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In a fast paced world like ours attention, is among the most
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precious resources of any audience.
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And that makes the ability to find the words that glue your audience to
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your lips or their screen invaluable.
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Leaders who master this skill have a sharp understanding of the journey
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they're taking their audience on.
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They create tension right away from the very first word so that their audience
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just has to know how the story unfolds.
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If you want to improve in this area, it helps to understand that the
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human brain is a prediction machine.
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At any given time it tries to figure out what happens next.
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Tension comes from the uncertainty about the prediction.
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Will the prediction match the true course of events?
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That's by the way, why criminal stories are so popular.
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It's also why we love a good riddle or puzzle.
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We just love to figure things out.
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And of course be right about it.
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Great communicators create tension by using this principle, they
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trigger our prediction machine and then they use our anticipation of
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the resolution to keep us hooked.
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For example, they might hint at a clever way to solve one of our problems.
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And then use our craving for knowing the secret to inspire us to listen
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to them, glued to their lips, for sometimes more than an hour.
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In other words, try to think of ways in which you can make your
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audience want a piece of information, before you give it to them.
