TJ’s Insights

Speakers and presenters who are men, especially men in finance, like to say the following:

“We hit a homerun.”

“We were third and long.”

“That was the third strike.”

“We killed the competitors.”

“We blew our competitors off the face of the earth.”

“We buried our competitors.”

“Our new titanium screws were a grand slam success for us.”

“It was a hole in one.”

“Let’s nuke ‘em back to the stone ages.”

“He’s a major league salesman.”

I have to confess, I sometimes use these sports and war metaphors too. Here’s the problem: a disproportionate percentage of women don’t like war and sports references.

I’m not suggesting that I buy into the stereotype that women don’t care about sports or security issues. But baseball, football and golf are not typically the sports women played the most when they were growing up. Therefore references to these sports fall flat on female ears, even when the understanding is clear.

When it comes to war and battle analogies, most businessmen have never actually faced combat, so the references don’t come from personal experience. But in my experience, many women find war analogies distasteful or at least distracting.

Great speakers can, do and must use analogies, metaphors and even clichés from time to time. But great speakers, men and women, learn to mix it up a bit. It’s OK to use an occasional sports or military reference, but make sure you even things out by also referencing literature, movies, nature, the home, and other forms of entertainment.

Great speakers can communicate well in front of any audience, regardless of the demographics; because they make sure that there reference points are varied and suitable for all.

Originally published as Refraining from Sport References by TJ Walker for SpeakingChannel.TV

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 4th, 2007 at 1:04 pm and is filed under Audiences, speaking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.