My Approach to Content Development Coaching
How I help students hone their material even though I’m not an expert in it.
One of the coolest parts about this job is coaching people from so many different walks of life, professions, corporate levels, and industries. In only one field (finance) do I have any past work experience. For all others, I’m a layman—and that’s usually A-OK. I don’t have to be familiar with people’s work if I’m just training them on things like vocal delivery and confidence-building. Fillers & jitters are easy to spot and correct even if the ideas explained are all Greek to me, and I can always use normal-life topics for more advanced skill development.
“How about you tell me about a hobby of yours instead, & we see if that makes sense.”
That changes when the student wants help developing or vetting content, usually from their job. Here, it might seem like only someone well-versed in their profession could assist. But it turns out, there’s still a lot I can do! & most often, my lack of specific expertise is actually an asset. Read on to see the roles I can play for students in need of content development assistance.*
Interviewer
Basically, I ask you a lot of questions. First & foremost, this is intended to nail down what exactly you’re trying to convey—your thesis and core theme(s). As any writer can tell you, thesis-writing is surprisingly hard! You might sort of know in your head what you want to say, but putting it into words may still be a quagmire. (For more on that, see my article, “Public Speaking and the Four Levels of Knowledge”.) The good news is that once you have a thesis, the rest of the ideas come much easier. So it’s worth spending plenty of time honing in on a good one—and I have a lot of experience wringing theses out of people. :-)
Interviewing can also uncover previously unknown weak knowledge areas that you’ll want to put more thought into before presenting. While it’s ok to not know the answers to all my questions, for rudimentary material or questions that will almost certainly arise, you really should have a quality answer ready. Better to discover this in rehearsal with me than in real life!
2. Sounding Board
Perhaps you have your central material prepared, but you’re not sure how your eventual listeners will receive it—and especially what might confuse them, if they’re not as familiar with the topic as you.** Here’s where my layman’s perspective shines—because I can use my own confusion to identify vague or confounding aspects of the content.
This is especially valuable because subject matter experts routinely lose touch with the Common Man and pepper their speeches with obscure language, unexplained references and the like. In fact, the more knowledgeable the presenter, typically the worse they are at explaining—a phenomenon I call “Expert Disease.” As a non-expert focus group of one, I can identify murky spots and help you clarify them.
Unfortunately there are no known treatments for Expert Disease except for Candid Clarity Feedback.
3. Structure Guide
Students occasionally arrive having already generated plenty of content, either written down or just in their heads—but it’s all jumbled together. They need structure & organization. As an erstwhile writer of several years, (both professionally and for fun), I’m accustomed to putting ideas in coherent, logical order. And along the way, we might encounter new & interesting angles that are worth incorporating into your content.
4. An Adversarial Voice
If you’re preparing for Q&A, a tough audience, or just want to put your ideas to the test, I can be more Pointed and Aggressive in my questioning, and even present contrary perspectives to give you a chance to rebut them. Nothing sharpens material like respectful argumentation, and with a background in competitive forensics & debate, I’m very comfortable taking the opposing side in order to spark a robust, collegial back & forth. I can even do a bit of outside research so I know just enough to be dangerous—and then put you through the Q&A wringer. If you can handle that, you should be all set!
Don’t get mad if I declare you out of order a couple times.
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All in all, I think my content development role is similar to that of a business consultant. Even with limited knowledge of the intricacies of your knowledge domain, by asking good questions and reacting the way an audience might, I can help you express your expertise more confidently & effectively.
*There are two things missing from this list: Writing & Editing. I do sometimes end up doing both for students, and the feedback has been positive. But if you mainly need editorial help rather than content development, you can probably find that elsewhere for cheaper.
**If your audience is comprised of fellow experts, then yes, you’re probably going to need a fellow expert content reviewer.
