© Tweeter Linder 2025 – All rights reserved—photo by iStock.

Speakers grow with the size of their stages, but how do you reach the next tier while staying comfortable?

What is new: A great way to grow as a speaker is to qualify as a substitute for an Executive speaker and be able to step in on short notice.

Why it matters: Executive speakers frequently face priority conflicts in which a committed live talk might need to be staffed by a backup speaker.

🏀 The Sixth Man of the Year award: The National Basketball Association introduced The Sixth Man of the Year (6MOY) in 1982-1983 to honor the league’s best player coming off the bench. The league’s super-sub! An outstanding award to aim for as an up-and-coming corporate speaker. Giving you access to big stages early and the opportunity to prove yourself as a permanent big-stage speaker candidate.

🎙 Grow into bigger speaking roles: Executives manage a variety of speaking roles, spanning owned, earned, and paid channels in different formats. Younger leaders can hone their executive speaking skills by gradually stepping up on speaking ladders before they need to be full-fledged speakers.

Growing in steps lets you refine the skills required at each level and gain experience across a variety of formats. By doing them before you need them, you reduce the size of your to-learn list when stepping into a bigger role and become great at speaking from the start.

⏱ Jumping in at short notice: The most challenging part to deal with is that the opportunities you should aim for often come up at short notice. The date is firm, and you’re getting the call because the announced speaker has a late, upcoming conflict.

You get less time to prepare, but the expectations for a backup speaker also go down. Trust the one who selected you as the backup, and use that as a source of positive energy to offset any stress the challenge might cause. Part of the job on big stages is managing the anxiety we all feel ahead of a big talk, and as a backup speaker, you gain valuable experience in this art.

✅ Well-prepared themes and topics: The selection of themes and topics for your talk is an area where you should not compromise when stepping up to a bigger stage. You want to stick to themes and issues that you are very familiar with and know by heart.

This limits the learning curve you face in the new speaking situation, and your confidence comes from your subject knowledge. You must have something in the setup that represents your home turf.

If slides are your primary anchor for your storytelling, consider converting them to an Executive talk track format. Be prepared for the situations where support in the form of slides is not an option.

🎨 Practice expected speaking formats: As soon as you have set an aspiration to take on bigger stages, you can start preparing. An unknown aspect is what formats you want to be able to take on. Pay attention to the complete suite of speaking undertakings that the ones you want to replace typically do.

Keynote presentations are the hardest. Fireside chats let you leverage the moderator to manage the flow and time spent on each topic, making it easier to manage. Panels are easiest when you are one of several speakers, and you get breathing room and rest in between making your points.

🏟️ Prepare for different stages: In addition to various formats, you face different types of stages and audiences. An industry trade show is different from an investor conference and from speaking to regulators and policymakers.

Make an effort to write down descriptions of the audiences you will be comfortable talking in front of. Describe their relation to your signature theme and topic, and words and expressions that are central to it.

Your flexibility in formulating your talking points varies with the nature of the stage. On an owned stage, your company has complete flexibility in selecting talking points and messages, and Executive speeches are well-scripted. On paid stages, you also have a lot of freedom in selecting points. The challenge is to balance your freedom with the audience’s expectations. On earned stages, the framing is often firm, and your value add comes from dressing the prepared questions well.

⛓️ Executive speakers need great backups: Executives do a variety of speaking undertakings in a given year, and it is more a question of when than if they need a backup. Make your interest in becoming a qualified backup known well in advance and prepare themes, topics, and audience types you are most comfortable with.

The waiting has started, and with it the journey to grow into the next level as a speaker.

This post was born in a conversation with a colleague who enlightened me on the apparent similarities between my favorite speaking gigs and the sixth man in basketball.