Start like Ted Lasso!

Apr 24

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Ted Lasso came at a crazy time…kind of like coming in out of the coldest of colds to find a warm beverage next to an inviting fire. In this post, you‘ll learn how to use a similar juxtaposition to drive your communications forward, right from the start!

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What’s the Point?”

Ever feel like the runway for our first impressions is getting shorter by the minute?

As we find ourselves constantly just one swipe (or worse, something I call ‘mental swiping’) away from losing our audiences’ attention, how can we ensure that our voice cuts through all the dopamine-induced competitive noise right away? Let’s look back to the king of first impressions, Ted Lasso for the answer.

If we Google, ‘What makes Ted Lasso a great leader,’ every search result will speak to ‘optimism’, ‘authenticity’, ‘vulnerability’, and ‘empathy’. But this isn’t a leadership blog, it’s a communication skills blog. If you go behind these 2.3 M Google results, you’ll find one common theme that causes people to feel these things…ethos. So what is it exactly that he does?

Ted leaves an impression on people that makes them feel his ethos more than anything.

As Maya Angelou said, …people will only remember the way you made them feel (ethos). So, in this post, we are going to teach one skill that anyone can use to open a presentation, meeting, or conversation to drive these impressions.

See my YouTube Video to Illuminate the points in this post

In this post, you’ll get::

The skill you can use to lead to these very impressions.
And another YouTube video I created to better illuminate the learning today and tomorrow.

Do This, Not That

So, what do we do?

A byproduct of Ted Lassos’ fleeting, yet modest lingo is a ‘what just happened’ moment. And the curiosity that comes from this is golden! How can anyone do this? By immediately tapping into both pain and curiosity to hook your audience.

In other words, plant an answer to a question, the audience may or may not even know they have. This is best accomplished through what I call, the Juxtaposition Effect (See the definition to the right).

From a communication standpoint, the opposing differences in your juxtaposition should be the PROBLEM your presentation or concept is there to solve…and your VISION for solving it.

Dale Carnegie once said: “Talk to someone about themselves and they will listen for hours.” So, if you have truly landed on the problem of your audience, then you’ll have their curiosity. Imagine talking to someone who has a terrible toothache, and you tell them you have a way to reduce the pain…immediate curiosity!

The Juxtaposition Effect

The sentence syntax for this juxtaposition consists of the following four steps:

Step 1: SET Ted’s Tone:

Use Ted’s positivity to set the stage by looking forward with an exploratory statement like ‘imagine if’ or ‘what if’. This sets the stage for your audience to look into the future with hope. This is an important first step!

Step 2: Invoke Curiosity (How):

Once you have them looking forward, plant the seed of a world free of the problem you are about to address. This phrase should be positive. For example, instead of ‘change fatigue’ use ‘change resilience’.

Step 3: State Problem (What):

Juxtapose backward to the problem your presentation, project, conversation, or product will address. For example, ‘low employee engagement.’

Step 4: Vision (Why):

This is the Ted Lasso ‘Believe’ piece. State the real long-term benefit of solving the problem. To complete the example we’ve been using, ‘safety, inspiration and innovation’.

Have you ever been out on a run, and you start singing some random tune? It’s not random.

The key with this Juxtaposition Effect is to not only begin the presentation with this but literally to repeat it 3, 4, or 5 times throughout.

Now I know what some of you are saying…that’s not as poetic as Ted Lasso. But I promise if you use this method, you will literally be having the audience humming your tune!

What Else?:

Here are my favorite communications from the past month: What’s Next: