How many of you have seen speakers that open their talk with a question? Anyone? A few? Raise your hands. Anyone else? Have I lost you yet?
It seems as if every book on speaking recommends starting a speech or presentation with a question, but I’ve seen dozens of people get off on the wrong foot, and sometimes never regain control, because they used the wrong kind of question. It’s not so much that the idea of a question is bad. It is one way to engage your audience. It’s just that by tossing out a question that requires a response of some kind you lose control of the presentation. And control is what it is all about.
I don’t mean that in the sense of controlling the audience or being a controlling, dictatorial ass, but rather that the audience willingly gives up control when they sit down to hear you speak. As soon as you require something from the audience, other than their attention and imagination, you have given up that control.
Even rhetorical questions, ones that don’t require the audience to respond, have their own problems. They invite the audience to disagree with your answer, if only in their own minds, before you have even built your case. Often, the point of your presentation is to persuade, which means the audience is probably already predisposed to disagree with you. Unless you are very careful in the question you ask, and how you present it, you run the risk of the disagreement bubbling to the surface before you are ten seconds into your pitch, and as any salesman could tell you, once they’ve started disagreeing with you, it’s tough to turn them around.
I have always found a good strong statement, particularly an irrefutable fact, to be a far better way to begin.
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A good point, as a question is reflexive and unconvincing. A statement sets purpose and agenda. The speaker must back up his statement with a point or an argument to justify it. Questions usually are vague and should never be answered by the speaker themselves.