Haris Ahmed, Chicago Consultant on Elevator Pitches
Haris Ahmed (Chicago) management consulting firm Pragmatium Consulting Group Inc. has over two decades of experience as an organizational change expert and executive coach. His experience as a facilitator taught him the importance of public speaking whether for one’s personal or professional life.
Due to the booming number of start-ups looking for venture capital investors, it would appear that the “elevator pitch” has become a constant in the business vocabulary. Seemingly overnight, everyone is talking about his/her elevator pitch, and what he/she can do to refine it. However, there’s more to the elevator pitch than opening a million dollar window of an opportunity – an elevator pitch, by its nature, purpose, and form, actually has all the trappings of a public speaking exercise.
The Elevator Pitch
What is the elevator pitch? In a nutshell, the elevator pitch is a short but persuasive sales pitch that succinctly summarizes what a product, company, or service is about. The idea is to present the pitch by the time the audience lands on their destination floor, which may last anywhere from 30 seconds to a few minutes. Some believe that the term elevator pitch had originated from the experience of scriptwriters who only had a few minutes to get the nod or approval of a Hollywood director in the elevator for their story, while some credit Vanity Fair editor Ilene Rosenzweig and Michael Caruso for coining the term. To this day, no one definitively knows who defined it, but the important thing here is that the sudden resurgence in the use of the term has the potential to revive public interest in honing communication skills, particularly public speaking.
Why should you work on your elevator pitch, even if you aren’t working in Silicon Valley? Good question, and one that can be answered with the classic pitch exercise: Imagine you’re about to pitch to legendary investor Warren Buffet. After hearing your pitch, would Buffet engage you and ask follow-up questions about your company, or walk away, never to be heard from again? Buffet’s investment in your company would not only give you a big confidence boost, but validate your work as well. After all, he built his fortune investing in valuable blue chip companies; any business owner would naturally want his nod of approval. With this in mind, wouldn’t you want to find out just how great your company or that million dollar idea is, just by your elevator pitch alone?
Public Speaking
As mentioned, the elevator pitch perfectly encapsulates what public speaking is about, which is to inform others about a certain topic, consequently influencing or persuading them towards a certain view. By honing your public speaking skills, you would have hit two birds with one stone and have an easier time giving that elevator pitch. At public speaking classes, you learn the proper way of carrying yourself, what to say and how to say it, what makes your audience tick and how to connect with them all while developing your speaking skills.
Stay tuned to this page to read more from Haris Ahmed (Chicago) management consulting firm Pragmatium Consulting Group Inc.
For more information please follow me at Haris Ahmed Chicago