Speaker 1: 0:12

Welcome to episode 36 of the Profitable Speaking podcast, where we provide practical tips and insights to help you succeed as a public speaker. In today's episode, we're going to look at the future of offices In the ever-evolving world of speaking. You've probably discovered that your home isn't just a sanctuary it's become a powerhouse for innovation, creativity and global outreach. Your kitchen table isn't just for meals, it's a conference desk and that comfy spot in the living room that's your seminar hall. The traditional office concept is being revamped and as we dive deeper, you'll discover how you can optimize your home space, harness the wonders of technology and balance work life, all while fueling your passion for speaking. Whether you're nestled in your home office or plotting your next keynote from a balcony, a world of opportunity awaits right where you are. As you navigate this home-based speaking journey, there are five pivotal concepts that I think we should consider. First, there's the aid of part of blending familiar coziness of your home with a professionalism as an office and striking that balance to elevate your work. Next, the layout and design of your home office can be drastically influencing on your productivity and mental well-being In this tech-driven age. The third point to delve into is the array of tools and innovations available to enhance your speaking engagements, even from the confines of your home. Equally vital is ensuring your emotional well-being, recognizing the unique challenges and opportunities that arrive when home and work merge. And lastly, while your base might be local, your reach can be global. Embracing the mindset of a global speaker from a platform opens doors to endless opportunities. Together, these concepts serve as a guide to mastering the nuances of home-based speaking, so let's have a little look at these individually.

Speaker 1: 2:07

Number one mixing home and office vibes, the blend of working from home while still feeling at the office. Here's a hard thing to do. You really need to delineate between what's home and what's office, and in my personal opinion, that means setting aside a room for that. Now, that's not always possible, given the size of houses, the sizes of families, changing situations and changing work situations as well, but the best thing you can do is think about taking one room and making it into an office, if you can. Another alternative that I've seen done lately is actually people getting like a container or a granny flat out the back and actually turning that into a working office, and sometimes you can put two rooms in those so you and your partner can actually work from home at the same time. So there's a lot of options available and, yes, they do cost money. But as you think forward and you look at what's going to be happening with your business in the future, think about the next place you get. Maybe we do actually need a room specifically for an office.

Speaker 1: 3:12

I know myself. I built an office out the back of our first house and it was very hot in summer and eventually I could afford some air conditioning in there when it was 40 degrees. But that was great. It was a place where I could go and I could shut the door and the kids knew everybody knew that I was working when that door was shut and they could peer through the glass door which was handy and just see. You know what I was up to. Eventually, when we moved into another property, I got a dedicated office inside the house which has worked out perfectly, and I do love my office. It's my sanctuary.

Speaker 1: 3:45

The other, the point of keeping that balance is you need to juggle home tasks and work tasks. Okay, Trying to keep professional. While people are coming and going and talking to you and all those sorts of things, little things like. When the doors are shut, it means that I'm working. Please don't come in unless it's an emergency. Or if I'm working and I'm happy for anyone to interrupt me, I'll actually leave the doors to my office open, because my office actually opens onto the hallway, but people are walking past all day. So I've got to find that balance. Now. I don't mind people walking past it doesn't distract me, quite frankly but if I'm focusing, like I am now where I'm doing the podcast, I'll shut the doors and that's a good sign Everybody outside knows. Please don't come in unless it's an emergency. Another thing you can do is set up one of those on-air signs. All sorts of things, be creative, have a bit of fun with it. As I said, glass doors allows people to see that you're working. On the other hand, being able to close the doors means your eyes and things like that aren't distracted if you're in a meeting, whereas when people are wandering past and you're on a zoom call or something, it can be a problem.

Speaker 1: 4:51

Also, keeping professional means dressing up. Sometimes, now, that might just mean a suit from the waist up, as we all know. Or it could be that you're standing and you're presenting in front of a camera, so people can see that all of you while off and dressed down, when I'm working, obviously in t-shirt and shorts or something, but when I'm doing a job, I'll dress up or pull a coat on or change my shirt or whatever it happens to be. So have a plan in place where you can quickly walk into your bedroom, pick up a particular shirt that you know is ironed and pull it on or something so that you look right. We've all had those calls where it's oh, can I give you a call in five minutes? So, yeah, getting that mix right, it's really important.

Speaker 1: 5:31

Obviously, you've got technology and tools and apps and things like that make you feel like you're in a conference room even when you're at a kitchen table, making sure they have the right tools. So Descript is one that I particularly like and I've really enjoyed for a long time, and so if you have tools like that mixed with other tools like Ecamm or Zoom or whatever they happen to be, make sure you've got the ones that work best for your situation. So if it's a little bit echoey or something like that, it's your kitchen table, make sure you got noise canceling on and all that. You've got filters on. There's little tools that you can plug into your computer which you download, put it into Chrome or whatever it happens to be, and it will actually filter all the background noise, and it costs a couple of bucks a month. So, again, making sure you've got that right, feel the right sort of sound so that you don't sound too rough, excuse me.

Speaker 1: 6:26

Number two, your home office setup and I suppose building a little bit on the previous one, moving from the couch to a dedicated work nook, so sometimes it's a case of corner of the room. Again, think about camera placement. This is a big one today because we're constantly connecting via video. So having camera placement in the right way means that the background's right behind you. So if you're gonna have a work nook and your work nooks against a wall and in front of you, but behind you is the kitchen, that's not gonna work okay, it's just unprofessional. No one wants to see your kitchen. It's fine if you're talking to friends, but it's not business. So you need to be able to have a plain wall behind you or something.

Speaker 1: 7:07

I was recently watching one of those renovation shows and they needed a home office downstairs and there's a company that actually sells a system. It's like a platform on two rails and it can move in and out by the press of a button. So when it moves back, this side is all home entertainment and this side, when it opens up, you've got two sets of bookshelves and a desk on one side. So when you're doing any conferencing, you got bookshelves behind you. When you're not using it, it closes up.

Speaker 1: 7:33

There is all sorts of things that you can buy if you get online and have a look. Alternatively, having a pull-up background behind your green screen. You can buy a green screen for a couple of hundred dollars that you pull up and it seals behind you so that you can get that virtual background going perfectly. So think about the presentation side of it, think about what there is available and then get online and actually do some digging around. You'd be amazed. Like traditionally, elgato made a pull-up green screen. Now I noticed that there's actually the companies that do all your banners and your conference table and all sorts of stuff. They're actually doing banners that go behind you to just plain green that you can set up or pull up so that you pull up banner you put up with your ad on it. They actually make them in plain green so you can put them behind you. So there's lots of stuff always happening and since COVID obviously this thing has evolved really quickly.

Speaker 1: 8:31

As companies get on board with home offices, make sure you keep things comfy but also health friendly. So good chairs is a good one. Having a cheap chair is not the thing. It's uncomfortable, damages your back, all those sort of things. You are really worth taking some time to spend some money on a good chair. It doesn't have to be thousands of dollars, it can be a couple of hundred dollars, but they will last if you buy a quality one. Don't buy the really cheap ones. Go to Officeworks, try out a whole series of chairs. Do you find one that's actually ergonomic? You can tilt the front down, the back up, so that the angles are better and you can adjust the number, support and stuff like that, because it will make a massive difference to how long you can sit comfortably without getting a sore back or having all sorts of other medical problems that come from that.

Speaker 1: 9:21

Lighting is another one. Often in the kitchen you'll have one light above you, behind you. That's probably not gonna work. You'll need to either get some little diffuser lights for up front or, like my office, I've had spotty's put in, and over on this side I've actually got a what do you call it? Flure around, flure that actually. It does. That call me, and it gives me enough lighting. Now I don't have to have them all on, but I can, and it lights my room really well.

Speaker 1: 9:48

Don't forget things like being eco-friendly. I know that sounds weird. You're using a lot of electricity and all sorts of other stuff, so when you're buying things buy LED, buy stuff that's gonna be keeping your pricing down, and also think about all the paper wastage. Don't use paper if you can printing, et cetera, et cetera. So the home office setup takes one of those skills that we picked up in a normal office situation. Bring them home, think about how we can get the best use out of that space and also be energy-saving and things like that, because you don't wanna push your cost up. You actually wanna keep your cost low if you can.

Speaker 1: 10:24

Now technical stuff. There's a whole range of things you can do in your home office. These days, there's no doubt about that. Ai and gadgets streamline your speaking business. Ai obviously is a game changer. There is so much happening in that space, from video AI through to, obviously, chat, gpt and all those sorts of tools.

Speaker 1: 10:45

The trick is learning to use the most tools as assistants and I've talked about this previously on the podcast. They're not the be all and end all and one is not the answer to every problem, but there is some great tools. There's one out there at the moment called Opus, and you upload a big chunk of video. So if I upload this podcast as a video to it, it will then go through and, using keyword they put in, it will cut out 10 little chunks and automatically put the voiceover and the subtitles and all that sort of stuff on it. For me, fantastic tool, free for a certain amount, worth trying. Allows you to leverage what you're doing into multiple sources.

Speaker 1: 11:28

Okay, make sure you get the best out of your video chats and virtual meetings. Make sure you've got like a good mic and you're sounding really nice. Putting the big headset on with the like that's a gaming headset, it's not a professional headset. Professional headset normally is just one ear and comes down to your mouth. Or buy a mic and a decent set of speakers. Quite frankly, my speaker is a little sound bar, about 30 centimeters wide. I bought it from Kmart. It gives me Bluetooth sound and I can plug in sound. So I've actually got two computers connected to it and I can switch between them for the sound and I can turn it up and down, and it gives me a really nice sound. I think it cost me $29. It's cheap. Now my mic, on the other hand, is a little bit more expensive, but I've had it for a long time, so I'm getting my value out of it. When you buy a Rode as a brand, you're gonna get quality. That's going to last.

Speaker 1: 12:23

Think about what you can do to try and improve your look and your sound. So my next step is actually to get a better camera. I'm using a Logitech streaming camera, which I think is a really good camera. I really like them. But I'd like to move to something a little bit more like a proper Canon DSLR or something. But I suppose then I've got to run extra power and I've got to do all sorts of things. So sometimes the easiest situation is actually just to use a USB camera.

Speaker 1: 12:51

Okay, and remember, explore virtual reality as well. This is a new area. We've got augmented reality and virtual reality. They are growing slowly and I know some people have jumped on board. The biggest issue I see is 99% of people don't actually have access to virtual reality headsets or that. Well, it sounds cool, it sounds good. If someone says to you you do this and they give you the gear to do it, I say go for it. But if you're going out to spend thousands and thousands of dollars on virtual reality gear and the computer that actually run it, you may find that you're the only one using it. It's definitely coming, it's definitely here to a certain degree. But let's be realistic. Most people will not use it. They're gonna watch a flat screen or they're gonna watch their phone or something like that. So get the standard sort of video conferencing stuff correct first.

Speaker 1: 13:43

Number four keep your spirits up. Okay, being at home and having a home office is also about balancing your emotions. A lot of the time You've got, family issues can come into the office. Fights with kids can come into the office. All sorts of stuff can happen while you're offline. That can affect your moods, and so you've got to keep that balanced. So it's important to take breaks from what you're doing, having some me time. So maybe going out for a walk at 11 o'clock in the morning for half an hour to if you've been working from nine to 11, go for a half hour walk to exercise, clear your head, come back and continue working, et cetera. Put these breaks here, but maybe making them exercise breaks isn't a bad thing. I quite like that.

Speaker 1: 14:28

On the other side, there's the option of some relaxation stuff. So some breathing, a little bit of meditation, just sending their breathing to some music or something. For a couple of minutes you sit out the backyard and look at something peaceful a tree, or sit in a hammock or whatever. Find something that allows you to control your emotions as well when you're in your office, because often when you're on your own you'll have problems with clients and I know sometimes it'll set me right off and I get very stressed about those things because I do worry about other people's success. So making sure that I do have time for relaxation, making sure at time that I step out of myself and just chill out for a couple of minutes until I can get my emotions back under control, is really important, because in a home office there's so many distractions going on and without other people around you to go it's all good. Oh, no, don't worry about that, we'll help you with that or whatever. You don't have all that stuff, it can really affect you.

Speaker 1: 15:29

The other thing that I think is really important is the loneliness of working at home. Even your partner's out children at school or whatever, depending on your situation. You're by yourself, which means you're probably 98% of the time not talking to another human being, and that can be really hard on the soul. There's no doubt about it. Now I like my own company. I'm an only child. I really don't care, but even I get to the point sometimes where it's nice to be talking to somebody. My way of dealing with that is actually to go business networking and to do other activities where I actually am engaging with other people. So obviously I'm involved with the fire brigade. So that takes time and I have these other things to bring people into my life. But when you're home all the time working, it really does affect how you perceive things and the loneliness is real and for some people they can't cope with it, and that's fine. If that's how it is for you, then maybe you're better going to a shared office space or a co-working space. I think they're brilliant. I'd love to go with one, but I actually really like my home office. Having to go to a co-working space to me would actually be annoying. On the other hand, it's a great environment. So have a think about that.

Speaker 1: 16:50

Number five is thinking local but acting global. Okay, use your home base, wherever it may be, to reach a global audience. Stop thinking local. Unless you're only delivering services locally, that's fine, that's what you're doing, but as a speaker, you've got the whole world to reach out to. Now, from my perspective, it's hard to reach the whole world. So maybe you build local, state, country and so on, but always be thinking about that global audience when you push stuff out, because you never know how far it's going to go. If one person likes your stuff and they share it on, it's going to go international pretty quickly. So just remember that.

Speaker 1: 17:28

Think about the fact that you're running a global company, not necessarily just a little home business. Those days where people would say, oh, I've just got a home business, I'm just a run from home, there's people making millions and millions of dollars out of their garages. Now the idea of a home business doesn't exist anymore. Okay, it's an office, doesn't matter where it is. The power of the web has opened up the opportunity to everyone, so stop thinking of it as a small home business. It is just your office, not my home office. My office Feeling comfortable. Can you tighten it a little bit.

Speaker 1: 18:04

Another thing is the power of local networking. Yesterday morning I went to a networking meeting and what someone speak. It was fantastic. Sat there with the whole whole local business. People made a few connections, talked about to some friends about what I'm doing now. Opportunity speak came up just like that when they found out what I was talking about, great, okay, I had a really nice morning. I connected with people, got back into the swing of networking, which I absolutely loved and my presto, opportunities arrive. When you sit in an office all day, opportunities are limited. When you're out talking to people, you do get more opportunities.

Speaker 1: 18:43

And the last thing is thinking about what the shift to home-based businesses means for neighborhoods and local communities. If you think about it, you're at home working. Well, how many other people around you are also at home working? There must be a couple of people, maybe at least another one in your street, depending on how long your street is. When you start to add up how many people are at home working, there's a lot of opportunity for you to connect with those people as well. So it's worth fighting out who is around again, thinking local that maybe you guys can, you know, tag together and develop communities online that are actually locally based, because you're all working at home. I always have this dream of building a like an online workspace where people just log in when they're at their computer and you come up, so like a Zoom meeting that's open 24 seven and when you're working you log in and it gives you who else is online. It can say hi and oh, this is what I'm doing, or whatever, but you're working like in a group, even though it's just you. That brings me to the end of my five points for the day.

Speaker 1: 19:47

The evolution of the home office is more than just a response to immediate needs. It's a testament to our ability to adapt, innovate and thrive in a never-changing landscape, and it was exacerbated by COVID. As we look ahead, possibility for our home bases are limitless. The walls of our homes can no longer define the scope of our emissions or the reach of our voices. Embracing the ships of today will undoubtedly pave the way for growth and expansion tomorrow. The future beckons with promise and from the heart of our homes, we're poised to meet it with vigor, vision and unwavering passion.

Speaker 1: 20:25

I hope you found this episode of our podcast on the future of offices interesting. If you did, I have a challenge for you Hit that like button and subscribe to the podcast right now and then share this episode with another speaker who could use the tips and strategies we've shared. Let's help each other grow our businesses and make an impact in the speaking world. Together, we can reach even more people and make a bigger difference. So don't wait, take action now and share the love. Thanks for tuning in and get ready for more exciting business building tips in the next episode.