I attended a conference recently at which I’d also been asked to speak. The brief was very clear – each speaker had been allocated a half hour slot in which to deliver a talk for around 20 minutes and then take Q&A. I don’t know about you, but I appreciate that kind of clarity – it helps me prepare.
The first guy on stage was someone I’d been looking forward to hear from, and although he spent a little too long at the start telling us about himself (yawn – we care about this bit far less than you do Mr Speaker), his talk started to follow an interesting path. The 20 minutes passed quickly and it became clear to me that he was going to overrun. Someone at the back of the room was busy deploying the classic ‘shut up and sit down’ sign by rapidly drawing their hand across their throat, and the presenter sailed on. And on. And on.
The half hour concluded with a fire alarm test (we had been warned earlier) and despite the repeated klaxon sound, our presenter carried on. He fought his way bravely through the alarm and persisted for a further ten minutes. As his talk rumbled on a few tweets appeared along the lines of ‘yeah yeah, we get it already, get a move on’. Someone tweeted from beyond the room ‘I’m sure no one will mind Mister X overrunning, he’s such a compelling speaker’, which prompted a few choice replies. Here are two of my personal faves:
“fire alarm announcement, and wailing – at last some insight”
“I have a slide deck and you are going to see them all regardless”
Mister X stretched a twenty minute talk out to forty minutes, left no time for questions and threw the whole schedule out of whack. He made a powerful mark – and not in the way he intended. Note to the conference chair – next time, please intervene and stop the torture.
Subsequently – Mister X chose to blame the fire alarm for him overrunning, conveniently ignoring the fact that he was supposed to have been done and dusted before said alarm even started. He got short shrift from the Twitterverse on this point and has not been seen since (well he probably has – it’s just that we’re not looking anymore).
The day carried on in fine form and the rest of the speakers were informative, enjoyable to listen to and on time. At the end of the event, there was a generous chunk of time put aside for a panel Q&A. Normally I hate these – and I had to be coaxed up to participate, sorry about that. I was wrong to be reluctant, the audience had loads of questions and the discussion bounced around the room freely and usefully.
At the close, the conference chair did a quick who’s who type run through, starting with Mister X who had long since departed, presumably to screw up someone else’s schedule. This is what the chair said. ‘First we had Mister X (loooong pause), he overran.’ That was it – the sum total, the full stop under Mister X’s appearance. He overran.
You will have an opportunity to make your mark today, how will you choose to do it?
A very valid posting. Over-running is a cardinal sin in my book. If you are speaking after someone who has over-run, and you can pull the event back to time, massive kudos ensues! I’ve been a member of Toastmasters International (naff name for a great organisation) for nearly ten years and have learned to stick to time. I try to finish a minute earlier than I am scheduled for, including Q&A.
I had this very experience the other week at a Pharmaceutical conference I was the final keynote on. By the end of the 2nd morning we were 45 minutes behind time. That would be my whole talk gone. I decided to act and spoke to the organisers about the need for a timekeeper. After lunch, we had a panel session. This was better managed to start with to start with. By the end, it was starting to over run, so I first of all waited a bit then stood up to the side of the room but with my eye on the ‘timekeeper’. We ended up losing 10 minutes from my schedule.
The first thing I did when I started was to ask someone to give a 10 minute signal. I finished with 3 minutes spare.
I agree that it is discourteous to other people to do this. Last year I watched as millionaire entrepreneur Lara Morgan publicly trashed the CEO of Kent County Council after he over ran by 15 minutes. As a friend, I can say that Lara does not always have the most elegant approach to feedback, but it is precise, short and very effective – I must admit I really enjoyed it since I suspect its the only way that Paul Carter (and some other people) will learn.
Thanks Graham and Peter. Yes it is frustrating and yes – a good conference chairperson can do a lot to manage timings, bluntly or otherwise. Last year I had a closing speech to deliver and the planned 40 minute slot was cut to 20 because of earlier overruns. I quite enjoyed the challenge of adapting things on the fly to finish on time, and I think other folk appreciated the effort and agility too. It meant they weren’t kept from their post conference drinks!
As the Chair of the conference it was also frustrating. I made “5 minute” and “wrap up” hand signals which were ignored and I also asked several times for him to stop but he kept saying he had one more slide then continued for another 5 minutes. In 15 years of chairing conferences I had not encountered such ill-mannered behaviour from a speaker before – he displayed disrespect to the other speakers (and audience). Unlike the other speakers, he also did not stay for the panel discussion. Hence I did not give him the return courtesy of summing up his presentation. I knew we could make time later in the day so wasn’t too concerned about overrun but any tips on how to politely extract a stubborn would be speaker appreciated.
Quite so – thanks for popping by and contributing. And you are right – you did try and stop him by signalling etc sorry I didn’t make that clear when I blogged. I think next time we should keep a shepherd’s crook out the back to manhandle him off….just in case! But of course – there won’t be a next time. Not for him at least.
Cheers – Doug
I worked with someone once who blew a horn. Unsubtle but effective.
In answer to the question about polite ways to extract a stubborn speaker…. politeness in some circumstances wraps us in vaccillation. A direct and measured interruption “we have five other speakers so I’d like to thank you Mr X and I now would like to introduce Ms Y” works.
Two good ideas – thanks Meg, and yes to your point about politeness.