamy (15m 25s):
I'd say the most important thing, let's say it's a presentation to your team about work or your CEO talking to your group, pick the highest impact presentation of your quarter. What is the most important one? Journal leads a status update meeting for how the company's growing, status report, maybe it's a big sales. Pick that one presentation, but the next time you go into it, practice it very differently. If we are working on a puzzle, which pieces would we start with first? And the answer is the edges.
Jim Stroud (15m 55s):
Yeah, the corners. Yep.
Brenden Kumarasamy (15m 57s):
Oh, so you seem to be a puzzle expert. Well, why would you start with the corners?
Jim Stroud (16m 2s):
I start with the corners because those are easier to fit than the ones in the middle. I tend to be able to find those faster.
Brenden Kumarasamy (16m 13s):
Absolutely. Exactly. Perfect. You actually got it right, Jim. You're absolutely right. Easy to find it at the box. Easy to put together. Kind of like an outline and then work your way into the middle. But we don't that in communication. Communication, we shoved a bunch of content or presentations. We start the middle first. We rambled throughout the whole thing. The last slide sounds something like this. Thanks. I guess, it's resonated with you. So, yeah, not the right approach, right? So instead, what I encourage people to think about, Jim, is practice presentations like a jigsaw puzzle. Start with the edges first. Do your introduction 50 times.
Brenden Kumarasamy (16m 55s):
Not two times, not three times, not five times. Do it 50 times, just the intro. Yeah, and I know what you're thinking. I know exactly what you're saying. Fifty is a big number, Brenden. I'm a big-time executive. I don't have time for 50. So let me convince you otherwise. Your introductions, one minute, right?
Jim Stroud (17m 13s):
Wow, okay.
Brenden Kumarasamy (17m 13s):
It'll take you 45 minutes. And by the way, this is what I always like to say. If you apply just 10 percent of anything I say in the podcast, you'll get a hundred percent of the result because I'm a loose coaching with the frame of how to be the best in your industry. If you want to be middle pack then, yeah, if you did 10 percent of what I say, you'll get the result. So going back to this role, when we think about puzzle pieces, practice the introduction 20 times, okay. Let's compromise. Most people haven't done that yet. Do the same with the conclusion. What's a great movie with the terrible ending? Last time I checked terrible movie. So same thing. Do the conclusion 20 times and only an hour of practice, you'll already have built more momentum than presenting the same presentation over and over again, because your introduction, your conclusion will be so refined that you'll have that momentum.
Brenden Kumarasamy (18m 0s):
So now let me tackle the middle with some confidence. And that's the way you want to approach practicing.
Jim Stroud (18m 6s):
So when I restate the intro 50 times, am I saying it exactly the same way? Am I saying the same thing differently?
Brenden Kumarasamy (18m 14s):
Oh, good, good question. What I respond to that, I always say we don't get rewarded based on how well we do something in my books. We get rewarded on how many times we do it. So for me, I don't really worry too much about, does it sound different? Do you want to change the language? I see it more as reps. So you don't necessarily have to make it the same. You can adjust it as you go, but really just focus on presenting your introduction, whether it looks completely different on the 50th time or it looks the same.
Jim Stroud (18m 44s):
Interesting, interesting, interesting. What role do facial expressions, gestures, and pauses play in communication?
Brenden Kumarasamy (18m 52s):
Absolutely. So there's definitely a lot of implications, but I'll keep it simple for today. Think of communication like a mirror. So I'll throw out an analogy here for us to understand this better.
Jim Stroud (19m 2s):
Okay.
Brenden Kumarasamy (19m 2s):
What's the first thing that we do when we wake up in the morning?
Jim Stroud (19m 8s):
Yawn.
Brenden Kumarasamy (19m 9s):
That's cool. That's the next level. And then after we yawn, we probably go to the bathroom, right? So I should probably say this confused other people in the future. What's the second thing that we do? The second thing is that we generally go to the bathroom and, you know, brush her teeth, look at the mirror, but fair enough, touche. Touche. Sure. So there's two types of people will show up that day, Jim. First, the number one will sound something like this. Wow. Today's day is amazing. I got to talk to Brenden today about communication. And then I have some meetings with my amazing team members that have dinner with my family. Life is amazing. So that energy is how we show up that day.
Brenden Kumarasamy (19m 50s):
But the opposite is also true. This day sucks. I talked to this Brenden guy. Geez, he's yelling at me. What's wrong with him? Then I have to have dinner with my family. Obviously, I know you don't think that, but the key is, is the way that we show up matters. But here's the punchline, Jim, is that the mirror we look at it in the morning, isn't just an object. It is the very thing that we are because as mirrors or rather as speakers, we are mirrors. We reflect our own emotions onto the people that we speak to. So the question for your audience is this, which emotions will you choose?
Brenden Kumarasamy (20m 31s):
Will you choose boredom like most speakers? Will you choose excitement, reassurance, and above all passion? And I'll leave that choice up to everyone on the call.
Jim Stroud (20m 41s):
Cool, cool. I like that. What are some exercises I can do to practice public speaking or communicating? I guess standing in front of a mirror and practicing is one, such an exercise that I imagine I could do? There's something else I can do?
Brenden Kumarasamy (20m 54s):
Yeah. I'll give three easy ones. So the first one is the random word exercise that we talked about earlier. So pick a random word and do it every single day. Like three to five times. A lot of people downplay this exercise, especially execs, they think is childish. So let me paint the burning bridge. They're burning bridge is this, if you can make sense out of nonsense, you can make sense out of anything. A lot of executives, they go into meetings, Jim, and they're like, yeah, I'm worried about this. I'm talking to a bunch of C-level clients. So when I have them talk about avocados and churros and McDonald's, they start to panic. But once they start getting used to the random word exercise, they can talk about anything in the boardroom because they've been working at the same company, the same industry for like 5, 10, 15 years.
Brenden Kumarasamy (21m 37s):
So no one's going to ask them to make a presentation on their favorite color. They're looking for the same stuff that they asked them last week, just for a different client or a different account. So it's the same thing. Practice the random word exercise three to five times. And I always like to say this, Jim. There's only probably less than 1 percent who will ever do it a hundred times in their life. But here's the thing, Jim, it only takes two hours to do the exercise a hundred times. So are you willing to give me two hours out of your life? Not out of your day, not out of your week, not out of your month, but out of your life to be in the top 1 percent of your industry? And that's really decisions that people have to think about.
Brenden Kumarasamy (22m 17s):
That's the first exercise. Second exercise, the question drills. Questions drills, super simple. Have we ever been in a situation where an executive is asking us a question on a steering committee or in corporate, and we don't know the answer to the question? So the way that we approach it, the way that I like to approach it is every day you wake up when you have high-stakes meeting, ask yourself this question. What is a question that they'll ask me for sure in this meeting? And start thinking about it for five minutes a day. And if you do that for 30 days, let's do the presentation is in 30, you have 30 questions that you've already thought of in advance. So you come into that meeting very well-prepared. That's the second exercise I recommend it only takes five minutes a day.
Brenden Kumarasamy (22m 59s):
Third exercise I recommend is more of a reflection exercise. And the reflection exercise is going back to the question we talked about earlier, how would your life change if you were an exceptional communicator? Don't just write the question down, really reflect on it because it matters a lot more than you might think, because if you don't reflect on how your life would be different, you won't do any of the tactics we suggested in today's episode. You won't do the random word exercise. You won't do the question drills. You won't do the puzzle. You won't send the video messages. It would take like 30 seconds. Like it's simple, just not easy. It's not rocket science, but the reason people don't do it is because they don't have that motivation. So reflect on that for yourself.
Jim Stroud (23m 35s):
Speaking well in public haves has clear advantages, no matter where you are on the corporate totem pole, whether you're in the C-suite or you're a worker. I definitely see the advantages of it, but I know that there are some hoolish thing will say it's just not for me because maybe I stammer or maybe I stutter, or maybe I just get too nervous or I'm confident as long as I'm sitting down. But as soon as you stand me up in front of a room full of people, as I go. Could give just one piece of advice to someone like that who's already self-sabotaging themselves by saying how badly they are as a speaker? What would you tell them?
Jim Stroud (24m 15s):
What advice would you give them?
Brenden Kumarasamy (24m 17s):
So since this is an executive group, I'm usually a lot more softer with people, but this is like VPs SVPs. A lot of these people are directors and managers. I'll paint a different story, Jim. I'll say how good are your dreams? How big do you want to play? Like all of you who are listening to this podcast, you've already had a lot of success in your life, right? You are managers, you're directors, you're VPs, the question is, how far do you want to go? And if the response is, I don't really want to go that far, then I have no feedback to give you. But if the goal is to become a CHRO one day, right, chief human resource officer, if the goal is to be a chief people officers, if the goal is to be a chief culture officer, we need to understand that being a great communicator is not optional.
Brenden Kumarasamy (25m 1s):
It's mandatory. And the reason it's mandatory is because most of your time as a C-level executive is spent on strategy at people management and brand. Strategy, people management, and brand. Why do I say that? People because you're always constantly trying to recruit top talent and the way that you do this at scale is by doing podcasts like this, it's by going to panel on conferences, going to sponsored events that your company does for you. Let's say you work at IBM and you're a change management consultant. You're going there and you're speaking about the company. You're speaking about the vision, especially if you're a C-level. So you are attracting people. The other reason why it's important is for brand, right?
Brenden Kumarasamy (25m 40s):
Eminence, executive eminence is the cornerstone that differentiates a VP from an SVP from a C-level executive. What are you known for in the business? What are you known for in the industry? Like let's say we use HR, which is the context of today. Let's say we take Bersin and Deloitte, right? Bersin is very well known in his industry because of his brand. Same thing with the Laszlo Bock, right? The previous SVP of People Ops at Google. He's really well known because of the books that he writes, the eminence that he creates, the way that he speaks on a podcast. And that's what you need to play if you want to be in the top level of this game. And the third piece is relationship building. Most of your time as a C-level, not only you're communicating the vision, you're recruiting, you're attracting talent towards going to network.
Brenden Kumarasamy (26m 25s):
You see who are the talented people here that I need to bring back into my companies. That's a huge requirement at that level because you need to play an active role in recruiting the best people, because people run everything else, especially on the HR side, obviously. So that's the key, Jim. I wouldn't force anyone to do anything. I think I would just ask the question how big are the dreams? That's all.
Jim Stroud (26m 45s):
Very good answers. Very good answers. You've done this before. I can tell. I've thoroughly enjoyed this conversation and I'm sure our listeners have as well. If they wanted to contact you and learn more about what you offer, how can they find you online?
Brenden Kumarasamy (27m 2s):
Yeah, absolutely, Jim. What a wonderful conversation. Excellent questions as well. I would say two easy ways. So the first one is my YouTube channel. Go to Mastertalk, in one word. You'll have access to hundreds of free videos on how to communicate ideas effectively. And the second one, for those that are interested in coaching, you can come to one of my free training. So I host a live free interactive Zoom call every few weeks, and you can register for that at rockstarcommunicator.com.
Jim Stroud (27m 29s):
Brenden, thanks again for being a guest on TribePod. You are appreciated.
Brenden Kumarasamy (27m 40s):
Likewise, brother.
Jim Stroud (27m 40s):
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you a thousand times. Thank you for listening and subscribing to our podcast. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please send them to us. You can reach us at TribePod that's T-R-I-B-E-P-O-D at ProactiveTalent.com. We look forward to hearing from you.
