public speaking, part 4

Instant Speaking Success, by Paul Evans

There is a lot of information out there on public speaking so I wasn't initially sure about getting

Instant Speaking Success

But then looking at the content of his website he does raise some useful points under the warning section:

"DO NOT Buy Any Book or Course on Public Speaking Unless it Meets the Following Criteria...

ONE: It is written by a true professional speaker. Too many courses and books are from theorists who write about speaking, but don't actually speak. You want a practitioner who speaks to thousands each year on subjects more than just public speaking. I am STILL speaking to thousands each and every year.

TWO: Shows you step by step how to develop, design, and deliver YOUR message. Don't be conned by someone who wants to "sell you a fish," without teaching you how to catch them for yourself.

THREE: Explains why certain speaking techniques work, not just that they work. Knowing why helps you understand the reason behind a practice. Without "why" you'll never reach your full speaking potential.

FOUR: You can actually talk with the author or developer. Unreachable people have no accountability for their product".

Now in terms of whether he is actually a professional speaker unless you've seen him you have to take him at his word. And after reading the information packed guide I sure do. But don't take my word for it check out his blog:

Paul Evans’ Blog

He delivers exactly what he says he's going to deliver: a step-by-step process to creating a great speech. Now I have to confess to only reading the first few chapters. So how do I know that although the first few chapters are great the rest are lousy? Because one of the bonus books is called "Fast Talker". This is essentially a condensed version of the main book and takes you through a sep-by-step process of creating a public speaking speech in an hour!

Obviously creating a speech this way is not ideal. You should spend as much time research writing, rehearsing and re-writing as much as you can. But I have to confess to being in a situation where I've needed to pull a speech out the bag in an hour. Yes, I did end up referring to notes on cards, but considering it was for one of my local Toastmasters clubs it didn't really matter so much. That is a place where you can learn and experiment.

So, if the information contained in the "Fast Talker" e-book is anything to go by then I feel that Instant Speaking Success will be pretty damned good by the time I've finished with it.

I've spent a lot of time temping in various offices over the last few years and at the time I didn't realise that I was subcnsciously training myself up to be comfortable in the public and private sector so I can in fact go in as a professional speaker to organisations similar to the ones I've worked for.

And from my observations, one of which I spoke about in an earlier post, if they are anything to go by then Instant Speaking Success should be mandatory to every organisation. Just because a person works at a certain level and and has "x" amount of years experience it does not automatically make them a good public speaker. But attending a Toastmasters club at a minimum or getting Paul Evans' e-book may just help imrpove their public speaking skills and yours.

Public Speaking, part 3

I just want to include this from Awaken the Giant Within by self-help guru Tony Robbins:

"People in my seminars often ask me, "How long do you think it will take for me to really master this particular skill?" And my immediate response is, "How long do you want it to take?"

If you take action ten times a day (and have the proportionate "learning experiences") while other people act on a new skill once a month, you'll have ten months of experience in a day, you will soon master the skill, and will, ironically, probably be considered "talented and lucky."

I became an excellent public speaker because, rather than once a week, I booked myself to speak three times a day to anyone who would listen.

While others in my organization had forty-eight speaking engagements a year, I would have a similar number within two weeks. Within a month, I'd have two years of experience. And within a year, I'd have a decade's worth of growth.

My associates talked about how "lucky" I was to have been born with such an "innate" talent. I tried to tell them what I'm telling you now: mastery takes as long as you want it to take".

Certainly something worth bearing in mind if you want to rapidly improve as a speaker.

Public Speaking, part 2

Public Speaking

Yes, there's those words again "public speaking". You might be like me when I used to hear those words and think: "what on earth is public speaking?" You see, my background is as an actor and a comedian; so technically I do public speaking already.

So I decided to do a little bit of investigation, don't ya just love the web?

Basically public speaking is not necessarily talking to the general public. It covers delivering speeches or presentations in business meetings, speeches at weddings or funerals as well as inspirational and motivational speeches.

Ah, so now we're getting somewhere.

In my mind public speaking can sit nicely alongside stand-up comedy. Now, I say that not wanting to put anybody off public speaking because they think they have to be funny. Because they don't. What I mean is that fundamentally stand-up involves you standing before an audience as yourself and speaking. The difference with public speaking is that you're not required to be funny. If you are then that's an added bonus. But you don't have to get the same amount of laughs as a comedian does.

A good place to start your public speaking career, or to get practise for your job, is to go along to a Toastmasters public speaking club. Toastmasters was established in the U.S. and has been around since 1924. It's now an international organisation.

There are two things that you can do. The first is to find as many Toastmasters clubs near you go along and participate in the Table Topics part of the evening. This entails a more experienced member coming up with a topic which fellow members and guests can be called upon to talk off-the-cuff for up to a minute-and-a-half.

Unlike a comedy club, you will get constructive and supportive feedback as well as suggestions for improvement from fellow members. This is very useful if you have a one off speech or a couple of speeches that you know that you have to give. By doing this you gain valuable stage time in front of a friendly crowd, which allows you to develop your confidence and delivery.

The second thing you could do is if you find that you enjoy is to become a member. They have a manual that assigns ten speeches which you can usually complete over the course of a year or so, because obviously there are other members wanting to do speeches and you should probably leave about a month or so between each speech you write.

Each assignment focuses on different skills such as structure, vocal variety and use of gestures. Once you complete your first 10 speeches you gain a “Competent Communicator” (CC) award which is an internationally recognised achievement. You also have the option to become a “Competent Leader” (CL) at the same time by undertaking a different series of assignments.

If you achieve CC status you have the option to progress further with a series of Advanced Manuals some of which deal with Speeches By Management, Technical Presentations and Special Occasion Speeches.

It is worth noting that you can only take part in speeches and earn your CC award if you become a member. Not only that but they also have various competitions which you can participate in such as a Humorous Speech contest (useful for our needs), a Table Topics Contest and an International Contest.

There are also a number of well-known Toastmasters that include actor and comedian Tim Allen, best-selling author Napoleon Hill and former U.S. astronaut Jim Lovell. For more information about Toastmasters use the following link to their website, which also helps you locate the club nearest to you: Toastmasters

More on Public Speaking in another post...

Public Speaking

Public Speaking… Badly

I was in a temporary office job and they had arranged for an external speaker to attend. This can invariably be a risky affair because as a temp not only do I rarely have a clue as to the subject matter, but I also have to sit through speakers of varying quality. Over the years in various jobs like this I have suffered a fair few people who can't do public speaking. And this time was no exception. I have to say that he was probably one of the worst speaker I’ve seen.

Even though some of the subject matter went over my head, my fellow colleagues told me that I wasn’t alone in thinking him bad.

Firstly, he had his “notes” on his laptop and kept leaning into it to read off the screen. They weren’t even notes for him they were points projected onto the screen behind him.

His hesitations would’ve put Eddie Izzard to shame and then when he spoke he swallowed his words, rambled and digressed. Someone obviously told him that all he needed to do was speak naturally because he certainly did that and was dull as hell.

He didn’t even pause correctly. He was halfway through a sentence drank some water and then went back of the sentence he’d already begun. If you’re going to drink water, either because you need it or because it’s a timed pause, then try to at least do it before or after a sentence, unless it helps with a punchline. But then there’s a danger of talking into the glass, which thankfully he didn’t do.

Even though you may want to speak naturally you still have to make points that need to be reiterated. You don’t just tell people everything you know about a subject and keep going until you cover the items on the screen.

For me a public speaking speech should sound natural, you should capture your own speaking rhythm. But this should be refined and edited to cut the useless words, right? You know what I mean?

If it’s appropriate for the speech then try to lace it with humour. Or if it’s not you could be amusing about yourself in your intro and then segue into the speech proper. And this is probably going to sound like I’m preaching to the converted but it might also be worth writing the speech down and learning it until it sounds natural, because it was clear to me that this guy hadn’t.

The scary thing is he was a Chief Executive of the company he represented and so everything I’m talking about here should be basic stuff for someone of his level. But it is amazing how often I've suffered through similar speeches which are delivered by people who are more than competent at their job, but lousy at conveying an important message.

I know that many of the people that they are speaking to know the subject really well, so they can essentially chat about a topic. But there are always going to be people like me taking the minutes, or others in different scenarios, who are not going to be able to follow the speech. Generally because the public speaker in question contradicts, digresses and doesn't speak loudly enough - to outline a few problem areas. In my experience, the amount of public speakers I've seen who can deliver a clear and concise speech, who work in either the public or private sector, I can count on the fingers of one hand.

Which is, frankly, absurd. This stuff should be prerequisite training. If it's not allowable by budget constraints then people should investigate and research what they need to do in order to improve in this area. But unfortunately, there aren't that many people around with either the courage or the knowledge to be able to tell them.

Public Speaking

Public Speaking

Welcome to my public speaking blog. Here you will learn about how public speaking works in "performance" and also how to write for public speeches.