I'm Writing My Next Book! An Early Look and An Invite to Contribute Your Stories
Today, I'm sharing a little update about this big next step for me, as well as sharing a little material I've drafted to help clarify the book concept, almost like a messy prologue I could use later.
I'm sharing this stuff many months before I actually finish the draft for four reasons:
Stories. I'm on the hunt, and if you're a paid speaker at any career stage with some stories to tell, please fill out this form! If you know others, please forward them that link.
Accountability. By finally talking about it publicly, I'm making an implied promise to you and to myself that I will at long last commit the time and say no to other things as a result.
Marketing. Most people wait until something is almost or already public to talk about it. That's a huge mistake. Sharing ideas early, before we feel ready, is how we sharpen them and validate them. It's also a great way to build anticipation so the launch is more successful. (Imagine a chef who wants to open a restaurant but never lets anyone taste any dishes before putting them on the menu and never talks about the restaurant before opening night. That's a recipe (eh? ehhh?) for disaster.
Breathing. I feel like I'm suffocating, friend. I haven't written a book since 2018 (Break the Wheel: Question Best Practices, Hone Your Intuition, and Do Your Best Work.) I also haven't given myself permission to write much lately, at least not in a deep, uninterrupted way. Thankfully, the business is doing exceptionally well, the family is settled and happy after we moved last year, and I'm SO ready to feel my fingers on the keyboard each day, as the voice in my head becomes the voice on the page. (Flow. I can't wait for flow.)
Crucially, I've also made peace with something which has troubled me for awhile. There's a book everyone says I should write, and then there's the book I'm actually writing.
The book everyone says I should write is the basic advice book about my topic, resonance. I'm very proud of the premise I own in people's minds (resonance over reach) and all the IP built on top of it. I'll continue to write about that of course. But when someone tells me, "You should write that book, Jay," it's not because they want to read it. It's because they believe it's the best direction for my business and for me personally.
They're wrong on both counts.
Turns out there's a difference between a book you should write and a book you need to write.
***
The book I need to write:
I'm writing the Kitchen Confidential of professional speaking.
Man, just writing that to you feels so freeing! It's out there now. It's also really fun to think about too, isn't it?
If you haven't read it, Kitchen Confidential is the creative nonfiction book from Anthony Bourdain recounting his adventures working in restaurants as a cook. Anyone who knows me knows I'm a huge Bourdain fan. (Can't wait to see the A24 movie about his early life next month!) The thing is, my book won't just be my stories. Mine will dot the chapters for sure, but most of the stories will be from other speakers: friends, mentors, heroes, newcomers to my network ... maybe even you. (Fill out this form if you've got stories from the trenches to tell.)
This is a book for actual pros who get it—and anyone who wants to break in or peer in.
I also believe this is a missing artifact in the world of public speaking. There are lots of books for beginners, most of which focus on the fear or skill of public speaking. There are lots of books about the theory, covering rhetorical devices and story structure and such. A handful of books also exist to help professional speakers build their businesses, mosts of which are really bad, some of which are okay, and only one of which I recommend routinely, because it's truly great: The Referable Speaker from Michael Port and pal Andrew Davis.
But there is no book of stories by the pros, for the pros. I think about it like this:
Plenty of books tell you what to do. This book will show you what it's like.
I want to write a book I'd personally read. A book my friends would read. A book a speaker flying to Scottsdale for another gig would read, laughing and nodding along as they devour each chapter before storing their tray table and putting their seat back in the upright position.
I imagine a group of speakers swapping stories in a Vegas green room before someone mentions hearing this story about this speaker in this book. "Oh I've read that! Great book!" Then the others who haven't read it immediately take out their phones.
This book will take you past the pablum, showing you what happens in the real world to real speakers. Speakers like you, behind you, ahead of you.
That is the book I want to write. The book I need to write.
I'm calling it...
Bag Full of Dongles
Adventures in the Weird, Wonderful World of Professional Speaking
Because the truth is, this work isn't all the glamor shots from the stage. More often, it feels like lugging around a bag full of dongles–and if you instantly chuckled at the title, then you get it. You’re an insider. Part of the tribe. This book is for you. For us. It seeks to honor your work and speak to your reality much more than any other book about speaking, whose pages offer plenty of frameworks, advice, and tips, but simply don’t capture the truth about this work.
We need to capture the reality, not just to entertain us (though these pages will–and the catharsis matters to speakers who can sometimes feel lonely). More than that, it’s only in hearing real stories from real speakers that professionals like us really learn. This happens in green rooms. It happens over drinks and dinners at the event. But it doesn’t happen often enough. In writing this book, I'll press all of those learned, felt experiences and lessons into an artifact which can be passed between speakers, making your business easier and more enjoyable to build—and the entire industry more transparent and accessible to more voices and more types of people.
You’ll scribble down ideas from your peers and your heroes to apply to your next gig, and you’ll smile as you stand backstage and realize every moment over the past few days resembled the book you just read. Because art imitates life, and in this case, that life is yours.
This is our Kitchen Confidential. This is our truth—a combination of love letters, cautionary tales, and woulda-coulda-shouldas from real pros doing real work.
* * *
Empathy statement for the book
I'm a big believer in writing about the feeling of a major project, like a show or a book, before you create the actual thing. The world of Hollywood productions often uses things like log lines and empathy statements to clarify a new series, so years ago, I borrowed the idea to create my version of empathy statements (longwinded as mine tend to be) to anchor the project. It's a kind of “starter dough” for the rest of what I create. The flavor, the consistency, the taste of the thing is guided by the empathy statement, as I answer an important audience question: “Why should I care?”
Here's the empathy statement for Bag Full of Dongles:
If you asked most speaking coaches about stagecraft, they'd probably give you a solid framework. The three Ps. The five Cs. Something with a pyramid. They've read every book. They've watched every viral TED Talk at 1.5x speed. They can tell you about vocal variety and the power pause and why you should never put more than six words on a slide.
But I bet they can't tell you what it smells like in a green room. They've never actually sat there on a couch from the 1970s and watched a face you've only seen on YouTube walk in, sit down, and talk to you like a peer. Because in the green room, you're all peers.
If I asked them about what it takes to be a great speaker, they'd probably give you a syllabus of their personal favorites. They may have even been booked a few times. But they've never felt that specific kind of silence in a cavernous ballroom at 7am, standing at the back while the AV crew argues about the confidence monitor, knowing you’ve got 60 minutes until you have to channel the mediocre breakfast burrito room service delivered into an extraordinary experience for 400 real estate agents.
Ask a training organization about client relationships, and they'll give you five outreach scripts and their template for testimonial requests. But they've never gotten an email from a brand's L&D leader before heading to the airport—Hey, Sam, sorry for the last-minute change but—asking if you can cut 10 minutes and tweak the topic slightly and make sure you are being “practical” and maybe weave in a slide about that big new tech product in B2B marketing. And they've never felt the urge to write back in shouty-caps how you really feel about the request, but instead you say yes, absolutely, no problem, because you're a goddamn pro and you know giving the signature talk is still the plan, because it’s been intentionally built and constantly validated to resonate to any room, with any crowd, no matter what.
They have no idea what it means to walk out of a venue and negotiate between two versions of themselves. Out of the expo hall and back to the room or rental car, face barely moving after more animation than Pixar, energy returned to a calm baseline—or battery levels blinking red. For 45 minutes, you were a superhero. Now you're back moving through the earth as a mere mortal. But you're no longer sure which version of yourself is the "real" one. Not when you feel the most alive you ever feel once you plant two feet firmly on a stage and hold a clicker in your hand and sense a room fixated on you. Not when you know all the moves of that one signature bit which creates an applause break mid-speech every time. Not when giving a talk makes you feel present in a way you almost never feel anywhere else. Is that the real you? Or is it the one walking out alone? The one eating yet another basic burger or sad salad, scrolling your phone on bleached white sheets, setting three alarms for 4:20, 4:25, 4:30 in the morning.
They'll tell you this work requires sacrifice. But they've never argued with their spouse late into the night, between diaper changes and bottle feedings, as you swear you're leaving your family because you're doing this for your family, when deep down you know you're doing it for you. Because it's making you money and it's also a drug, and you're dependent and addicted.
And you don't know what else to do.
Lots of people want to help speakers, but they've never had to do the math on whether there's time to eat a quick meal in Nashville before catching an Uber to the airport to fly to Atlanta, once you factor in giving your talk AND doing your Q&A after AND talking to a line of people near the coffee station AND figuring out a polite way to tell that one person currently sharing their life story to move it along because you have a line of people waiting for you and a flight to catch to Atlanta … so you can do this all again tomorrow.
They've written about stage presence. But they've never stood backstage before speaking to 2,000 dentists and gone completely still inside, not because you're nervous but because you're loading. "Please welcome to the stage—"
It's showtime, and you're right where you're meant to be.
There you have it! I'm on my way. Thanks for the nudge.
Reminder: if you're a speaker with stories to tell about this work and this life, consider filling out this form.
I'll start scheduling interviews later this year.