What They Don't Tell You About Public Speaking

For those that do much public speaking there's an interesting article on rhetoric here http://www.european-rhetoric.com/rhetoric-101/modes-persuasi...

In a nutshell For communicating a message Pathos(emotive "Be Excited") is more important then logos(the words). Ethos(Ethics, character) is more important then Pathos.

Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken word there are three kinds. The first kind depends on the personal character of the speaker; the second on putting the audience into a certain frame of mind; the third on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of the speech itself. Persuasion is achieved by the speaker’s personal character when the speech is so spoken as to make us think him credible. -Aristotle 1356a 2,3

It's tougher to be a solid public speaker than it looks. I've given talks to big rooms, gyms and moderately sized conference rooms. I rarely get nervous but occasionally it hits us all. I do have some notes on watching great speakers in person and learning from my own mistakes.

1. Do NOT ask for a 'show of hands' from the audience. Even some practiced speakers do this. They think that it engages the audience, but it is a crutch, an attempt to turn the focus away from the speaker onto the audience. It's always clumsy and delays the audience from hearing the content. Some speakers claim that they want to know more about the audience before they proceed. We all know that's not true. Are you really going to completely modify your speech, dropping that five minutes of solid material just because not enough hands were raised when you asked about it? Of course not.

2. Note cards are not 'bad'. I had to learn this one the hard way. If you are professional orator, you will eventually get to the point where you can pontificate the same speech verbatim without a single note. But for the rest of us, a note card of bullet-point topics can keep us on track. Just don't have a ream of pages and stare down at them, reading monotonously without looking up.

3. Everyone hits that middle 'death valley' at some point. It's the point of a talk where you are very aware of your own voice, and you aren't getting any perceived feedback from the audience. This is the hard slog where you have to know that while time has slowed to a crawl for you, it hasn't changed for the audience. Remember how you feel when the situation is reversed - how often have you ever seen a speaker so bad that you actually noticed it and remembered it? Not often, if ever. Boring speakers are forgotten - bad speakers are ignored - great speakers MIGHT be remembered. So just keep going, and the worst that could happen is that you are boring, which no one will remember anyway.

+1 on the 'death valley.'

I think it's when you realize that this is the piece of the talk that is more interesting to the audience than myself. However, in my head, the doubting self-talk of "I'm boring everyone!" comes up.

The beginning is fun - that's the point you're trying to hook the audience. The end is fun - that's the point you're trying to give the audience a final take away. That middle point? That's what they've come for, even though it's the most boring part of the speech.

To that end, try to build in little peaks to your presentations. If you give yourself little "endings" and "beginnings" to work toward, it breaks things up into more managable chunks for your audience, helping their attention, but it also helps you avoid the self-talk and worry and "I hate the sound of my voice"-ness.

Totally off-topic but: I wish you'd comment more often here.

I'm with 'gruseom on that!