It’s Not About You

A speech is not your article you read aloud. Your article or book has your name on the cover. It’s all about you and the reader knows it. They spent money to buy it with your name on the cover. The reader expects it to be all about you. They can stop reading it whenever they want. They can skip to the end; they can reread some parts and skip others. A speech is a live event in real time. No rewind button. Just you and the listeners sharing an experience–intimate and participatory.

With a book, the reader expects to do the work of relating your content to their lives. In your writing, they find the solutions to their needs, situations, problems. But when you are the speaker, they expect you to do the work. You need to make the connections.

So the good speaker opens with a need, problem or situation of the listener. In the first two sentences, the speaker reassures the listener: “I got you.” The listener– delighted– smiles or nods or gives some tiny feedback clue that says, “I got that you got me.” The speaker responds, “I got that you got that I got you.” It’s almost a conversation with tiny smiles and head nods. It’s certainly a real-time connection, unlike any between reader and book, or reader and blog or podcast.

The speaker responds. And not just responds. The listener demands you draw pictures with your words, not just spout dry concepts. Here’s an example: “Positive reinforcement maintains good performance.” How boring. Draw a picture. Your listener wants a movie. Try this: “When you take notice of the person working for you doing something good, and you say ‘good job,’ that person will sit up a bit straighter; they will feel good about working for you.”

Boring speakers spout concepts and cliches. Good speakers make it real; they give the listener a movie–about the listener.

Want to know how to do that? Please schedule a 30-minute complimentary clarity call with me. You get value and we discover if we are a match to work together.