Hollywood Lessons: Make your Speech Opening Strong
You get one chance to make first impression. This hold true for speakers – even when presenting to an audience consisting of colleagues or clients you have known for a long time… When starting any speech or presentation you need to make a positive impression – one that forces each audience member to sit up and think about the topic you are presenting.
Mirror, Mirror – How to practise a speech
“How can I practice my presentation?” is a question I frequently hear from clients wanting to perfect their pitch between coaching sessions. Usually its followed by “Should I practice in front of a mirror?” There are many reasons why I don’t encourage clients to waste their time delivering a speech in front of a…
Are you being understood?
I recently read an article on the BBC website describing some of the greatest mistranslations. There are some hilarious examples of phrases uttered in one language becoming mangled with a completely different meaning after an interpreter has translated them. One phrase has President Jimmy Carter saying “I left the United States this morning” being translated…
How to avoid a Sherlock moment – Investigate your language
I have sympathy for Benedict Cumberbatch and the situation he finds himself in at the moment. It appears to be a circumstance where one, poorly chosen, word has landed him in hot water. And, the positive message he was trying to communicate has been lost in a flurry of condemnation for his choice of a single word.
Identifying your Audience
The key to successfully communicating a message to an audience is to understand who the audience is. Without knowing who you are presenting to and what they are interested in you have little chance of success. This short entry outlines the Who, Why and Whats you need to know to effectively prepare your next presentation.
Learn Public Speaking with these 4 lessons from Twitter
Want to know how Twitter can help you improve your Public Speaking Skills? Check out this video to find out more… Add your comments below. We love to hear your feedbaack.
How can leaders better inspire an audience
For any leader, public speaking is about the art of inspiration. The higher you climb up the career ladder the greater your ability to move and inspire groups of people needs to be. Yet too many visionaries of business, government, and technology fail to embody THE key leadership skill: selling their vision while moving an…
Five Tips to reduce your Fear of Public Speaking
It is often quoted that people fear speaking in public more than they fear death…. While there’s an obvious exaggeration in the quote, there is also some truth to it. Not many people actually ENJOY the act of delivering a speech in public. If you do feel uncomfortable speaking in public you can reduce your…
Structures used by the great Communicators
For your audience to effectively understand your message you need to ensure that your speech is structured in such a way that your audience can digest what you are saying. In the video below, Nancy Duarte, the author of Slide:ology describes the speech structures utilised by the worlds best communicators. Enjoy! How will you use…
The Power of One… Word
Words hurt, heal, motivate, and aggravate. They are powerful. They control emotions and can even control a person physically. It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand words… But how accurate is that? I believe a well-chosen word in a speech can be worth a thousand pictures. Your words are power.…