Shawn Achor is worth watching as a way to help your speaking skills

Here’s a good role model for your speaking. He’s natural, conversational, funny and to the point. Watching others do a good job can help improve your speaking. TED offers many opportunities to watch speakers with something to say. Of course, some a better than others, but in addition to content, you can learn a lot from their delivery.

Don’t copy other speakers

Watch other speakers. Learn from them. But don’t imitate. It’s better to be yourself with some lumps and bumps than to try to copy someone else.

There’s lots to learn if you can look at others objectively. Do you feel connected to the speaker or not? Either way, figure out what’s making you feel that way. Does it feel as though they’re talking  right to you or entertaining themselves? Or do they seem mostly occupied with trying to get it right thereby focusing on themselves?

Does their movement mesh with the message–feet, arms, body? Natural, effortless, appropriate–or not.

Do they speak conversationally or sound scripted? Do they use examples that you can relate to or do they just give you the facts and make you connect all the dots?

Usually, speakers who are more interested in making sure you get the message than in how they come across, voice, movement, examples, will be pretty good and you’ll feel connected.

So, analyze. Don’t copy. Connection is king.

Improve your speaking by watching the candidates

We’re in that season again to learn the candidates political views as well things in their delivery that work and don’t work

I caught snippets of a few of the possible GOP Presidential candidates speaking at a meeting last week. Two things that didn’t work jumped out at me. Ralph Reed was doing a fine job of making his point until his last words. He lost the extra bump you can get by staying focused on your last words after you’ve delivered them. It’s like not sticking the landing after your gymnastics performance. He stopped focusing as soon as the words were delivered.

Michele Bachmann needs to stop waving her index fingers around. Less wrist movement, all fingers rather than just the one–looking out of control.

These aren’t hard to fix. Be sure you avoid them in your speaking.

Myth #3 “Walking around is powerful. (Standing still is boring.)”

Movement doesn’t automatically equate with interesting. I’ve heard people say how important movement is as they’re pacing, tapping and jiggling. Yes, it’s movement. No, it’s not interesting.

Movement is good. Purposeful movement. But standing still can be powerful in the right situation. The question isn’t, “Is it okay to move?” but, “Can you stand still, maintain eye coantact and feel poised? This isn’t something you can practice while you’re speaking; you’d just be focused on yourself. But you can practice it while you’re going about your life.

Standing still and doing it well and effectively requires inner quiet and awareness of what your body is doing–without focusing on it. When you can do that, all movements (feet, arms, body, face) will be more effective. And so will you.

 

Myth #10 If you wear the wrong clothes, you’ve lost before you start

Indeed, it’s good to wear the right clothes–the ones that make you most invisible. (Invisible: the audience is focused on what you’re saying and not focusing on you. It’s a good thing.)

Wear clothes that fit in with what everyone else is wearing and then, just a tad spiffier.

But what if you get it wrong? I’d hate to think you’d have to leave without presenting your point to your audience or miss an opportunity to help your audience just because you were given the wrong information or you’d slipped up somehow.

A marketing manager at The Anchorage Daily News showed up at work on casual Friday dressed, well, casually, in a moose sweatshirt, jeans and tennies. Turns out she had a community meeting to attend that she’d forgotten. No time to go home and change, so, knowing she had no part in the program thought she’d just try to blend in to the crowd.

BUT. A committee member asked her if, as president of the organization, she’d say a few words about the importance of this new facility to the community. As she scanned the room full of dignitaries (mayor, state senator, chief of police)–all in suits, and a TV camera, she decided if you’re going to give a speech wearing a moose sweat shirt it better be darned good.

She thought about what we’d covered in class, came up with 3 main points and a conclusion, focused on sharing her message and sat down. And it worked. (Please note that she spent no time chastising herself or worrying about what people were going to think. Both of which would have kept her from focusing on how to solve the problem.)

Sure, she might have looked at the meeting announcement more closely, but wearing the wrong clothes didn’t keep her from sharing her message. Make sure you don’t let it stop you, either. It’s your message that’s important.