COURSE NUMBER: EWMBA-291T.12

COURSE TITLE: Audience-Focused Communication

UNITS OF CREDIT: 1 unit

INSTRUCTOR: Adam Leipzig

E-MAIL ADDRESS: adamleipzig@haas.berkeley.edu

Please note the unorthodox boot camp format of this course, which meets all day on two Saturdays. You must attend both sessions in their entirety in order to earn a passing grade.

PREREQUISITE(S): Completion of Core Curriculum

CLASS FORMAT: In-class and video live presentations, lecture, case study and role play examples, exercises.

REQUIRED READINGS: Readings and video. These will be announced one month prior to the first class.

BASIS FOR FINAL GRADE:

Class participation is of utmost importance. Students who miss either of the two, full-day sessions will not pass this class. Some of the class participation will include video presentations.

Grades will be based on following percentages:

·         Participation and presentation: 55%, comprised as follows:

o   In-class presentations: 30%

o   Active listening, discussion and responding to case study/role play situations: 20%

·         Completion of video and written assignments: 45%, comprised as follows:

o   Assignment 1, to be delivered prior to first session: 10%

o   Assignment 2, to be delivered prior to second session: 15%

o   Assignment 3, to be delivered two weeks after second session: 20%

CAREER FIELD: This class is ideal for anyone whose success depends on making their personal communications skills, both live and virtual, impactful, dynamic and persuasive. You will gain specific techniques and practice in leading teams; managing up and down; and presenting to supervisors, boards, investors, clients, and vendors.

ABSTRACT OF COURSE'S CONTENT AND OBJECTIVES:

In a boot camp, rapid-results format, to give students understanding, practice and tools for Audience-Focused Communication: the way successful entrepreneurs and executives communicate concisely, clearly, crisply, and passionately so they understand their audiences, and their audiences understand them.

Audience-Focused Communication

The Spring, 2020 edition of Audience-Focused Communication will be in a boot camp format on two consecutive weekends. Your presentation skills will improve markedly and quickly, plus you’ll acquire the tools to keep getting better.

Questions from the “pitcher’s mound”:

·         Why is the audience important?

·         How does my audience impact my message?

·         My idea is great – I had all the evidence to back it up – why didn’t they invest in it?

·         I’ve pitched this three times before, I can just use the same pitch, right?

·         Wow, I’m embarrassed, why didn’t they tell me they were looking for that?

“Know your audience” is an admonition as relevant for board rooms and VC pitch sessions as it is for the consumer marketplace. A retail business that does not know or seek to serve its customers—its audience—will not succeed. Similarly, entrepreneurs and executives, seeking to pitch an idea, get funding, or motivate a team, must have a clear and specific understanding of their audience in order to achieve success.

However, just because you think you know your audience doesn’t mean you do know them. Many internal corporate presentations have gone down in flames because the presenter was unaware of the hidden agendas and subtle signs from decision-makers. This class will provide the grounding in practice, and tangible knowledge and skills, to answer the fundamental question: How do I sell THIS idea to THIS audience? What are the questions and expectations I should expect from my audience—or any audience?

At times it appears easy to know your audience, as in cases where you are already part of the same work group. At other times, it may seem hard to you know audience, as, for example, when you walk into a VC pitch session and face a room of strangers. In all cases, however, there are common areas of interest all audiences have, which will allow you to present effectively and persuasively.

In order to address the driving questions of this course (like those questions above), students will develop the tools to discern their audience’s needs, even if they are meeting their audience for the first time, and how to speak in a language that resonates with their audience. In addition, students will gain practical, in-the-room experience by making presentations directed to the specific audiences they will inevitably face in the marketplace, and will learn techniques for presenting virtually (on video) as is required in so many distributed work groups.

Course Objectives

At the conclusion of this course, students will be better able to:

·         Identify and present from their strengths and comfort-zones

·         Utilize techniques to understand and address their audience’s overt and hidden agendas

·         Determine what is pertinent in their presentations, and what should be left out for a given audience

·         Present information tailored to a specific audience’s way of understanding, and in so doing, answer the audience’s unspoken or implicit questions

·         Demonstrate a level of mastery of their presentation skills by exuding confidence, presence, and influence through strategic, audience-focused communication

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:

Adam Leipzig is an expert at bringing media industry smarts to diverse companies worldwide, and coaching senior executives how to shine in front of their boards, investors, teams, and customers. He specializes in sharing insider skills that up-level power and presence. As CEO of Entertainment Media Partners, he has advised technology, venture investment, social media, marketing, and entertainment companies. Many of Adam's accomplishments have emerged as household names, including A Plastic Ocean, March of the Penguins, Dead Poets Society, and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. Collectively, Adam's projects have generated over $2 billion in revenue on

$300 million production spending, and twice he has been responsible for the "most profitable movie of the year".

Adam provides informed guidance, dealmaking intelligence and relevant connections for prestige media companies and creative entrepreneurs needing access to Hollywood expertise, the US marketplace and audiences worldwide in order to maximize the value and visibility of their entertainment content. In this role, he also advises a wide range of companies in all areas of their businesses, and specializes in empowering key executives to excel in communications skills.

Adam is the former president of National Geographic Films and senior vice president at Disney. Collectively, his films have earned more than $2 billion on $300 million in production cost. As a game-changing visionary and leader, Adam has been involved as a producer, distributor or supervising executive on more than 30 films that have disrupted expectations, including A Plastic Ocean, March of the Penguins, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Dead Poets Society, and Titus. He has a history of working with artists as they explore new realms of their creativity – including producing or supervising the first films directed by Jon Turteltaub, Julie Taymor, Joe Johnston, Craig Leeson, Cherien Dabis and Mary Agnes Donoghue, and the first plays directed by Robert Altman. 

Adam’s movies have won or been nominated for 10 Academy Awards, 11 BAFTA Awards, 2 Golden Globes, 2 Emmys, 2 Directors Guild Awards, 4 Sundance Awards and 4 Independent Spirit Awards.

Over the course of his career, Adam has worked with more than 10,000 creatives, including established directors Robert Benton, Lu Chuan, John Curran, Barry Levinson, Dan Petrie Jr., Donald Petrie, Roger Spottiswoode, Fernando Trueba, Peter Weir and Peter Yates.  Actors he has worked with include Ellen Burstyn, Nicholas Cage, Colin Farrell, Morgan Freeman, Whoopi Goldberg, Tom Hanks, Daryl Hannah, Ed Harris, Dustin Hoffman, Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, Jessica Lange, Queen Latifah, Julianne Moore, Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, Saoirse Ronan, Forest Whitaker, Robin Williams, Bruce Willis, and Elijah Wood.

Adam is the publisher of Cultural Weekly/Next Echo a digital platform for participatory civic media, and his articles and essays have appeared in the New York Times, Screen International, Written By, American Theater, Theater Communications and High Performance magazines. He is the author of Inside Track for Independent Filmmakers: Get Your Movie Made, Get Your Movie Seen and co-author of Filmmaking in Action, both published by Macmillan. He has a degree in Literature from Yale University.