If you are a fan of TED Talks, you may notice than many of them hover around 18 minutes in length. If you search online why that is, you’ll learn that the folks at TED made that decision based on neuroscience and strategy. Their belief is that 18 minutes is long enough for a speaker to present an idea, while short enough that a listener can hear it, digest it, and understand the key points.
For those of us who facilitate, rarely are we assigned only 18 minutes to complete our work so why bring up the TED Talk timeframe? I think it’s an important reminder that every 18 minutes it’s time to significantly change things up. We want to pivot in our approach to the content, as well as the style in which we are facilitating. As we map out our plan for the hour, 90 minutes or whatever amount of time we have, consider how to grab the audience’s attention in a drastically different way at least every 18 minutes.
Considering the popularity and impact of TED Talks, let’s follow their lead on this one.
18!