public speaking – Page 4

Public speaking

How to become a better speaker

Each difficult moment has the potential to open my eyes and open my heart

We learn from our mistakes.

It's been a hard lesson to learn, but I'm learning.

Mistakes are not failures.

Difficulties are not the end.

A speech that challenges in some way is not a reason to give up speaking.

Every time there is a difficulty, it is not the end but a sign post.

It is an indicator that something needs to be altered to avoid that difficulty next time, and therefore become a better speaker.

Are you nervous, perhaps to the point of not speaking at all? Then look at those nerves and see how they may be changed.

Did you not get the results you hoped for?

Did you have a difficulty with the equipment?

Did you have difficulty with the audience response?

There are a myriad of issues we face when we speak, but each one is a sign post to improvement, a trigger to open our eyes to how we can be better and to open our hearts so that we understand and forgive ourselves and better serve our audiences.

[Note to self - and you if you happen to be in the vicinity] Next time you find me beating myself up over some error/mistake/failure, please will you just remind me of the wonderful improvements that lie ahead for me. Thank you!

[Quotation about public speaking] The success of your presentation depends on more than your knowledge

Public speaking

Speaking and branding lessons from a sandwich board

I am writing this after a scrumptious dinner in a town in the north of our state called Townsville. I am looking out over moon-sparkled water and the dark mass of almost-tropical islands close off-shore ...

... a holiday-inspired article which nevertheless applies to all of us who speak and to those of us, also, who work on branding our businesses.

And I was inspired, today as we wandered down the main street of the town full of historical buildings and more modern businesses.

There it was. This sandwich board.

It caught my eye and then my imagination.

I had to go back and look again.

And what made it do that?

There are three reasons and they are all techniques we can use in our speaking and our branding to have people caught, intrigued and going back for another look (or listen).

1. She used Alliteration

All those Ps!

It's a beautiful rhetorical and literary device, alliteration, and it creates an effect called foregrounding

It creates a little hitch in the flow of attention, a little distraction. People might not even be aware that you used it, but they will be drawn to the words and their meaning. with a slight sense of intrigue.

If we count Pre-Push as one word, there is also anther device called the Rule of Three operating here. Create a list of three or a group of three and we have the same effect - that slight sense of interruption and something special.

2. She used Humour

(I'm using the word "she" because I met the owner of the establishment as I was taking a photo. She had a beautiful smile and very graciously and humbly accepted my exclamations about her marketing and my explanation that I wanted to use her work to share with you.)

I have never seen "Pre-push" used before.

Have you?

And even if you have, you have to admit it has flair.

It is a classic humour device - using the unexpected.

It made me smile and if we can make our audiences smile, we have them a little more open to feeling that we are likeable, that they can trust and believe our message.

3. She used an image

It's a subtle reinforcement, this image, of just what is meant by "Pre-push", and has a strong sense of the feminine, aimed, no doubt, at the target client, or perhaps her significant others.

We use images, too, to support our points when we speak. We don't need them to be distracting from our message, nor do we want them to be offensive.

(... and yes I have blocked out one of the words in the promotion in case you were offended or distracted by it!!)

So if you are in Townsville. Queensland, Australia and in need of some pampering, pre-push, I recommend you check out Bellanova.

And if you are in front of an audience, either presenting or online, I recommend you check out the lessons from her sandwich board, They are simple, subtle and powerful!!

Awards, public speaking

[Quick Public Speaking tip] Accepting an award? Shift the spotlight

It's very gratifying to be given an award ... or to win, to be given first prize.

The spotlight is on you - your achievements - your win - your prize - your award.

Shift that spotlight.

Humility is called for here, not crowing.

Obvious, isn't it?

You can thank the other team or the losers. Thank your parents, your friends, your dog, your kindergarten teacher.

Where is the spotlight?

On you, still. On you, surrounded by all your helpers to whom you are grateful, certainly.

Shift that spotlight.

Turn it right around and on to the presenter and the organisation or group or business that is presenting.

Be grateful to them. Laud them. Highlight their value and excellence. Establish your sense of belonging to them, but highlight them.

You have successfully established humility without any falseness, or compromising of your value.

You have created a valuable sense of community.

And you have made them feel good.

audience in public speaking, public speaking

[Public Speaking Quotation] The success of your presentation

"The success of your presentation will be judged not by the knowledge you send but by what the listener receives."
-- Lilly Walters

Public speaking

One of the best pieces of advice any speaking coach can give …

One of the best pieces of advice any speaking coach can give is to create a message for your speech.

One central message.

Do not speak until you have one central message - one sentence - make it 140 characters if you're a tweep - but one sentence. Limit it to ten words if you want to really succeed.

If you were to condense your speech into one sentence what would that sentence be?

It forces us to really focus on our audiences.

Who are they? What do they really want? What is it that we really want to say to them? What is it that we really NEED to say to them?

Creating that one sentence forces us to simplify our speech structure. If there is only one message, then every single section, sentence and word needs to support that sentence. What doesn't work is jettisoned. How much easier does that make your choice of material and avoiding the temptation to ramble?!!

And when there is one single message in our presentation, then obviously there can only be one next step for the audience to take. If we give them too many options, they end up confused and take none. If there is just one next step for them, we are forced to present that in the most powerful, persuasive passionate way we can.

The problem, of course is that we would prefer to speak about a topic . "My passion is about TOPIC A," we think. "I'll speak about that - share my passion, get the audience enthused and inspired." If there is no message, though, we are left with the challenges of how to choose content, how to maintain the enthusiasm and inspiration, and, most importantly, no specific outcome for the audience, (or ourselves).

For many of us, too, there is the old belief that public speaking is all about showing just how knowledgeable we are - bombard the audience with heaps of important information and we have created an image of ourselves as .... worth knowing, worth hiring, worth whatever it is that we are desiring from this experience. And what does the audience get from the experience? Overload, confusion, maybe even boredom.

What do they remember? Possibly they remember one or two points - a story, perhaps or a word picture. And all that information was wasted. Unless we are incredibly good at creating a particular experience with the presentation, then it was wasted.

Having one single message, one single desired outcome, one single focus, would have made the limiting of the information overload so much easier.

And the process of creating this message?

I said at the beginning that this was one of the best pieces of advice that a speaking coach can give.

It's true.

It is not true, however, that the message must be formulated first.

Much as I would like to teach a single process to building a speech, it just doesn't work that way - well certainly not for me.

There is research about the topic, usually. There is a process of researching the audience. There is the collection and refinement of possible content. There are the thought processes that winnow and define the outcome required. They all respond to each other, careening and intertwining and sparking off each other. And out of all of those processes, finally comes a message.

Start with the topic by all means. But let the message develop.

It's a difficult process, but one of the most rewarding!

powerpoint, Public speaking, videos

Create meaning for your audience – be inspired by "The Beauty of Data Visualisation"

Images are becoming the new language of content communication.

As David McCandless says ... "We are being blasted every day, all of us are being blasted by information design. It's being poured into our eyes by the web and we're all visualisers now, we're all demanding a visual aspect to our information and there's something magical about visual information."

The fact that "a picture paints a thousand words" is now mainstream.

As speakers, we use them in our social media. We use them in our blogs. We use them in our presentations.

"By visualizing information, we turn it into a landscape that you can explore with your eyes, a sort of information map. And when you’re lost in information, an information map is kind of useful." says David McCandless.

If you've watched this TED talk than you will know ... if not, then watch right now, and know ... that David McCandless inspires with his presentation style, and his amazing ways of designing infographics.

Be reminded of, and inspired by, the possibilities for you as a presenter, and renew your enthusiasm for creating graphics that will allow your audiences, the visitors to your websites and your social media peeps to understand that you have the power to create meaning for them.

Quotations, Quotes - public speaking

[Quotation about public speaking] Public speaking will have its place

"As long as there are human rights to be defended; as long as there are great interests to be guarded; as long as the welfare of nations is a matter for discussion so long will public speaking have it place." ~ William Jennings Bryan

Public Speaking has its place

In my current obsession with storytelling, I have discovered a Hopi Proverb which says the "Those who tell the stories rule the world."

Leaders everywhere are those who give their followers something to believe in, a narrative that explains the present and paints a future.

And leaders are not just those in government or religion.

They lead in business, they lead in our institutions, they lead in our families.

We all have the capacity to be a leader at some time.

I am only thankful that the skills of public speaking are there to give us the power to lead and to create a world with values that we can uphold.

Public speaking, public speaking impact, speech writing, speeches

In public speaking …. Is bigger really better?

It's an age-old argument ... that bigger is better.

And without getting into too much anatomical detail or economic theory, sometimes it is.

Does that mean more is better too?

Well when it comes to speaking, the belief that more is better has been many a speaker's downfall ... including my own!

For me, I think it comes from the old school idea that more information means a higher mark, and possibly the old-school culture of an information age where information was king and prized above rubies.

It also comes, I think, from a need to come from a place of power as a speaker - a place of asserting authority on a subject, of being seen as the expert.

There's an old speaking proverb that says "When you squeeze your information in, you squeeze your audience out."

In order to create power for ourselves, we inadvertently take away power from the audience.

Some of the best speaking engagements I have had, have been where I was able to ask the audience questions - and get answers. Sometimes the groups were small enough to have an actual conversation, sometimes there were large so that I had to have show of hands or some other type of response. But I sensed the feeling of validation in the people who responded and in those around them. And we learnt from each other, sometimes far more than they simply would have learned from me.

There is value in giving power to our audiences.

There is value in not squeezing them out with an overload of information, too.

We want to be remembered. What is it that we want to be remembered for?

We want an outcome, a next step, for our audiences to take. What is that one step?

How many things do you remember from the last presentation you attended? One? Maybe three?

How many next steps can we realistically expect an audience to take when we finish speaking, or in the days, weeks, months afterwards? One? Any more than one?

So there is value then, in giving only the information that will contribute to that single powerful memory or that single next step. Give too much information , more than anyone could be expected to remember, or act upon, and we give nothing more than confusion, a garbled message. The result - forgettable and ineffective.

In this age driven by quick visuals and 140-character messages, there is enormous power is presenting a very focused, very memorable single message or two. You will be invited back, and/or you will have built a bridge to further communication and then can share more.

We can still be seen to be giving valuable loads of information, but remember at the same time that one single focus, that one memorable message.

Can you, as Carmine Gallo has challenged his students, write your message in 140 characters?

Bigger is not always better.

More is not always better.

And for speakers, less is definitely more.

Public speaking

Just for fun – Dressing for speaking success? For men only

Cleaning out my inbox I discovered this graphic in an email from the beginning of last year.

Do you live in the UK or US?

Does this ring true? ...

and ...

does it matter?

Your opinion in the comments may just mean the difference between success and failure for an international speaker!!

This infographic is supplied by T. M. Lewin

Tag Archive for: public speaking