How to think faster and talk smarter, with Matt Abrahams

**Jeff Berman** (0:01)
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**Jeff Berman** (1:21)
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**Matt Abrahams** (2:17)
You should start pitches and presentations like an action movie. There's something there right away. A lot of people have long preamples. You need to get yourself into the audience's perspective. This is a fundamental tenet.

**Jeff Berman** (2:36)
Matt Abrahams knows what it takes to win over a crowd, close a deal and inspire a team. It's not enough to have a great product or terrific idea. You need to be a brilliant communicator as well.

**Matt Abrahams** (2:50)
Neuroscience has taught us emotion gets into our brains differently than information. It gets in faster, stays longer, motivates behavior. So, do I want people excited or concerned? Do I want them to have FOMO, fear of missing out or be validated or just be confident? Think about that emotion.

**Jeff Berman** (3:07)
This is Masters of Scale. I'm Jeff Berman, your host today on the show, communication expert Matt Abrahams. He teaches at Stanford's Business School and has a brilliant podcast called Think Fast, Talk Smart. Whether it's preparing for a big speech, a one-on-one investor pitch or anything in between, Matt has science-backed strategies to help you succeed. We talk about how to overcome anxiety about public speaking, how to nail a job interview, and much, much more.
Matt, welcome to Masters of Scale.

**Matt Abrahams** (3:42)
I'm thrilled to be here, Jeff. Thank you.

**Jeff Berman** (3:43)
We're thrilled to have you. I just want to start by asking you, how do you describe what you do?

**Matt Abrahams** (3:49)
Fundamentally, I'm somebody who's really passionate about communication. Really, what I think I do is I help people to hone and develop their communication skills. A lot of that is really just asking people to turn habits into choices. Most people communicate out of habit, and my job, I think, is to expose them to different opportunities, tools, and techniques, and then ask them to consider in their situations. They find themselves in to try a different technique out.

**Jeff Berman** (4:14)
What led you to choose to really specialize in this and to teach others how to be great at this?

**Matt Abrahams** (4:20)
The teaching bug, I think, is just inside of me inherently. I've always loved teaching. I've had lots of opportunities to teach. After graduate school, I worked in the corporate world for a while. I had to pay off some loans, and I just saw the impact that good communication could have on somebody's career and a company's trajectory, and how bad communication got in the way. And so when the opportunity presented itself to do some teaching in this, actually here at Stanford through their Continuing Studies program, I fell in love with it, and I saw the impact it had, and I really enjoyed learning from my students and have never turned back.

**Jeff Berman** (4:52)
I started my career as a public defender, not the obvious place to start for what I do now. And I'll never forget we had one lawyer who quite experienced in doing this for decades, who told us that they went into the restroom and threw up every single day before court.