Archive for February, 2012

Public Speakers Know That Clichés Can Cause A Speech To Sink Like A Ship

Tuesday, February 28th, 2012
Image Credit Some clichés are as old as dirt…

Some clichés are as old as dirt…

As public speakers, we all know the importance of public speaking. The one tool that we all have to work with is our choice of what words we want to speak. Even more important than any presentation tips is the choice that we have in choosing a wide variety of both words and phrases that we can use in our next speech. It turns out that we can make good word choices that help us get our message across to our audience or we can make bad choices that cause our audience use their listening skills to tune us out. When we use a cliché, we’re doing a bit of both…

What Is A Cliché And Why Is It Good / Bad

Before we go throwing stones at the way that you’ve been using words in your speeches, perhaps we should spend just a few moments making sure that we all understand just exactly what a cliché is.

A cliché is a group of words that is used to communicate a popular or common thought or idea. You’ve heard hundreds of these before. A few examples include “talk is cheap”, “it’s now or never”, “don’t cry over spilled milk”, etc.

Simply by becoming a cliché this collection of words or phrases has become overused, and that’s the problem. When you use a cliché, you are throwing out a phrase that your audience will instantly recognize. In some cases this can be a good thing – it will put your audience at ease because, just like a warm familiar blanket, it’s something that they recognize. However, at the same time if you overdo it and use too many clichés you run the risk of boring your audience and causing them to tune you out.

How Speakers Can Avoid Overusing Clichés

Ok, let’s say that you may be a cliché abuser. What’s a speaker to do?

The first thing that needs to be done is that you need to recognize that you have a problem (“hello, my name is Jim and I’m a cliché abuser…”). After doing that, you need to take steps to replace the clichés that you are using with other words and phrases that are not clichés.

You need to realize that you are probably using clichés simply because they are so familiar. You need to find new things to say in their place. One immediate step that you can take is to get out your thesaurus and look up other ways of saying the same thing.

One of the biggest problems that most speakers have in reducing or eliminating the number of clichés that we use is that all too often we are not aware of how many of these guys are working their way into our speeches. That’s where a friend or confidant can come in handy.

Having someone listen to your speech and note each cliché that you use can be a real eye opener. I know that when I had a friend do this for me, I discovered that even after I thought that I had removed all of my overused clichés I still ended up using 15 of them.

If you don’t have a friend who can help you do this, another way to accomplish the same thing is to video tape yourself giving the speech. It can be hard to listen to yourself talking closely enough to pick out all of the clichés, but it’s well worth the effort!

What All Of This Means To You

Words are indeed a powerful tool that speakers have at their disposal. Sprinkled among the words and phrases that we use are clichés – well-worn phrases that our audience will recognize instantly. Used properly they can connect us with our audience and let us maximize the benefits of public speaking, used too much and they’ll drive our audience away from us.

Once you realize that you are using too many clichés, you need to take steps to replace these over-used phrases in your speeches. Tools such as a thesaurus can come to your aid in these types of situations.

Taking your speaking skills to the next level where you start to really study the words that you are using is the mark of a gifted speaker. By trimming the words that are not being effective from your next speech, you’ll be able to hone your message and ensure that you make more of an impact and end up changing the lives of everyone who is in your audience.

- Dr. Jim Anderson
Blue Elephant Consulting –
Your Source For Real World Public Speaking Skills™

Question For You: How many clichés do you think a speaker should feel comfortable using in a 30-minute speech?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.
P.S.: Free subscriptions to The Accidental Communicator Newsletter are now available. Subscribe now: Click Here!
 
Note: What we talked about are advanced speaking skills. If you are just starting out I highly recommend joining Toastmasters in order to get the benefits of public speaking. Look for a Toastmasters club to join in your home town by visiting the web site www.Toastmasters.org. Toastmasters is dedicated to helping their members to understand the importance of public speaking by developing listening skills and getting presentation tips. Toastmasters is how I got started speaking and it can help you also!

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

Going to the effort to prepare and deliver a speech is a big deal. As long as you are going to make the effort to do all of this, you sure want your audience to get the most out of your speech – you want to change lives (that’s one of the benefits of public speaking)! No matter how well you dress or how clever your speech is, if your voice isn’t something that your audience wants to listen to, you won’t be able to make an impression on anyone no matter how good their listening skills are…

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Posted in words | No Comments »

5 Ways For Public Speakers To Not Say “I’m Sorry”

Monday, February 20th, 2012
Image Credit We All Know When We've Done Something Wrong

We All Know When We've Done Something Wrong

Oh, oh – now you’ve done it. Somehow, in some way, you screwed up. You made a mistake and did something (or in many cases you said something) that was wrong. What are you going to do now? The best thing to do would be to apologize and hope that your audience is using their listening skills. However, it turns out that this is just a bit more difficult than it seems…

The Problem With Saying “I’m Sorry”

So why do we even bother with saying “I’m sorry” in the first place? When we do something wrong, we offend others. This means that they are going to be less willing to work with us and to help us out. If we go to the effort of apologizing, then we can mend fences with these people and get things back to the way that they used to be.

One-on-one apologies are fairly simple to do. However, when we’ve done something that has offended a larger group of people, then that’s when our public speaking skills are going to have to come into play and the true importance of public speaking is going to have to save the day.

5 Ways To Not Say “I’m Sorry”

Just as there are many ways to correctly tell the world that you regret what you’ve done, there are just as many ways to do a bad job of it. No presentation tips are going to help you out here. The author Chris Witt has taken a look into how we can make up for the wrongs that we’ve done. Let’s take a look at 5 ways that you should not go about saying “I’m Sorry”.

  • Duck!: As kids we all did this – when we were caught doing something wrong we were quick to blame someone else: “He did it!” As speakers, we can’t do this. We need to “man up” and take responsibility for our own actions.

  • Hide: It’s not your fault if there were a set of circumstances that ended up forcing you to do or say what you did. This is another classic defense that won’t go over very well with your audience. Don’t even try it. Instead, accept responsibility no matter what the sequence of events was that led you to where you were.

  • Others Did It: This is an interesting defense that your audience might not pick up on for awhile, but they’ll see through it eventually. When you use the passive voice to offer your apology you deflect the blame on to others by talking about what happened in an onlooker way: “Facts were incorrectly evaluated and a bad decision was made”. You made the bad decision, tell everyone that you are sorry that you made it.

  • Time Is On Your Side: Every event has a timeline associated with it. This means that from the moment that the mistake is made going forward, things can happen or not. When you choose to make an apology is important. You may be tempted to wait as long as possible in the hopes that the whole thing will blow over. Don’t. The sooner that you apologize, the quicker the event will become defused.

  • Keep It All Inside: Making a mistake and then having to apologize is a big deal for all of us who are not emotionless serial killers. This means that while you are making your apology, there is a good chance that some of your emotions will come spilling out around the edges. This is a good thing – it shows that you are human. Don’t let your emotions obscure your message, but do let them show.

What All Of This Means For You

We all make mistakes. Even knowing this, we will all continue to make mistakes. What this means is that we need to become good at asking for forgiveness. The ability to say “I’m sorry” and to be believed is the key to starting to move beyond whatever we’ve done.

As easy as this may appear to be able to do, it turns out that it’s quite difficult to do it well. One of the benefits of public speaking is that we can apologize to a large group of people all at the same time. Speakers need to be careful to avoid making the 5 mistakes that we’ve discussed when offering an apology.

Learning to make a good apology may be something that none of us instinctively wants to do; however, the benefits can be substantial. When people believe that you mean what you are saying then you’ll be able to quickly move beyond the situation that you find yourself in. This is a skill that is well worth developing.

- Dr. Jim Anderson
Blue Elephant Consulting –
Your Source For Real World Public Speaking Skills™

Question For You: How soon after you realize that you’ve done something wrong do you think that you should offer an apology?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.
P.S.: Free subscriptions to The Accidental Communicator Newsletter are now available. Subscribe now: Click Here!
 
Note: What we talked about are advanced speaking skills. If you are just starting out I highly recommend joining Toastmasters in order to get the benefits of public speaking. Look for a Toastmasters club to join in your home town by visiting the web site www.Toastmasters.org. Toastmasters is dedicated to helping their members to understand the importance of public speaking by developing listening skills and getting presentation tips. Toastmasters is how I got started speaking and it can help you also!

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

As public speakers, we all know the importance of public speaking. The one tool that we all have to work with is our choice of what words we want to speak. Even more important than any presentation tips is the choice that we have in choosing a wide variety of both words and phrases that we can use in our next speech. It turns out that we can make good word choices that help us get our message across to our audience or we can make bad choices that cause our audience use their listening skills to tune us out. When we use a cliché, we’re doing a bit of both…

Tags: , , , , , , , ,
Posted in connecting with your audience | 2 Comments »

Public Speaking: How To Make The Teleprompter Your Best Friend

Tuesday, February 14th, 2012
Image Credit If you know how to use it, a teleprompter can be your best friend

If you know how to use it, a teleprompter can be your best friend

As public speakers, because we know the importance of public speaking, we try very hard to be as comfortable as we can be on a stage in front of an audience. If we try hard enough and get enough chances to speak to an audience (whom we hope have good listening skills), then we have an opportunity to get good at doing this. However, this can all fly out the door if we find ourselves in a TV studio someday staring at a teleprompter. What is this thing and how do we use it?

What Is A Teleprompter?

Before we spend any time talking about how to make the best use of a teleprompter, perhaps we should spend just a few moments talking about just exactly what a teleprompter is and what it is intended to do. It turns out that the answers to both of these questions are quite simple.

In its simplest form, a teleprompter is a tool that lets a speaker see the words that they should be saying in a way that allows them to read the words even while they keep eye contact with the video camera that is taping them. By maintaining eye contact with their audience, speakers can make a deeper connection even while being able to say all of the words that they intended to say.

Teleprompter design can range from the simple, a laptop or iPhone set next to the TV camera’s lens to sheets of tilted glass that are placed in front of the camera’s lens. No matter how they are created, the end result is the same – you’ll be able to see your written out speech scrolling by as you stare into the camera lens.

How To Make A Teleprompter Work For You

When speakers first encounter a teleprompter, there is a little burst of joy that runs through them. What they think is that they no longer have to practice or rehearse their speeches. Instead, they’ll just write them out, place them on the teleprompter and *poof* they will magically be able to deliver a great speech. It’s almost as though they’ve just been handed the ultimate set of presentation tips.

The bad news quickly settles in. It turns out that you can give a bad speech with the help of a teleprompter just as easily as you can without a teleprompter. It turns out that speakers almost have to practice more when they are using a teleprompter than when they are not.

If you don’t take the time to practice your speech before you deliver it using a teleprompter, then several things are going to happen. When you give your speech you want to look believable. This means that you are going to have to know the content of your speech cold. You want to appear to have memorized your speech and not appear to be just reading it to your audience.

The other challenge that speakers run into when they are using a teleprompter is that they change their pace of speaking. Because we all read slower than we speak, if you don’t know your speech material well then you are going to slow down and your audience is going to start to view you as being a methodical speaker who is not enjoyable to listen to.

What All Of This Means For You

The good news is that teleprompters can make speaking on TV easier to do. The bad news is that if you don’t know how to use a teleprompter, then you are going to end up looking foolish and you won’t be able to connect with your video audience. All of the benefits of public speaking will have flown out the door.

In order to use a teleprompter correctly, speakers still need to spend a great deal of time practicing their speech. Long before you find yourself standing in front of a teleprompter, you need to make sure that you’ve spent the time rehearsing your speech so that you have it down cold. Only then will you be ready to maximize the value that the teleprompter can deliver to you.

The good news is that once you’ve become comfortable with a teleprompter, you will be ready to shine the next time that you find yourself being videotaped. Adding this skill to your public speaking bag of tricks will allow you to become even more successful and to get your message out to more people.

- Dr. Jim Anderson
Blue Elephant Consulting –
Your Source For Real World Public Speaking Skills™

Question For You: Do you ever think that it would be wise to speak on TV without using a teleprompter?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.
P.S.: Free subscriptions to The Accidental Communicator Newsletter are now available. Subscribe now: Click Here!
 
Note: What we talked about are advanced speaking skills. If you are just starting out I highly recommend joining Toastmasters in order to get the benefits of public speaking. Look for a Toastmasters club to join in your home town by visiting the web site www.Toastmasters.org. Toastmasters is dedicated to helping their members to understand the importance of public speaking by developing listening skills and getting presentation tips. Toastmasters is how I got started speaking and it can help you also!

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

Oh, oh – now you’ve done it. Somehow, in some way, you screwed up. You made a mistake and did something (or in many cases you said something) that was wrong. What are you going to do now? The best thing to do would be to apologize and hope that your audience is using their listening skills. However, it turns out that this is just a bit more difficult than it seems…

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Posted in television | 3 Comments »

Is The Telephone Really A Stage For A Speaker?

Tuesday, February 7th, 2012
Image Credit
How Can You Make The Phone Work For You, Not Against You?

How Can You Make The Phone Work For You, Not Against You?

When we are on the stage giving a speech, even if this is not easy for us to do, at least we know what we need to do. We can learn how to keep the audience’s attention, we know how to communicate information effectively, and basically we understand the importance of public speaking. We also understand how to interpret all of the signals that the audience is sending our way. All of this knowledge may be contributing to why so many speakers do such a poor job of communicating with groups when a telephone is involved…

Why A Telephone Is A Scary Thing

So why do we speakers have such trouble when we have to participate in a teleconference? I think that it all stems from one simple thing: we don’t know what to do. We’re used to being the star of the show and having everyone stare at us and that’s awfully hard to do when you are on the other sides of a telephone. No presentation tips are going to help you here!

Got Notes?

The first thing that you can do to make your next teleconference go better is to learn to take notes. Look, you’re not standing up on a stage and so nobody’s know that you’ve got a pad of paper and a pencil on the table in front of your phone.

If you take the time to jot down some notes about what’s been said on the teleconference, then when it comes your time to speak, you’re going to sound like the smartest person in the room – even if you’re the only person in the room! You don’t have to take detailed notes. Just note down enough to trigger your memory when you glance at the paper and that should do the trick.

No Robots Allowed!

If there’s one thing that we all hate is when we have to listen to one of those “robot” answering machines when we call companies. What you need to realize is that since the other people on a teleconference can’t see you, the sound of your voice is all that they have to go off of. The last thing the world that you want to be doing is to be trying their listening skills!

This means is that you need to be careful to not talk in a monotone. The use of vocal variety (changing your voice’s pitch and rate) becomes very important when that’s the only way that you have for a teleconference audience to “see” you.

Let Your Telephone Audience “See” What You Mean

Although we don’t quite live in the era of Dick Tracy’s video conferencing wristwatch, that doesn’t mean that you can’t make visuals part of your next teleconference. The easiest way to go about doing this is to distribute your slides or other visuals before the call starts. Then while you are talking, you can reference your visuals and the audience on the line can follow along.

Know When To End The Show

One of the basic rules to giving a good speech also applies to hosting a successful teleconference: wrap it up on time. Nobody will think kindly of you if you run over the time that you scheduled for the call (in fact, they might just hang up); however, they’ll all love you if you can wrap things up a bit early and give them some of their precious time back.

Wrap It Up So That They Remember What You Said

You can make sure that the teleconference was worth everyone’s time by wrapping it up correctly. You do this by taking a moment at the end of the call to review what was covered and to make sure that everyone knows what the important points were. By doing this you’ll be assured that everyone leaves the call with the same view of what was discussed.

What All Of This Means For You

When you place a speaker on one end of a telephone and his or her audience on the other end, all of the rules that we’ve learned as speakers seem to go flying out the door. We need to learn how to do a better job.

It turns out one of the benefits of public speaking is that it’s not that hard to conduct an effective teleconference if you go about it in the correct manner. This means that you’re going to have to take notes so that you don’t get lost, you’re going to have to use as much vocal variety as you can in order to retain interest, and you’ll have to review what you’ve said before you wrap things up on time.

In the world of the 21st Century in which we find ourselves living, more and more often we’re going to have to communicate with groups of people using the telephone. What this means for us speakers is that we’re going to have to adjust how we talk. We can still be effective, but only if we are the ones who change in order to meet the needs of our audiences.

- Dr. Jim Anderson
Blue Elephant Consulting –
Your Source For Real World Public Speaking Skills™

Question For You: How long do you think that a teleconference should run – how long is too long?

Click here to get automatic updates when The Accidental Communicator Blog is updated.
P.S.: Free subscriptions to The Accidental Communicator Newsletter are now available. Subscribe now: Click Here!
 
Note: What we talked about are advanced speaking skills. If you are just starting out I highly recommend joining Toastmasters in order to get the benefits of public speaking. Look for a Toastmasters club to join in your home town by visiting the web site www.Toastmasters.org. Toastmasters is dedicated to helping their members to understand the importance of public speaking by developing listening skills and getting presentation tips. Toastmasters is how I got started speaking and it can help you also!

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

As public speakers, because we know the importance of public speaking, we try very hard to be as comfortable as we can be on a stage in front of an audience. If we try hard enough and get enough chances to speak to an audience (whom we hope have good listening skills), then we have an opportunity to get good at doing this. However, this can all fly out the door if we find ourselves in a TV studio someday staring at a teleprompter. What is this thing and how do we use it?

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

Dr. Jim Anderson To Speak At 16th Annual Pink Conference

Friday, February 3rd, 2012

Dr. Jim Anderson Will Speak At The 16th Annual Pink Conference

 

Dr. Jim Anderson has been asked to deliver two speeches at the 16th Annual Pink Conference. The role that Blue Elephant Consulting plays in the IT industry has been recognized as being a thought leader and the organizers of the Pink Conference have asked Dr. Anderson to share some of his insights with the conference attendees. Dr. Anderson will be delivering two speeches at the conference in Las Vegas on Monday, February 20th.

The first speech that Dr. Anderson will be giving will be giving is titled “The Secret To Knowing Where You Are Going“. In this speech Dr. Anderson will be discussing the Balanced Scorecard management technique and showing the audience how it can be applied to an IT department. Dr. Anderson’s goal will be to build a complete IT balanced scorecard during his presentation. He’ll also be showing how a single balanced scorecard can be used to monitor a department’s performance, communicate it’s strategy, and even ensure the proper execution of its strategy.

Dr. Anderson’s second speech is called “Secrets For Getting Them To Listen“. In this speech Dr. Anderson will be covering the common mistakes that IT professionals make when they are asked to deliver a presentation. It’s not that they don’t know the material, rather it’s how they create their presentation and how they deliver it. Dr. Anderson will address both of these issues by using his presentation to create a complete IT presentation the correct way. He’ll introduce and use the Blue Elephant Presentation System to create an effective presentation that the audience will be talking about long after the presentation is over.

You are invited to join Dr. Anderson and attend both of his presentations — all you have to do is sign up for the 16th Annual Pink Conference. Here’s the link and I hope to see you there!

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »