Communication Lessons from Patrick Winston’s “How to Speak” Lecture

An MIT lecture by Professor Patrick Winston titled “How to Speak” is a fantastic example of an effective presenter and an informative discussion filled with useful communication tips. According to MIT News, Professor Winston unfortunately passed away in 2019. Even so, his expertise as a lecturer can still be viewed today on the MIT YouTube page here. In his lecture video, Professor Winston outlines numerous elements that separate good communicators from great ones. Here are our top four favorites from the lecture: 

1. How to start- The Empowerment Promise

When you start your presentation with an empowerment promise to your audience, you grab their attention because you explicitly state that what you are about to say is relevant and beneficial to them. They will have gained something of value by the end of the presentation. 

An empowerment promise can sound like this: “By the end of this presentation, you will have learned how to…”. 

Keep in mind that once you make a promise, you must deliver. This means ensuring that your content is organized in a way your audience can absorb the material. You want them to leave the presentation feeling they have gained something of value. 

2. Verbal Punctuation

Winston isn’t discussing pausing here. He expresses that verbal punctuation is a useful tool that acts as a checkpoint during your presentation. This allows people who may have lost focus to “jump back on the bus” as he puts it. 

If an audience member loses focus, this doesn’t necessarily mean they ignored your presentation. Instead, your presentation may have been so engaging that it brought up an idea in their mind that caused them to briefly lose focus. 

Have a check-in during your presentation where you give a short recap of what you have covered and what’s coming next. This can relieve any audience stress if they missed something important during your presentation. 

3. Case the Location

Winston explains that just as a bank robber would “case” a bank to build familiarity before a robbery, you should case the location where you plan to speak.

One benefit of this is it makes it easier to visualize your presentation ahead of time. Visualization is a form of practice and acts similarly to performing another repetition. 

In addition to the mental rehearsal benefits, scouting out the location also allows you to get a feel for the location and spot any potential obstacles that might hinder your presentation. This could include testing out lighting or equipment you plan to use during your presentation. 

Taking the time to test things out ahead of time ensures that your talk goes smoothly and your audience walks away remembering your content instead of a logistical issue. 

4. Choosing a Visual Aid

As Winston puts it, “[slides] are for exposing ideas, not for teaching ideas”. 

Powerpoint slides allow you to show information you can’t write on a whiteboard quickly, such as data sets, still images, quotes, or videos. Although your slides allow you to upload a large amount of information on them, you want to avoid overloading them because your audience can begin to lose focus or become confused. 

We recommend keeping your slides as lean as possible. If you’re including a video, trim it to its essential section. If you’re using bullet points, you can incorporate builds that allow you to gradually expose the information you are discussing to focus the audience’s attention. 

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Ultimately, these tips center around giving your audience the most value. Highlight what’s in it for them, pace the discussion so anyone who loses focus can regain focus, use visual aids that help them understand the content, and create an environment that provides an effective space for you to share information with your audience.