UPS workers take stage as TED talkers

— The success of the videos has spawned offshoots such as TEDx, a program to help communities stage “local TED-like” events, and TED Institute to work with companies such as UPS. TED also awards a $1 million annual TED Prize to support major projects.

On myajc.com: Meet all 13 UPS employees and read about their TED talk topics.

For the full videos, go to https://solvers.ups.com/think-solve-do/.

On myajc.com: Meet all 13 UPS employees and read about their TED talk topics.

For the full videos, go to https://solvers.ups.com/think-solve-do/.

On myajc.com: Meet all 13 UPS employees and read about their TED talk topics.

For the full videos, go to https://solvers.ups.com/think-solve-do/.

Compared to the typical conference room presentation, giving a TED talk is almost like being naked onstage.

No notes in hand. No podium to clutch. No bullet point slides to read from.

“You have to memorize it, and I thought, ‘How in the world?…’ ” said Kevin Etter, a healthcare marketing and global strategy manager at UPS.

He was among a group of UPS employees chosen to take on the challenge for an unusual corporate event that paired the Sandy Springs-based shipping giant with TED, the nonprofit known for staging engaging and influential video talks that sometimes go viral.

The idea: Use the TED format to highlight employees with fascinating stories or ideas to share — some with direct business applications, but others deeply personal, inspiring or just plain entertaining.

Thirteen UPSers were featured at the one-day TED@UPS event in September, staged not at the corporate campus but at a Decatur performing arts venue.

In addition to Etter, who talked about his experiences while on loan from UPS to a nonprofit that increases access to vaccines overseas, the lineup included a transgender UPS pilot; a manager who had worked for the State Department in Rwanda at the outbreak of that nation’s horrific civil war; another who talked about turning trash to fuel; and a delivery driver who is a virtuoso mandolin player, among others.

All the presentations were recorded and posted at a special website for the world to see.

UPS executives see it as a chance to show the company is not just a big, highly regimented package-pusher, but an innovative giant filled with interesting and thoughtful people.

It’s a shift for a company that has never quite shaken a reputation for having a close-lipped, buttoned-up culture — the tightest ship in the shipping business, as its slogan once said.

Because of that “cultural bias,” said Maureen Healy, vice president of customer communications at UPS, the marketing team that worked with TED wondered if employees would “feel comfortable talking about themselves.”

“I think we overcame that,” Healy added.

Reaching out

The company hopes the TED talks will help it reach both millennials and executives who make decisions for companies. The videos also are a way to bring to life UPS’s latest “United Problem Solvers” marketing campaign, said Teresa Finley, senior vice president of global marketing.

It started with TED reaching out to UPS’s advertising agency. TED leaders had formed a special TED Institute unit in 2013 to market their services to companies. It has previously worked with a handful including IBM, Intel and Boston Consulting Group, but UPS is the first Atlanta-area client.

“We knew a company with UPS’s scope and potential impact would have incredible stories to tell,” said Jenee Gilhooley, director of TED Institute.

UPS employees were invited to apply to give a talk, and about 300 applications poured in. A culled-down group then auditioned through a reading over the phone. Ultimately, 11 speakers and two performers — including the mandolin player and an Indian dance group member — were selected.

Employees who participated describe the weeks of preparation for the talks as an emotional, consuming, stressful and defining experience.

“It became a complete whirlwind,” said Peter Harris, UPS director of sustainability for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, who delivered a talk on turning trash into fuel.

Harris said as he started preparations a month in advance of the big day, “It became readily apparent that a month [of preparation] was not really enough to get this thing right.”

He estimates he went through 10 drafts with countless tweaks to each version, and practiced giving his speech about 100 times.

“It was relentless,” Harris said.

Remote coaching

Each UPS employee worked remotely with a TED speaker coach, via phone calls and Skype practices, and did live rehearsals just before the event. Lean forward onto the balls of your toes, they were told. Tell a story that will connect with people. Don’t even think about PowerPoint.

On the day of the event, the audience included a few hundred colleagues and family members.

Many were amazed at the metamorphosis in the presenters.

“We know some of these people. I’ve seen them present before,” Finley said. “It was transformational in a big way…. It floored me.”

To help memorize his 10-minute talk, Etter fell back on a technique acquired as a teenage fan of Bruce Springsteen.

“When have I ever effectively memorized anything? And it came to me… When I was a kid I knew every lyric of every Bruce Springsteen song he ever wrote, because I listened to it over and over again.” He recorded his speech and listened to it repeatedly to embed it in his head.

Harris had similar trepidation about his talk, which he hoped would impart a sense of optimism about tackling issues such as climate change.

“I had done a lot of public speaking, but I’m very familiar with a method where you don’t have to do very much. You guide yourself through the talk using bullet points on the slide,” Harris said. “This was the other way around…. I had to know what I was going to say.”

He rehearsed in front of colleagues and others.

“One of the practices I did in front of my family was a disaster. I got a lot of feedback on that,” Harris. said. “It kind of shocked me because I thought I knew it, and then I stood up in front of them…. It was really useful.”

The work paid off with a successful presentation. “It was really quite exhilarating,” he said.

‘I’m here for you’

Kelly Lepley, the transgender UPS pilot, gave one of the most personal talks in describing the experience transitioning from male to female.

She had told her story before through online posts and talks to small groups, but never in a forum as large. She decided to go public in such a big way partly out of gratitude toward her employer, she said.

“I’ll never forget what my chief pilot said” the day she informed him of her situation, Lepley recalled. “He said, ‘Don’t worry about it, I’m here for you.’ The people at UPS showed me more Christ-like love than my own church.”

Lepley said she spent 80 to 100 hours practicing her talk.

“Everywhere I went, driving a car or walking or running, that speech was constantly running in my head,” Lepley said.

“I’m sure I’m going to get some positive [comments] and I’m sure that there will be some that are negative,” she said. “I’ve had to learn to put on some iron.”

Harris said seeing the talks by his colleagues “left me completely awestruck by the depth of talent I was surrounded by…. It really sort of gave you a behind-the-scenes view of what made the other participants tick, in a way that I don’t think I would have otherwise discovered in an entire lifetime.”

UPS’s involvement was not risk-free, Finley acknowledged.

“You really put your people out there,” she said. What’s more, TED essentially had creative control over the program, working directly with presenters on their talks. The employees’ bosses and UPS marketing managers had limited influence.

But Finley said the event was “the right next step for us,” one the company hopes will generate buzz and inspire customers and employees.

“I think what we’re trying to do is to get out there a message that there is within the organization of 400,000+ people such a variety and depth of innovation that there isn’t anything we can’t do if we put our minds to it,” Harris said. “This is a journey for UPS as well.”