In public speaking circles a battle is raging that rivals the Yankees vs the Red Sox, the Hatfields vs the McCoys, and the Patriots vs the world.
It’s between the anti-memorizers ...and the practice-makes-perfect people. Polar opposite strategies, so who’s right?
293 words.
The slide shown below, used during the keynote address at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, consists of 293 words.
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At their core, effective slides must augment the presenter’s message, not introduce a distraction.
Read MoreThe New Year is a time of optimism. Of anticipation. Of hope. And the New Year contains this wellspring of expectation because it marks the beginning. The beginning of something unknown.
The very first moments of a speech share much with the New Year, and like the turning of the calendar, the first thing an audience experiences sets an all-important tone.
Read More“TURN!”
I grew up before the advent of GPS, and I keenly remember my passenger’s side-seat navigation. If we were lucky, it involved last-second commands to take a turn or change lanes. On many occasions, however, the command came seconds too late and we were forced to make hasty u-turns, back-track, or otherwise bumble our way to the destination.
And while GPS gave us a digital roadmap to solve this problem in our cars, many speeches and presentations still suffer from unannounced and abrupt twists and turns that leave the audience dizzy with intellectual whiplash.
Read MoreLast night, a steady stream of ghouls, zombies, and werewolves crawled the streets, making wild gestures to add to the believability of their characters. Speakers looking to command similar attention and engagement from their audience must also pay attention to their hands and arms when presenting.
This action is known as gesturing, and it is more important than you think.
Whether firefly or public speaker, providing your audience with an authentic indicator of who you are is essential to your success. Audiences are looking for signals of authenticity, and when they are missing, their internal alarms are quick to signal an imposter.
Read MoreThe human brain can perceive over 7 million colors!
This astounding ability allows us to discern important differences between similarly colored objects; it also allows us to perceive a richer, more interesting world.
But the visual system isn't the only sensory system that can parse out subtle differences between similar stimuli. Our auditory system also has this exceptional ability, and it's critical to how we perceive the meaning of spoken words.
Begin by appealing to the oldest part of your audience's brain...
You have the most critical, game-changing information on the planet to talk about, but if you don't immediately create a connection with your audience, your message will fall flat.
Read MoreWait for it...
Whether you're building anticipation, adding emphasis, commanding attention, kindling an emotional connection, inspiring trust, or employing a device to calm your nerves, silence can be a speaker's best friend.
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