Talk to the Human™

Have you heard (or read) opinions about how competing, and even winning, a Toastmasters contest has no real value in “regular” speaking?

I have, and I find it very confusing. With the exception of some very specific types of speaking, such as debates, I can’t understand why people have trouble translating great contest speeches into great speaking in general.

In a previous post, I wrote about some lessons I learned from watching contest speeches, especially at the top level. In this entry, I’ll describe how those same lessons apply to “regular speaking” (if there is such a thing).

First was, Have a message. In contest speaking, I think this is the single most important aspect of a winning speech. This is such an obvious need for any presentation, including project reviews, performance discussions, and any training that I can’t imagine how you wouldn’t see the correlation. No matter when you talk, without a message you are just blabbing. Right?

Next was Tell your own compelling story. While much of our corporate-style speaking may seem to be devoid of storytelling, the fact is that it is still the best way to make your point stick. It may be true that your boss only wants the brief facts without anything “extra”, but the fact is this is still an invaluable skill to have. You should be ready to back up your point with a story in case the boss wants more detail.

Use humor appropriately. I’ve had a couple of rare bosses with no sense of humor, but in a majority of cases even the most stoic of bosses like a little humor thrown in. Appropriately for those circumstances does mean to use caution and keep it professional, but it doesn’t mean you can’t elicit an occational chuckle.

Finally was Set the stage with grand and normal gestures. In this case, you may stay with more conservative gestures, but again the watchword is appropriate. Yes, it would be rare to use the type of stage presence that the Champs have used to win those awards. But knowing and practicing the appropriate gestures for your topic, audience, and stage is still a skill that will make a positive difference in any presentation.

The next time someone tels you that contest speaking has no bearing in “real” speaking (be sure you use the air quotes in your response), remember these tips. You can most certainly apply those skills you learn while competing. They wouldn’t just apply to professional speaking, but to corporate, volunteer and most other types of speaking.

As I walked into the room, there we no people there. There was, however, a good size stage and about 300 chairs, silent in anticipation of a future audience. I decided to step up the stairs to the 12X24 foot platform, and ponder giving a presentation in front of an audience filling that room.

I thought about 2005 World Champ Lance Miller’s presentation the day before, and how his chairs were filled and even after they brought in more there were people standing anywhere they could. I had no presentation to give at that event, but as I stood in that empty room and gazed at those 300 seats, I imagined them filled with an audience waiting to hear a well-designed (and hopefully well delivered) presentation. Just one word came to my mind. No, that word wasn’t fear, paralysis or even whatamIdoinghere.

That word was responsibility. It’s funny how a bigger crowd, even an imaginary one, can change your perspective on things. I’m not saying that I don’t feel responsibility when speaking to a 20-person Toastmasters club, or a 50-person lunch and learn. But that room really crystallized the depth and meaning for me.

What hit me there on that stage, in that empty room with those unfilled chairs was that when you speak to Humans, you have to be ready to take responsibility.

Responsibility for knowing your audience. What do they need, what do they want, and what are their expectations?

Responsibility for your content. Is it accurate, is it specific enough, and is it credible? Most importantly, will it help?

Responsibility for your self. Have you prepared to be professional, are your handouts professional, and is your delivery professional?

This responsibility can feel like a very heavy weight if you aren’t ready. But when you are, it can be a wonderful gift. Because on the other side of this responsibility is another word: Impact.

By meeting this responsibility, you can have a tremendous impact on your audience and their lives. What is it you want them to think, do or feel after your presentation?

Another convention presenter, Rory Vaden, talks about self-discipline and how we should “Take the Stairs.” One visual is of a line forming to wait for an escalator going down when the stairs next to it go unused. I know there were people that looked at those escalators differently after hearing his presentation. That’s impact.

Next time you have to address an audience of any size, consider that responsibility you have and how you’ll use your skills and your message to make that impact on your audience. It’s your responsibility…

As I watched the International Speech Contest at the 2010 Toastmasters International Convention, I noticed a few things that, in my opinion, truly contributed to the best speaker being recognized as the World Champion.

First, without a doubt is have a message. This may be a no-brainer, but in two years of watching the finals and three years watching regional/semi-final contests I have seen some speakers miss this one all together. You may ask, how do they miss something so critical? Good question. It’s simple, they only think they have a message. You have to, have to, HAVE TO  be sure that the audience will walk away with your message, and better yet with it worded the way you meant it. See Craig Valentine’s work on Foundational Phrases – No Phrase, No Stage.

Tell your own, compelling story. It has to support the message, and in my experience the strongest messages are the ones learned from someone else, like a parent or sibling.  In David Henderson’s speech, The Aviator, his lesson “losing people is a part of loving people” came from a powerful discussion with his mother. His use of dialog was strong, and it helped us relive those moments with him.

Use humor appropriately. David’s speech had a very serious message. However, he was able to light up the room with parts of his story about how he and his friend would play together. As I remember it, they “flew over a bazillion missions together without any casualties.” In Robert Mackenzie’s speech, My Alter Ego, there were a number of well placed lines that fit right into the speech. A crowd favorite was, “By 30 I had said ‘no’ more times than Toyota said ‘recall’.” 

Set the stage with grand and normal gestures. David took us back to a time when he and his friend, at age 7, used to play aviator together. He did this twice by extending his arms and making airplane (and shooting) noises to simulate the event. Robert did this by showing us the size and place for his invisible alter-ego, and then taking us back to that spot on the stage when he needed to, including simulating a door to go inside and shut himself in.

Of course, giving a championship-quality speech is more than checking off a few boxes of “must-do’s”. But if you are missing any of these elements in your speech, don’t be shocked if your name doesn’t get called.

Another thing – be sure to practice (duh), but don’t overdo it on soliciting feedback. Use Ideas #1 and #2 in my advaced suggestion post, and get feedback each time you practice. Have someone you respect and trust write you a manual speech evaluation each time you practice, and ignore all the verbal minutia you get from the rest of the room. Of course, you’ll want to get some professional-quality coaching as well. World Champions Edge (affiliate link) is a great place to start.

Good luck, and don’t wait too long to get started. Next year will be here any minute…

http://www.speakerblogger.com/

I’ve been working with Arlen Busenitz on a new project, and we have taken it live this week. SpeakerBlogger.com is our new site to Help  individuals take their experience & passion and create a platform to help others and make a profit. 

Take a look now, and sign up to get our free e-book, 7 Steps to Turn Your Passion & Experience into Profit.

Check back as we’ll be putting 2-3 posts a week and going into more depth on the 7 steps. National experts will also be sharing their thoughts through guest articles.

I was out driving a bit today, and I saw three separate Car Wash fundraisers going on. Something that I immediately noticed was that I couldn’t tell where my money would be going.

All three that I saw just said “Car Wash”. IF they would have said “Boy Scouts” or “West Marching Band” I might have chosen one to donate to. Just a thought..

Have you actually heard how often people are using the word actually lately? Not just in regular life, but in the news and advertisements as well.

Here’s an idea, keep track of the number of times you actually say “actually” during the day. When you catch yourself, repeat the sentence without the extra superflous word and see if you really needed it.

If you are a Toastmaster, add the word to the Ah Counter report and see what you learn…

Are you stuck in the middle?

Once again, I went off and read a blog that made me think. This blog, called The Fluent Self is written by Havi Brooks, who has a really cool writing style. Beyond that, you may want to check out the page yourself because it might be a bit risky for me to try to describe her further (read her about page and you’ll see why).

Back to the blog entry itself.  Titled Exit the Middle, the discussion is (like all good points) a really good, brief story. This story is about a yoga class, but it was pretty easy to see some direct correlations to some examples for speakers.

Last week, a Toastmaster member asked why members would work on a second (or more) Competent Communicator (CC) award? What is the value to completing what is considered the basic manual?

In the example in Havi’s post, there is a yoga class that was taught in a way that was difficult for basic students, but not so tough for more seasoned people. At the end of the class, the newer students were sweating and so were the really advanced ones. Those in the middle were not only mostly sweat-free, but complaining about the lack of challenge to the class.

So why were the most advanced members sweating like newbie’s?

Newbie’s – Challenged by the relative difficulty of the class
Advanced – Challenged themselves to get the most from the class

And the middle? They were not challenged by the class itself, and not able and/or willing to challenge themselves.

That’s the answer to the public speaker question. Newer Toastmasters are challenged by improving their speaking skills with that first manual. Advanced members (sometimes DTMs, but not always) have found ways to use that manual to challenge themselves and continue to improve.

Those in the middle? Havi says that you are stuck in the middle for as long as you choose to be. You have to be the one that decides to get unstuck. Of course, it will take a little more than a decision, it will take work. That is true whether you’re stuck in yoga-middle, Toastmasters-middle, or any other middle in your life.

Maybe the question isn’t “are you stuck in the middle?” I think the question is this: in what part of your life are you stuck in the middle, and when are you going to decide to step out?

While I work on getting that on a T-shirt, read Havi’s post and think about how you can make that change. If you are in that middle, then you are at a point where the external challenge is no longer a challenge. Look at how you can challenge yourself. For ideas, look at how others challenge themselves. Example, when I wanted to challenge myself to be a better speaker, I started a blog (yeah, this one).

I hate to sound like an 80′s business book, but think outside the box.  You could go in a totally different direction, like yoga. And after you sweat, you can write a really great speech about getting out of the middle…

In Part one, you learned the first steps to creating an Icebreaker speech; the first speech you will give in your Toastmasters club. In Part two, we took our example message and worked on our opening remarks. Next, let’s put together the closing.

First, let’s look why the closing is important:
Remember, people remember how you start your presentation and how you finish. Not that your main points aren’t important, but the rule of primacy and the rule of recency are simply human nature. It’s important to be aware of that.

Second, some “don’t do’s” for the closing:
- Don’t finish with the words “Thank You”. More about thanking the audience here.
- Don’t finish with a Q&A (this really doesn’t apply for the first ten speeches anyway).
- Don’t finish with your third main point. If the green light comes on before you finish your third point, you want to abbreviate that point so you can deliver your conclusion.

What’s the goal?
- Tie your message together
- Leave your audience with the feeling that you’ve finished
- Make it memorable

How do you do that? For our example Icebreaker, we used thees three main points:
First Point: Where I grew up
Second Point: Where I work
Third Point: My family and hobbies

Option 1. Simply review the points.
“I want to thank you for inviting me into your club, and for giving me the time to introduce myself to you. You’ve learned a little about how I grew up in Las Vegas, how I currently work for Trump Enterprises, and how my hobbies include reading everything written by Stephen Covey and Alan Weiss. I’m sure you will agree with Dr. Covey when he says, ‘In the last analysis, what we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do.’”

Option 2. Tell a story.
Do you have a story that ties those three points together?
“When my Mother and I used to bake cookies, I would always tell her that I couldn’t wait to have my own pastry shop. Now I’m teaching my own daughter to make delectable deserts! I really appreciate how what I learned growing up helped shape who I am today. More importantly, improving my communication skills here with all of you will help shape who I am tomorrow, and help me better shape my daughter’s future as well.”

Tied together:
Where you grew up: Mom’s Kitchen (doesn’t always have to be a city name)
Where you work: Your own business
Family and hobbies: Cooking with your daughter

Option 3. Finish with a call to action.
This works if you have a message with your story. When you transition to your closing, you may want to ask a question about their relationship with a family member, and then challenge them to strengthen that relationship before they suffer a loss like yours, or something similar to that.

These are not the only options for closing a presentation, but they are some that will work well with your Icebreaker speech at a Toastmasters club, and can work well in other settings as well. The call to action (Option 3) is especially geared toward inspirational and sales presentations.

Coming in the next part, putting together the 3 main points in the body of your presentation.

<Editors note: Here is another excellent related blog entry from Craig Valentine http://www.craigvalentine.com/3-keys-to-closing-your-speech-with-impact/>

In Part one, you learned the first steps to creating an Icebreaker speech; the first speech you will give in your Toastmasters club.

For this lesson, we’ll take our example message and work on our opening remarks. You may wonder how we can craft these without determining our three main points, right?

Good call. Let’s draft out those three points first. In part four (after developing the closing in part three) we will deal with developing those three points further. But for now we can use a farily easy technique to draft out these points.

For the example message, lets look at a basic chronological Icebreaker speech.
First Point: Where I grew up
Second Point: Where I work
Third Point: My family and hobbies

For the opening, we want to:
1. Avoid pointless pleasantries
2. Make our promise
3. Provide a road-map

What are pointless pleasantries? Things like “glad to be here”, “nice weather”, “Mr. toastmaster”, or anything that doesn’t add to the value of your conversation with the audience. Better to open with a powerful question, a story or a relevant quote.

What about the promise? “In the next five minutes you are going to learn a bit more about me and what brought me to this Toastmasters club”

And the road-map? This is just a way to let them know what those three main points are.

“Dr. Stephen Covey says the seventh habit of highly effective people is to ‘Sharpen the Saw.’ In the next 5 minutes you are going to hear a bit about my life, and what brought me here to sharpen my saw with you. First, you’ll learn about where I was raised, then what I do for XYZ company here in Wichita. Finally you’ll hear about what I like to do with my off-work time and why I’ve added Toastmasters to my life.”

Then you’ll finish the opening with a transition to first main point:

“Of course, being a Toastmaster isn’t what I thought I would be doing when I grew up. In fact, would you believe in high school I wanted to be an Architect? Here’s what really happened…”

That is a simple opeing for the Icebreaker speech. Next would be that first point about growing up. We’ll discuss that more later in the week, along with the other main points.

Tomorrow, we’ll work on the closing statement. This is where you want your best story or other material. You may look to tie it to the opening, such as “I may not have become an Architect, but now I …”

The rest of the closing tomorrow…

<Editors note: Here is an excellent (and recent) related blog entry from Craig Valentine. http://www.craigvalentine.com/open-your-speech-and-open-their-minds/>

I read another great post today on Men with Pens. This post, titled How to find your writing voice leads with the same picture as this post (yes, I stole it). My point: when you want to find your speaking voice, you may want to start by examining your writing voice.

In fact, the main reason I read writing blogs like Men with Pens is to improve my speaking. After all, how can I write great (or even decent) speeches if…I…can’t…write???

Just a thought…

<Note: Part Two of the Icebreaker post is being pushed to tomorrow>