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A Toolkit for Volunteer
Leaders
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Public Speaking C-3Think (a lot) before you speak. How well we communicate with others is key to our effectiveness and success in life. Communication is particularly important in leadership. We will all find ourselves in different leadership roles, from time to time, whether we view ourselves as leaders or not. It might be as a coach for a Little League team, or a member of a church group, or an officer in a community organization, or it might involve speaking up in a meeting. Our effectiveness in these situations depends on our ability to communicate.
LEARNING OBJECTIVES After completing this module you should be able to: 1. Prepare a speech.
PREPARING TO SPEAKMany people are fearful of speaking before others, and they shy away from it at all costs. In a national survey, people were questioned as to their greatest fear in life. The fear listed more often than any other (41%) was "speaking before others." We can overcome that attitude of fear through preparation and practice. Speaking before others can either become a major barrier, or an avenue to success and accomplishment in life. Learning to speak before others, in small social groups as well as in larger community groups, provides us with one of the greatest opportunities we have for personal growth. How can you become more effective in speaking up for yourself? The following pointers are as pertinent to one-on-one communication as they are to speaking before a group. KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE: The makeup of your audience (whether one person or one hundred) greatly influences what you are able to say, and how you say it. People don't have to listen to you, and they won't unless they want to. People are more likely to give you their attention if you speak to their needs, concerns and interests. Take time to analyze the person or group you'll be speaking to. If you don't know the person or group, consult with someone who does. What are their expectations of you? Use illustrations that are pertinent and meaningful to your audience. Have your facts together, and adapt them to the needs and interests of the listener. Avoid inflammatory statements. Analyze your audience not only before you speak but also while you are speaking. Pick up and respond to your audience's nonverbal reactions. Seek questions and feedback. Adjust your comments accordingly. Getting your point across and getting people to take action sometimes require waiting for the right time, "the teachable moment." Pushing a point before people are ready for it can become a futile effort. Know your audience. BE PREPARED: Think through what you want to say, and how you are going to say it. The biggest mistake most of us make is not being prepared. We know we might be called upon, or that there is an action we wish to support or oppose, and yet we avoid thinking about what we would say until that time arrives.
THE SPEECHThe following suggestions will be helpful in preparing yourself to speak, whether to two or three people or to a large group.
OPENER Have a prepared opener, a two or three sentence lead-in that grabs your listeners, and clearly states what you hope to accomplish in speaking to them: "I'm a 4-H member, and I'd like to share with you what 4-H has done for me." "I support this proposal (motion), and the reasons I do are..." Get the opening clearly fixed in your mind. Many people suffer a moment of panic just as they begin to speak. This prepared opener will get you over that moment of panic. As you prepare to talk, take a couple of deep breaths to calm yourself. Stand (If the group is small and informal, you may choose to remain seated). Standing brings attention to you and will strengthen your impact on the group. Position yourself so that you can see everyone, with no one to your back. Make eye contact. Acknowledge any introduction with "thank you". Pause for attention. Don't apologize: "I'm not prepared," or "I'm not a very good speaker," or "I didn't know I was going to be called upon." Don't hem and haw around. Don't use common- place clichés like, "It's a pleasure to be here." Instead start right off with your prepared opening statement.
BODY Then in the body of your presentation, include the logic, facts, examples, the points you wish to make. Clearly indicate what you would like your listeners to do with the information you are providing them. Outline the points you wish to make. Think through the ordering and organization of those points, and how you will make the transition from one point to the next, from the opener to the conclusion. Know what you are going to say, and then say it. Your message will be strengthened if you can: Incorporate vivid examples. Share actual experience. Make a comparison or analogy that your audience can relate to: "Have you ever...?" Touch briefly on arguments that oppose your viewpoint, showing their weakness. Quote an authority, or use simple statistics to support your argument. In your delivery, make eye contact. Speak directly to individuals in your audience. Pick out a face, focus on it for several seconds, then move on to another. Vary your speaking pace and the loudness of your voice. Use gestures and appropriate pauses to keep the attention of your audience.
CLOSING Finally, write out a two or three sentence closing that summarizes the key points you've made. Strive for a climax, a challenge, a call for action that will leave your message clearly in the listeners' minds. Memorize it. The closing is your point of greatest potential impact. Don't give it away by sitting down abruptly with "Well, that's about all I have to say." If you run out of time, calmly move into your prepared conclusion, and no one will know the difference.
PRESENTATION TIPSGET TO THE POINT: Jesse Nirenberg in his book on Creative Persuasion {2] states that people do too much beating around the bush, and as a result reduce the impact of their message. They tend to give too much background information, leaving the listener confused as to their aim. Dr. Nirenberg suggests that the purpose of your opening remark should be to motivate the other person to continue the discussion. This is best accomplished by getting right to the point and stating your conclusions: "I suggest...." "I would like to see us...." "I'm concerned about...." Then state the anticipated benefits of your proposal to the listeners and to the group or the special interests they represent. If you delay in describing the benefits, your audience will use their own imaginations to do so--and their imaginations might be less motivating than yours. Quantify those benefits. Then follow with a question to stimulate the listener to react. The listener's reaction then gives you a cue as to what you should say next. Explore the other person's position, if he disagrees or challenges you. Give him more information if he agrees. Don't overload. We all have the tendency to say too much at a time. PORTRAY CONFIDENCE: Good speaking is 50% attitude. If you approach a speaking situation with confidence that you will do OK, you most likely will. If, instead, you approach the situation with fear and self-depreciating thoughts ("I'm a poor speaker" or "They are not interested in what I have to say"), you will likely perform under your capability. Your nervousness, your anxiety as a speaker, is rarely as obvious as you think it is. So relax. The object of good speaking is not to remove the butterflies from your stomach, but rather to teach them to fly in formation. Be enthusiastic. Show people that you believe in and are excited about what you're saying. Unless you have convictions and are willing to express them, you really have nothing to say. Enthusiasm is contagious. Be Yourself. Develop your own unique style. Learn from others, but don't copy them. HAVE A SUPPORT GROUP: A support group is one or more persons that you feel comfortable with, that you can rely on for encouragement and suggestions. A support group is formed through mutual consent, with the purpose of giving each other constructive feedback as to how well you do in communicating with others. Communication is a learned skill that comes through practice, learning through experience. A support group can be very helpful in assisting you with that learning experience. Public speaking is a skill that is difficult to perfect on your own. It is difficult to objectively evaluate one's own performance. A support group (person) has two objectives: (1) build the speaker's self-confidence and (2) strengthen skills. Self-confidence is developed by giving nonverbal encouragement through smiles, an agreeing nod of the head, or excitement in your eyes, while the person is speaking. Following the presentation, give immediate, sincere feedback as to what the speaker did well. Be specific: "It was particularly effective when you...." Generalities, ("You did a good job") are less helpful. Don't whitewash, with false encouragement. Skills are strengthened through helpful critique with specific suggestions as to where improvement might be made. This is to be distinguished from the more negative approach of criticizing and pointing out "mistakes." In giving feedback: (1) Tell the person in very specific terms what you liked about what she did. Feedback what you perceived as the audience's reaction. Acknowledge progress made over previous presentations. (2) Give one, not more than two, specific suggestions for improvement, e.g., "After you made your points, you just stopped and sat down. A two or three sentence summary and restatement of your recommendation might have been more conclusive in leaving your points clearly with the listener." (3) Conclude with an overall statement of positive regard. Don't combine your likes and dislikes into a single statement connected with a "but: "It was a good talk, but..."
SPEECH EVALUATION (3) The following checklist is provided to help you evaluate yourself and others as a speaker. The most important criteria is overall impact on the listener. Were the speaker's objectives obtained? Were the people being spoken to motivated to action? What distracted from the presentation? 1. Overall impact of the message on you and the audience. 2. Content and organization of the message:
3. Delivery style:
GET A GOOD INTRODUCTION: A much neglected aspect of effective communication is the making of introductions. A good introduction can make a speaker, new member or guest feel great about themselves and the group. Most introductions, unfortunately, are done in a spur of the moment, haphazard manner. In introducing a speaker, your objective is to get the audience's attention, to put the speaker at ease, and to set the stage. You are to introduce the topic and purpose of the talk, as well as provide background on the person. Clearly indicate what and why: On what subject will the person be speaking, and why is he or she speaking on that topic. Contact the speaker in advance to get the information you need. In making an introduction, indicate your interest in the person and the topic. Weave the speaker's name into the introduction as much as possible. Be brief. Emphasize the two or three things you personally find most interesting about the person. Illustrate the pertinence of the speaker's subject to the group. Don't provide a pedigree. Once the person has spoken, stand and compliment the person on the presentation. Lead the applause. People will become more willing to speak when they receive a supportive introduction, and then complimentary feedback on what was said. Recognition and support are key to the development of speaking skills and confidence. PRACTICE: Effective communication can be boiled down to three words. They are practice, practice, practice. Good communicators are so because they work at it. It doesn't just happen. Practice fine tunes our speaking skills, overcomes our fears, raises our comfort level and builds self-confidence. A very effective but little used means of practice is mental imagery. Mental imagery involves sitting down in a quiet, comfortable spot, and closing your eyes. Visualize in detail the person(s) you will be speaking to. Visualize yourself delivering your message. Hear yourself speaking the words you plan to use. Visualize yourself as calm, relaxed and confident, with good eye contact and rapport with the audience. Visualize every detail of your presentation. Anticipate different problems, such as losing your train of thought; anticipate likely questions; anticipate different audience responses. Then think through how you would handle each. Clearly visualize yourself as poised and effective--a success. A community resource that can be very helpful in improving your communication and public speaking skills is membership in a Toastmasters Club. Toastmasters also offers an excellent eight-part educational program called Speech craft, that is available to community groups. Toastmasters develops speaking skills and confidence in a fun, non-threatening, supportive atmosphere.[4]
EXERCISE: Prepare and deliver a short speech. Practice it until it is smooth. Get a colleague (or a support group) to evaluate you using the speech evaluation above. |