Tim Cook & Company at a Developers' Conference

I just ran into a series of speeches led by Apple CEO Tim Cook at the June 13, 2016 keynote event at the Worldwide Developer Conference. Apple runs this conference every year. Cook and a group of developers presented enthusiastic talks about the latest software developments relevant to Apple products. Cook began his presentation, after remembering the terrible Orlando shootings, and reminded the audience that Apple welcomes people from all backgrounds, viewpoints, and ethnicities.

Cook then turned to the conference itself, praising the "really big and jam-pack morning plan for you." He praised the community of software developers: "the developer community has never been more vibrant. . . . This is truly a worldwide conference. We have people here from over 74 countries." He reminded the audience that Apple had awarded 350 scholarships for developers: "These guys are incredible. If you see them, make sure that you congratulate them."

This was excellent public speaking technique. Wasting no time, Cook praised the attendees, reminded them why their work was important, and pointed out how important the conference would be. It is important for speaker to orient to the audience, and Cook accomplished this effectively.

Cook then reviewed much of the development of software for Apple products. He discussed the App store's growth from 500 apps to more than 2 million. He gave specific examples of Apple's success, including the Macintosh computer, the iPhone, Apple Watch and Apple TV. He concluded his opening remarks by saying that "now we offer you four incredible platforms that power these world-changing product experiences." He then called on a series of developers to discuss software for each of those platforms.

At that point, Apple vice president Kevin Lynch offered several specifics about the speed and versatility of the Apple Watch, giving specific examples of its features that would appeal to software developers. Here's one of his examples:

"Let’s take a look at an example. This is watchOS 2 and we’re going to look at an app called Onefootball. We’re going to launch it from a complication in the bottom left. We’re going to see how long it takes. So here we are, launching the app, takes a few seconds to launch, and then once it launches, it loads some data and it updates, there we go. So that is pretty typical example of watchOS 2."

 That is an excellent way for a speaker to present an example. Lynch started with a quick transition, stated what the example was about, and showed how the product worked. He then went to the general point about the Apple Watch operating system. Quick, to the point, and very clear.

Apple's Stacey Lysik talk some more about the Apple Watch. She gave examples of some of her favorite apps for the product. Among the other presentations was an interesting talk Jay Blahnik, who focused on Apple's contributions to health and fitness. Craig Federighi gave a live demonstration of Siri's capabilities, actually conversing with the imaginary digital assistant in front of the audience.

These are just a few of the presentations given at the opening ceremony.

Conclusions to draw:

1. Software development often seems like the loneliest profession, in which extremely intelligent people sit alone at their computer developing software. In real life, however, conferences are absolutely vital to their profession. 

2. The presentations at this conference were short, crisp, and enthusiastic.They gave lots of details about the products. They wasted very little time, with the speaker getting to the point very quickly. The speeches were extremely enthusiastic and uniformly positive.

3. The speeches were extemporaneous.  What this means is that the speakers were well prepared, but they did not write their speeches out, memorize them, read them from the manuscript. They had a lot to say, but they preserved the atmosphere of conversing with their audiences rather than preaching to them.

Business speech is absolutely vital to the success of world commerce. No matter how much work one does in private, there is no substitute for going to conferences, meeting the famous people in your profession, hearing what they have to say, and making your own contributions during your own presentations. I always encourage my students to find out what the important conferences are in their field and to attend them. The University of South Carolina Aiken, where I teach, makes public speaking and conference opportunities available to students right on campus. I'll talk more about that in a few weeks. If you can't communicate, you might as well not be show up at all.

Caveat: I am not endorsing Apple products one way or the other. I only own one Apple product and it isn't charged up at the moment.

PS: Lynch was also very effective as he introduced each speaker. I'll publish a post about speeches of introduction in due course.