Archive for January, 2010

What’s More Important: What You Say Or Who Is Saying It?

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010
Image Credit The Right Speaker With The Right Words Can Win Wars

The Right Speaker With The Right Words Can Win Wars

So here’s a question for you to ponder: what is more important – the words that you say or how you say them? This is one of the classic questions that gets asked about public speaking. Could you pick up a fantastically written speech and deliver it in a way that would create the same (or better) reaction in the audience that the original presenter got?

It’s All About Teamwork

In the end, it turns out that this is really a trick question. The answer is that you can’t have one without the other. It’s the combination of both the material and the speaker who presents the material that causes the desired reaction in the audience.

One thing that too many speakers don’t take the time to realize is that each speech needs to be tailored to meet the unique needs of the speaker who is delivering it. You have your own unique style (you are loud, you are quiet, etc.) and nobody else presents a speech the same way that you do.

The one thing that we need to be careful to not do is to try to present someone else’s speech. Trying to deliver a speech that was created for someone else will be just like trying to wear clothes that were custom tailored for somebody else’s dimensions. It just won’t look good.

How To Match Your Next Speech To Your Speaking Style

If you can accept the idea that it takes both a good speaker and a good speech to deliver a winning presentation, then the next obvious question is how can you do this successfully?

Gene Perret spent his career writing television shows and comedy material. He knows a thing or two about tailoring the material to the presenter. He has three suggestions on what you need to do in order to ensure that your next speech connects with your audience in a powerful way:

  • Be True To Your Speech: A speaker who is talking about a subject that he/she either doesn’t believe in or doesn’t care about will never be able to connect with the audience. I don’t care how great of an actor you think that you are, if you don’t believe in what you are saying then it will eventually show through to your audience and they will dismiss your message. If you don’t believe me, then think back to some of those corporate speeches that we’ve all seen when executive management tries to convince the staff that everything is ok and that there’s nothing to worry about. That message never flies!
  • Match Your Words To Your Style: I have a friend who is a very flamboyant speaker – he’s all over the stage and his arms are always waving in the air. Once upon a time I happened to see him deliver a very somber speech about a sad set of circumstances that had caused a business to fail. The speech went over like a lead balloon. My friend’s normal speaking style had to be greatly restricted because of the speech’s subject matter and so the audience got conflicting messages – they saw a lot of bottled up energy, but were hearing and seeing a very low energy speech. Don’t make this mistake – when you give a speech, make sure that the material that you are presenting matches your style of speaking.
  • Stay Competent: we all have areas of knowledge that we are strong in. Either we’ve spent the time studying in order to understand this area or we’ve worked in a related field. That being said, there will be occasions that we’ll be asked to talk on a topic that we know nothing about. Don’t do it! We all do certain things well, and a bunch of other things not so well. If you end up talking about a topic that you don’t know well, then all of your weak points will show up during your speech and you won’t be able to connect with your audience.

What All Of This Means For You

A speaker by themselves or a speech by itself has very little value. It’s only when the two are brought together that the real magic of an effective presentation can happen. As speakers, we need to understand that we have our own unique style and we need to make sure that we never try to present a speech that has been created for someone else because it just won’t work.

In order to harness both the power of a speech and our personal style, we need to make sure that we believe in what we are saying, matching our speaking style, and only talk about topics that we know something about.

Combined with the right speech we can move audiences. Now all we need to do in order to make sure that our next speech is the perfect combination of words and style is to practice, practice, practice…!

Do you think that you can tell when a speaker is talking about something that they don’t really believe in?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

Just imagine your next presentation. Just a few minutes into your speech, you become aware of someone, gasp, talking. We’re not talking about quiet whispering here, we’re talking about someone in the audience standing up and shouting things at you. Congratulations, you’ve got a heckler…

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Posted in style | 4 Comments »

You CAN Learn To Speak Like President Obama

Tuesday, January 19th, 2010
Image Credit President Obama Sure Knows How To Give A Speech

President Obama Sure Knows How To Give A Speech

Who do you think is the greatest communicator of all time? For most of us, we’d pick someone who has lived in the last 100 years because that’s pretty much all that we know. We’ve had some great ones in this time period: Winston Churchill, John F. Kennedy, etc. However, if I had to pick the best communicator out there right now, I believe that President Obama would win. Now the question for you, independent of your political beliefs, is how can you learn to speak more like him…?

Welcome To The World Of Politics

Linda McGurk spends a lot of time studying how politicians like Obama work their magic, and she’s come to some interesting conclusions. The first one is that if you want to have the impact with your speeches that Obama has with his, you are going to have to learn to be sincere.

One of the key take-aways from this guidance is that you really do need to believe in what you are talking about. Audiences get bombarded with so many different messages these days that they have reacted by developing sophisticated fraud detection capabilities. They can detect if you don’t believe the words that you are saying.

Keep in mind that it’s not just what you say when you are up in the front of the room or on the stage that counts. Everything that you’ve done up until that point may be known to the audience and it counts also. If you are known to be an avid hunter and you show up to give a speech on why people should be vegetarians, then you are not going to come across as being sincere.

Do You Care, I Mean REALLY Care?

How much passion do you have inside of you? Why are you keeping it all bottled up in there? If you want me to listen to you speak about something, you had better be passionate about the topic.

When you let your emotions out, when you let your audience know that you really do care about what you are talking about, that’s when you can connect with them. It is all too easy to do a great job of researching everything that you need for a speech and then simply delivering a lot of solid facts to your audience. That shows that you care, doesn’t it?

The answer is no. If you open up and explain to me why something is important to you, then I’ll listen. If I can understand how deeply you feel about something then I’ll at least listen to you. I may still not agree with you, but I will at least listen.

How Far Can You See: What’s Your Vision?

When you are giving a speech, you need to be painting a picture of the future for your audience. Once again, if you are just unloading a bunch of facts that you’ve picked up during your research for this speech, then you won’t be able to make a lasting impression.

One of the best examples of a fantastic vision expressed in a speech is John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address in which he told the country to “ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”

This is exactly why people come to hear speeches — they are looking to hear a vision laid out for them. This is what makes the good politicians like Obama stand above so many other speakers — they’ve got the vision thing down cold.

It’s All In How You Do It

This all comes back to the basic point: what do you need to do in order to capture some of that politician speaking magic for yourself. There are three things that you can do immediately to make your speeches have more of that Obama impact:

  • Have A Conversation: The more that you are able to work a conversational tone into your speeches, the deeper the connection that you’ll be able to make with your audience. Using fancy words or “talking over their heads” will only serve to increase the distance between you and them. Have a conversation with them and you’ll be able to make your point.
  • Add Some Punctuation: Sure, we generally only think about punctuation when we are writing, but politicians show us that it plays a role in our speeches also. Adding periods, semicolons, and new paragraphs to the way that you deliver your speech will allow your audience to catch up and follow along with your thinking.
  • Pause For Effect: Some of the worst speakers never seem to take a breath when they are speaking. Adding more pauses to your speech is a fantastic way to make it have more of an impact. Pausing allows your audience to laugh, consider a point, or just catch up and ponder what you’ve just said.

What All Of This Means For You

If you really want to learn how to speak like Obama, then run for the office of President. However, if you need to keep your day job, then perhaps simply incorporating these suggestions into your next speech will do the trick.

It turns out that it’s not all that hard to learn to speak like a politician. The overall goal is to connect with your audience using sincerity, passion, and vision. To do this in your next speech, all you have to do is have a conversation with your audience and add some punctuation and pauses.

I can’t guarantee that you’ll get elected to an office by incorporating these speaking techniques, but I can assure you that you’ll win the vote of your next audience.

Do you think that having a vision is all that important or can it be skipped?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

So here’s a question for you to ponder: what is more important – the words that you say or how you say them? This is one of the classic questions that gets asked about public speaking. Could you pick up a fantastically written speech and deliver it in a way that would create the same (or better) reaction in the audience that the original presenter got?

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in politician | 2 Comments »

It’s Amazing What A Speaker Can Learn By Watching YouTube

Tuesday, January 12th, 2010
Image Credit
YouTube Has More Speakers Than The Largest Motivational Workshop

YouTube Has More Speakers Than The Largest Motivational Workshop

Just how does one become a better public speaker? I mean let’s be serious here, you do want to get better, don’t you? Pretty much any book that you read on the subject or class that you attend in order to build up your skills will tell you the same time — if you really want to get better, then you’ve got to take the time to watch the pros at work. Great, just where do you find such pros and how can you get admitted to their speeches to watch them at work? Good news — I’m going to tell you how (and it’s free!) …

Welcome To The 21st Century

In the olden days (like about 5 years ago), if you wanted to become a better speaker then yes, you would have to pick yourself up and go to where a good speaker was giving a speech and plop yourself down and start taking notes. Thanks goodness we now live in the modern 21st Century and we no longer have to make such an effort in order to improve ourselves.

Carmine Gallo is a communications coach who faced this very problem a few years back. After doing some searching on the Internet, Carmine discovered that the free video service YouTube was a treasure trove of recorded examples of excellent speakers. Who knew?

Who Should I Watch?

So now you’ve found the Library of Congress of online videos. The problem is that there is almost too much information here. If you start searching for “speakers”, you’re going to get blown away. How about if we take a few moments and come up with a list to get you started:

  • Tony Robbins: people seem to be split on what they think of Tony and his motivational message; however, from a public speaking point-of-view we don’t really care — he’s one heck of a speaker. His workshops cost thousands of dollars to attend, but on YouTube he’s there for you to study for free.
  • Steve Jobs: Steve is not only a great speaker, but he also has a very good understanding of how to use multimedia to support what he’s saying. His presentations at Apple user conferences are legendary for their style and impact. Sure we don’t have an army of graphic artists working for us; however, we can learn something from Steve and he’s living proof that if you practice, practice, practice you will do a good job.
  • Suze Orman: we all know Suze Orman as a no-nonsense provider of financial advice; however, she’s also a fantastic speaker. One of her best qualities is that she handles questions very well — there’s no good way to practice for them. Watch and learn!

Looking Beyond YouTube

You might think that once you’ve found YouTube, that’s all that you’ll ever need. However, the Internet is a big place and you might be interested in watching more formal speeches than you’ll be able to find on YouTube. Gallo has done some research and here are some other sites that you should be sure to check out:

  • Charlierose.com: Charlie Rose is a PBS interviewer who seems to be able to gain access to just about every important person out there. This is the place to go if you want to learn how to master the one-on-one interview.
  • Cisco: John Chambers, the CEO of Cisco has overcome personal difficulties in order to become a master speaker. His speeches do a fantastic job of making the complicated seem understandable. His trademark move is the trip into the audience in order to connect with people. Watch and learn how a master does it.
  • Businessweek.com: sure you know about the magazine, but did you know about the web site and its videos? This is where you’ll see all of the “big” business leaders being interviewed and you can watch to see how they communicate. Hint: not all of them do a good job of it.

What All Of This Means For You

In the end, we can read all of the books, take all of the courses, and even attend all of the Toastmasters meetings that we can fit into our already busy lives, but in the end it always comes back to one thing: we’ve got to study and learn from the folks who know how to deliver a good speech.

In the old days it required a great deal of effort to seek out who the best speakers were and then to track them down when they were speaking close to where we’d be. However, in today’s electronic age, this is no longer necessary — now we can bring the speakers to us via the Internet.

In order to make the most of this powerful tool, we need to do our homework. We need to watch each speaker carefully and take good notes on what we think that they do well and where we think that they could do better. These are the notes that we’ll then be able to use to improve our own speeches. Now go out there and watch some YouTube!

Who do you think is the best speaker that people can watch on YouTube in order to become better speakers?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

Who do you think is the greatest communicator of all time? If I had to pick the best communicator out there right now, I believe that President Obama would win. Now the question for you, independent of your political beliefs, is how can you learn to speak more like him…?

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Posted in video | No Comments »

10 Professional Speaking Tips That You Need To Know

Tuesday, January 5th, 2010
Image Credit
The Best Way To Become A Better Speaker Is To Ask A Pro

The Best Way To Become A Better Speaker Is To Ask A Pro

Editor’s Note: This article has been selected to be included in Angela DeFinis’ “Public Speaking And The New Year” Blog Carnival. This Carnival can be found online at: http://www.definiscommunications.com/blog/public-speaking-and-the-new-year/

Happy New Year! As we start yet another a new year, you may be asking yourself what is the best way for me to become a better public speaker this year? Taking a crash course in which you immerse yourself in all of the subtle tricks of effective speaking is one way. Giving a million speeches and then studying how both yourself and your audience reacted is another.

The problem with both of these approaches is that they take time. Too much time. A much better way to quickly improve is to find a professional speaker who is doing it right and ask them how they do it…

Meet A Pro

Shawn Doyle has been a professional speaker for over 19 years. During that time he’s made mistakes. Lots of mistakes. The good news for you is that he took the time to remember what he did wrong and made sure that he never repeated a mistake.

He’s come up with his list of the “top 10” things that you just can’t learn in a class. Instead, these are the speaking lessons that all professional speakers end up learning on the road. Since you are reading this, just maybe you’ll learn them here and you won’t have to learn them the hard way!

10 Tips For Giving A Professional Speech

  1. Prepare, Prepare, Prepare: I’m going to bet that I’ve fooled you on this one: I’m not talking about practicing saying your speech. Instead, I’m talking about taking the time to know your audience: how old are they, what do they do for a living, what are they expecting from you.
  2. Become A Space-Man: The effectiveness of your speech will be heavily influenced by where you end up giving it. The room, the lighting, the sound system, etc. will all play a role in determining if you are able to connect with your audience. You need to arrive early and check out the room where you’ll be speaking. It will be too late to make any changes if you show up just before you go on.
  3. It’s All In The Opening: Welcome to the age of instant-everything. We can download movies, cook a complete dinner in a microwave in minutes, and purchase almost anything over the Internet. If the opening for your speech is long, slow, and boring then you’ll lose your audience right off the bat. You need to grab them at the start and never let go.
  4. Talk With Your Hands: When you are giving a speech, your hands are an incredibly powerful communication tool that you can use to boost the impact of your speech. If you are holding on to something (a pen, a piece of paper) while you talk, then your ability to use this tool is greatly diminished. Keep ‘em free!
  5. Stop Hiding Behind PowerPoint: Ouch! This one probably hits all of us hard. We’ve worked hard to make a great set of slides and we love to use them. Stop! You are the presentation, not your slides. Don’t use PowerPoint if you can get away with it or use it sparingly if you have to. Don’t hide behind your slides.
  6. Go For A Walk: All too often speakers will plant themselves behind a lectern and stay there during your entire speech. If you do this, then you will have missed an opportunity to engage your audience by moving around. Use your entire body and where you are standing to emphasize the point that you are currently making.
  7. Use Your Own Stories: Forget those “Chicken Soup For The …” books, when you use someone else’s story it comes out much weaker than when you tell your own story. Doyle suggests that you use the following formula for creating and telling a story: story + moral + how it relates to the topic = great story.
  8. Never, Ever, Apologize: Too often speakers spend much of their speech apologizing for a wide variety of things: the room being too cold, their slides not being in the right order, etc. Stop it! When you apologize, your audience starts to see you in a different light — a negative light. Just skip the apology and move on.
  9. You Must Believe To Achieve: In order for your speech to have an impact on your audience, they are going to have to believe that you believe what you are saying. If you are just mouthing words that you don’t fully buy into, then you will come across as insincere and your message will have no lasting impact.
  10. Think About Your Audience: All too often we write the speeches that we’d like to hear. The problem with this is that we are not necessarily the same as our audience. Your speech must be about your audience and what they want, not about you and what you want.

What All This Means For You

As long as you are going to go to the effort of creating and delivering a speech, you may as well do a good job of it. The challenge that we all face is finding ways to become better at giving our speeches so that we can have a greater impact on our audience.

There are a lot of different ways to go about improving our skills; however, one of the simplest and best ways is to get guidance from professionals who have already gone out there and learned the lessons that you want to know.

I’ve listed 10 suggestions from a pro that should go a long way in helping you to avoid making some of the more common mistakes that speakers make. Read, learn, and get out there and speak like a pro!

Do you think that you could feel comfortable giving a speech without using any PowerPoint slides?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

Just how does one become a better public speaker? I mean let’s be serious here, you do want to get better, don’t you? Good news — I’m going to tell you how (and it’s free!) …

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Posted in presentation tips | 1 Comment »