Alumni Speakers Series: Alex Sanso

Last May, 14 brave souls pioneered the way for Ignite Bainbridge. As we are gathering a whole new crop of speakers, we’ve asked a few of these alumni to share a bit of their memories from this inspiring event.  Hopefully, their words will offer some insight into their experiences that you can apply to your presentation as well as provide you with greater comfort and confidence to move forward. Because, you know, we would love to hear from you.

Why did you participate in Ignite Bainbridge?

Alex: The basic idea behind Ignite was “compelling” and it sounded “interesting and fun.” “I like to be on stage” and have done improv and karaoke in the past. So Ignite was a means to “put myself in front of people and be on stage. I liked that.”

Why did you choose the topic that you did?

Alex: When deciding on a topic, I “set this bar in my mind that it has to be monumental and profound.” I was getting the TED speeches inside my head and using those as a guide and basis for what was expected. After thinking more about it, I realized that it doesn’t have to be this. It just has to be interesting…something that I like to do. Karaoke seemed to fit the bill. But how do you turn this in to something interesting, rather than just rambling on about getting up in front of a bunch of people and singing? This was a “fun challenge” in trying to express “what effect does karaoke have on me? What feelings did this generate for me?” Figuring out how to integrate this into a talk that goes beyond just singing, so that it can apply to and be interesting to anyone and also become both a learning experience and entertaining was an objective. Using karaoke as a metaphor for overcoming a person’s problems in life was a creative and entertaining approach. Read the rest of this entry »