Episode 67: Presence Trumps Program — 3 Lessons from One of Vistage's Best Speakers

You've done the work — the degree, the experience, the framework. But when you finally get into the room that matters, you cling to your outline, race through your points, and slip out the back the second it's over. And you wonder why the message didn't land.

This week Sam spent two days with Michael Allosso — one of Vistage's highest-rated speakers on the planet ("You on Your Best Day") — and learned more about speaking and coaching in two days than in the last three years. In this episode, Sam distills that experience into three lessons every executive communicator needs.

Key Takeaways:

• The reps are the price of admission into better rooms. Like Rocky's two-minute montage representing months of training, the reps nobody sees earn you the permission slip into bigger rooms. Your bio takes two seconds to read — but it took decades to write.
• Presence trumps program. The best communicators — Alex Hormozi, Tony Robbins, Dave Ramsey — win because of what they do in the room, not what's on page 32. Nobody grades you on coverage; they want their problems solved. Don't let your notes be your prison — let them be your platform.
• The line at the back is important. The best executives don't clock out when the talk ends. They stay, connect, and answer questions — and for some people, that conversation is worth more than the whole session. If you're there, you're clocked in.

Resources Mentioned: Michael Allosso ("You on Your Best Day"), Vistage, Jon Acuff, $100M Offers by Alex Hormozi, Rory Vaden / Brand Builders Group

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Transcript

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One of the things I do that is has been consistent of me since I entered the workforce was connecting with people that are further down the road than I am. It's such a hack. No one, and I don't want to say no one does it, hardly anyone does it. They don't realize the power of it. And when they are able to do it, it is like really like stepping into a rocket ship. Well, today I want to talk to you about what I did this week, partially what I did this week, for a couple hours this week. I spent time with one of Vistage's highest-rated speakers on the planet. And uh one that's been speaking and coaching and leading for decades now. Uh, to give you some perspective, he started training executives right around the time I went into ministry. And I've been doing ministry for 22 years now, and he has been a vistage speaker for that long. But not only that, he has a an exceptionally high quality rating. His name is Michael Alasso. And I mention him because uh if you are a vistage chair, and just so you know, for those of you that might not know about this, but Vistage is a peer-led executive group that you essentially join and you can workshop and highlight different things that are going on in your specific industry and in your field. And then in a collaboration type of mastermind way, and Vistach has its own terminology around this, you get the opportunity to workshop your problems and to discuss your business and network, and it's an amazing group. And that's one of the reasons why I became a Vistage speaker is because I saw what the groups were like. And as a business leader, when you get to be in a group like that or connect to people like that, it's invaluable. Well, what I do and what people like Michael Alasso do is we're subject matter experts that come into the vistage groups and we speak on a subject that would be most helpful to those executives. So mine is specific communication, executive presence. And Michael Alasso, he kind of covers the whole gamut of how you show up. His signature program is called You on Your Best Day. And so I had the privilege of meeting with him. I met picked him up at the airport, I had dinner with him, and I learned more about speaking and learn more about coaching in the last two days with him than I probably have in the last three years of me doing this because I've been actively coaching on my own, in addition to what I do with Dale Carnegie, in addition to what I do at the church. And me having my own business, this is that's a newer thing. Me coaching is not new, but structuring the business, it's like everybody's doing their own thing, and it's hard to get a consistent idea. Well, Michael put me in the launching pad and gave me a lot of insight, which I took copious amounts of notes. So, um, but what does this have to do with you? Well, I learned a lot about communication from him. So, what I'm gonna share with you is three things that I learned about communicating from watching one of the best communicators, sought-after communicators really on the planet. So I'll put these into three buckets because you can learn what I learned, and I'm gonna give you the lessons in a fast track. So the first one is that the reps are the price of admission into better rooms. Last week we talked about being in the right room. And this week I'm telling you that the reps are what get you into the right room, and nobody sees those reps except for you. So I have an illustration of uh the this essentially this whole idea of reps from John Acuff in his latest book, Procrastination Proof. He talks about the montage moments and he compares the montage of Rocky. And Rocky, I think he I think he used Rocky for, I'm not sure, but it was, I think it was the one where Rocky fights the Russian. And there's this time of training where Rocky goes and you see Rocky like running uphill in the snow, and you see him punching meat, and you see him fighting, you know, uh uh hitting a punching bag, and you see all of this. And he said the montage takes like two minutes, but really it represents months of Rocky training for this fight in Russia. Well, the reps that nobody sees are what give you the permission slip to get into bigger rooms. And one of the things that the reps do is they give you a program or a framework. So every thought leader has this. I have mine, and this coach, Michael Alasso, has the same type of thing. Not identical to mine, but meaning he has his own proprietary things that he uses, and that he developed those in coaching rooms. He developed them working with clients, he developed them over time training people in drama programs that he ran in productions. And so the reps are what give you the permission slip. But here is the key, and this is the big uh thing that I learned. All of those things disappear over presence. They disappear over presence. And so him being in the room, and when you're in a room with people that you're leading, the most important thing is you being in the room. The reps got you there, your degree got you there, your experience got you there, your ability to work with people got you there, your book that you wrote got you there, your uh success with a program that wasn't working, that got you there. And the reps get you into the room, but what you do in the room is what matters. So keep that in mind. So we'll talk about presence more in a moment, but the reps are the price of admission, and you don't want to compare your rocky training ground, which takes months, to the highlight of, oh yeah, you in a bio, oh, I did this for 10 years. Like I've been just personally in ministry for 22 years. I can't fathom where that time went. I can't fathom it. And because of how much time I've spent, it enables me to go into conversations in a different way than if I had just started. It's not exclusive to anyone who can go into ministry, but I have done the reps. My montage on paper, oh, he's been in ministry since 2004. That's fine. It takes you two seconds to read that. Well, it took me 22 years to get that on a paper. And so when I'm coaching nonprofit leaders, and I've coached quite a bit of those, one of my clients is a huge nonprofit leader. Well, that little blurb is probably what got me in the room. Being a nonprofit leader, an executive leader in a nonprofit space where people do not have to give you money. They don't have to. You're not there, you can't fire people that don't give you money and don't produce income for you. That's not how nonprofit works. And of course, those of you that uh are in that space, you know this. Well, that permission slip has given me the ability to have conversations in a unique way. And so the same goes with him. So the the reps are what gets you the permission slip to get into the room. Now I want to talk about presence for a moment. Presence Trump's program. Presence Trump's program. So I mentioned that I have a program, Michael Alasso has a program, and any in Dale Carnegie, they all have everything has frameworks. And I'm looking at um, I'll show you a book right now that I'm working through. It's $100 million offers. And if you are a business leader, you know this guy, Alex Armozzi, he's kind of jacked, he has a beard, uh, he looks very much like me with a little bit more muscle and a little bit less charisma. I'm just kidding. No, he's very charismatic. He's uh always in a wife beater and he's always talking about business. And his book he wrote called $100 million offers. Well, if you read his stuff, I mean every page, like this is just his frameworks and pictures and charts, and all the research is there. Look like he has graphs and it's all in the like the books are big, like this is bigger compared, like a regular size book. It's bigger oh yeah, here. It's bigger than like a regular size book in terms of its size. Like here's a a prayer journal book. This is like a normal size. Well, his books are bigger because he draws and he puts graphs and all that in there. Now, those are all valuable, but some of the clips on YouTube of him, and here's a picture of him and his wife, if you've never seen them, uh, some of the most viral clips on YouTube is just him sitting at a table in front of a room, and somebody comes up with a question and he's like, tell me about that. Like, tell me what what's going on with your sales, tell me what's going on with your funnel, tell me what's going on with your employees. And it's viral. And he doesn't say, okay, well, on page 32, let's cover this. I talk about the different health, wealth, and relationships and blah, blah. He doesn't do that. He's there, he's present, and he's focusing on those people, their problems, their issues, and their business. And because of that, he is given much love in the internet community and the business owner community, the entrepreneurial community. Uh, he's up there with top voices like Tony Robbins, Cody Sanchez, Rory Vaden. They're all in those spaces. And it's because of what they do when they're in the room. They have the program. So, and I've met Rory Vaden, uh, brand builders, and I work with brand builders and great guy and amazing program. But when he's in the room, he's working with people and he's focusing on them. So, presence beats program. And so if you are an executive leader and you are trying to come up with an outline, this is uh goes for all executive speaking. If you have an outline, outline is a great skeleton, but the flesh happens in the present moments. So this is where you look at recognizing coverage is not as important as impact. And I I hate to say this, but I've seen this so much when I'm working with clients and working with people that I've coached. They make their content king and they miss connection. They make their content king and they miss connection. They lose. And it's evident because nobody cares that you didn't cover the three, the third point of your eight. Nobody cares. Nobody is, they're nobody's grading you. Like when Alex Ramosy speaks, nobody is going, you know what? You said that to this gym owner, but here you talked about bonuses and scarcity and pricing, and you didn't mention that here. So I don't think I want to listen to you anymore. Nobody cares. Nobody cares. They just want to know how to solve their problems. They want to know how to make a connection. So I watched in the way that Michael Lasso facilitated, and he covered his stuff loosely. He could have gone, like he had 35 different pillar points, 35 different things. Each one of them could have been an entire module in a workshop, each one. Easy. And what he did instead was he was present with the people. Everything that he said was based on something that was said in that room. Everything that they said to him was based on conversations that were started in that room. And it was so fluid, you almost forgot that you were in a program because he was subconsciously covering the program material without losing presence. And this is I have gotten there sometimes, and I'm aiming for it on a regular basis. But if a communicator gets like this, they don't care about their material as much as they care about the people that they're trying to connect to. And the best communicators, think Tony Robbins, Alex Harmozzi, Cody Sanchez, think Dave Ramsey even. The best communicators are focused on being in that moment and being in the room. So that is really, really vital. And as an executive leader, you will be worth your weight and gold if you are able to focus on what's going on in the business and keep your hand on that while simultaneously focusing on how to be present with your people. So the material is good. That's your preparation. You don't want to go in there and just be like, well, I'm just gonna wing it and I'm gregarious and I'm charming and I'm charismatic and don't have anything. But you don't want to go in there thinking that if I miss these three things, then the meeting's gonna be worthless or the presentation is not gonna connect. That's not true. So don't let the presentation notes be your prison. Instead, let them be your platform that you use to stay in the moment and to focus on how to help. Um, last but not least, and this is really important, especially for executives. I didn't realize how important this was probably until the last five years. And I learned it just in watching uh Michael Alasso from the executive side, is the line at the back is important. The line at the back is important. What does that mean? Well, after your conversations are done, after you're finished with whatever activity it is, whether it's you're training somebody or you're doing a presentation as a leader, well, it's easy to kind of clock out, like, whoo, I'm done, and you kind of step into the back of the room and decompress and get away. But the best executives wait and they talk and they stay, or they're there early to connect. There's a a pastor that I met when I was, I did a con I was in a conference in Atlanta, and he has a massive church, you know, thousands and thousands of people. And it's in, I believe it was Las Vegas. I think, yeah, I think it was, I think it might have been Judd Wilhite, yes, Judd Wilhite. So um, if if I'm pronouncing his name correctly, I only met him just that day. I'm I'm not friends with him, but I met him. And what was different about him is he probably had one of the largest churches of all of the people presenting at the conference, way larger than mine, way larger than any of the other people there. And what was really unique is he had one of the keynote slots, but he was there and he was going table to table talking to the other pastors, just interacting with them, just asking them about their churches, asking them about pain points, asking them if they have any funny church stories, which there are slews of those, tons of those. And he just really connected to just about everybody there. I mean, to the degree that time would allow. He was going from table to table, and then eventually the MC brought everybody up there and then he had to do his presentation. But his connection before the presentation and then after his presentation was over was it was beyond anything I'd seen from a leader that of that prestige. Because normally leaders and even pastors, when they have that kind of an audience and that kind of a reach, they're gone. They don't interact, they don't stay because they they know they're gonna be there for an hour answering questions, counseling, pray. It's a lot. And this guy just was completely available. And he was available after the presentation to answer questions, help talk through things. That's what an executive does. That's what a founder does. They're not just there to do their thing and leave, they're there to make sure that other people are engaged. And so when you have the opportunity to get people to hear you communicate, you're leaving a lot on the table when you think that your message is done being spoken after the last point is spoken. So when Michael Alasso finished, there were people wanting to talk to him. And one lady in particular, you know, because I was with him, she said, Can I eat lunch at your table? Uh meaning our table. And if you're introverted, and I ha I have a weird, I'm like an omniverb. I'm in my the stuff that gives me energy is usually private stuff, stuff that I uh do in solitude, like walking and reading and you know, listening to things, podcasts. So when I'm doing a program, it's hard for me to wrap my mind around staying on. Well, Michael was like, of course, come sit with me and Sam and we're gonna have lunch. And he just stayed on and he stayed connecting and he stayed present. And and that was probably more valuable to that lady than the whole session, the whole four-hour session and three-hour session. And what my point is, is as an executive, don't miss those in-between spots. I know I speak at the church and I do a lot there. I was there today, this morning, the other pastor was speaking, and I was just talking to leaders. I what I had no formal, I'll I'll make jokes. Sometimes I'll talk to people and I'll say, I have no responsibility here today. I'm just here just to hang out. And that's actually probably more important than some of the stuff I do from the front. It really is. Because people want to know that they can interact with you and they want to see how can you help them. And there was somebody that I was talking to about some health issues they had. There was somebody else talking to me about some plans that they had. I was talking to a young person about their uh college plans. I was talking to a mother about uh something that was going on with their child. I that you might call it counseling, but from an executive standpoint, it's presence and it's not just being there when you have to be there. Of course, it requires you to be on. You can't be like, oh, I'm tired. I don't want to talk to you like if you're there, you're clocked in, you're locked in. That's the only way that it makes sense. You have to keep that charisma, or else you lose. And if you're an executive, don't throw this away because it's a great opportunity for you to connect with your team and a great opportunity for you to be there. I'm not the best leader by any stretch, but uh I do like talking to the people on our staff. And I do enjoy, you know, I was texting one of our staff members really late about the Connor McGregor fight. And I don't sit there with a note and say, okay, I have to text this staff member at nine o'clock because Connor McGregor is going to get his leg broken. I know, but it's I was making a connection because I know that they're into it. There's there's a few people that I know that are into that, and I was talking to them about it, and it was, you know, that's part of it. So don't think that just because the presentation is over, that your ability to connect and communicate is because it's not. And for some people, it might be really the true actual start of it. So I've talked a lot, communication. Of course, you know, if you're interested, my calendar link is in the show notes. I'd love to talk to you. I have a bunch of discovery calls coming up about helping people with their communication. I've been sending out some videos evaluating presentations. Uh I have some programs. My fall is kind of filling up. I have some programs that I'm delivering in South Carolina and Alabama and Nashville. And so I'm kind of going all over the place. Um, but I have some slots open. If you are looking for help on how to do these things or how to communicate better, how to be better with your team, let me help you. Because the best way that you can connect is by communicating at the level of your competence. And that's what I'm here for. So until next week, I will see you. Take care.