Page 191 - The New Articulate Executive_ Look, Act and Sound Like a Leader

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HOW TO USE

TELEPROMPTERS

f you look closely, you will often see politicians and offi cials on
ITV or in real life standing behind lecterns fl anked by what appear
to be little glass shields, which are sometimes mistaken for special
bulletproof security devices. But these glass plates are actually tele-
prompters (also known as autocues), which help speakers give
speeches without having to look down at a script.
Teleprompters are one-way mirrors, which are supposed to be
almost invisible to the audience but provide a large-type scrolling
text visible only to the person behind the lectern. Their functional
beauty lies in the fact that they put the speaker perpetually in the
GO ZONE.
Obviously, teleprompters do not make sense in smaller rooms
with smaller audiences because they are much easier to detect. In
fact, they can quickly become a distraction at the expense of the
speaker. Up close, it doesn’t take long even for people who have never
seen one before to figure out what they are. On top of that, with the

lectern bracketed with “shields,” it can look like you have insulated
yourself from your listeners behind a kind of barricade. With busi-
ness and political audiences alike, this does not go down well. So a
business leader using a lectern and teleprompters in a boardroom,

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