If you want to start off on the right foot with your audience and control that first impression before you ever speak, introduce yourself.  Instead of staying in the back of the room, or hovering by the podium or panel table reviewing your notes: Introduce Yourself!  

Walk into the room and just go up to the first person you see in the audience and say,

Hi, I'm so-and-so and I'm your speaker today. 

Don't be surprised if they give you a wide smile and introduce themselves right back.  Then ask them a bit about themselves, and why they are there or other questions that will give you insight into what it is they want to get out of your presentation.

Then move on and reach out to more attendees.  Try to reach as many as you can up until right before you speak.  

What does this do for you?

First, it gives you more information about your audience, so you can tweak your presentation at the last minute, as needed, to better meet their needs.

Second, it helps break the ice with your audience. It helps break down the speaker/audience barrier and make you seem more human and more approachable.

Why does this matter? Because the more familiar you are to them, the more responsive your audience is going to be to you.

And for those of you that have a fear of public speaking, this is an excellent way to reduce your nerves. You will be busy meeting nice people and learning a little about them instead of standing behind a podium nervously waiting to speak with a tape in your head telling you how afraid you are.

Of course the corollary rule to this is: Thou Shalt Show up 20 - 30 minutes before you speak

I don't remember who put it on and I'm not going to mention the speakers by name because I don't want to embarrass them.  At least two were sweet older gentlemen and a third was an academic from Loyola Marymount (who seriously needs speaker training).

I will say, however, that I walked out of the lecture mid-way, after the third speaker.  Can't remember ever doing that.

Now why would I do that?  Because the speakers weren't speaking, they were ranting.  And even worse, they were ranting to the wrong audience.  The audience of probably 100+ attendees was made up of 50 - 80 year old Jews.  This is an audience who already knows the damage of the holocaust and the evilness of those who perpetrated it.  Some of them were probably survivors and lots of them have family who didn't survive.

This was supposed to be a lecture and discussion about the Eichmann Trial itself. 

Instead what we got was as follows (at least until I walked out):

They started the program without telling us what was going to occur and instead just played video clips from you tube. OK, I'll play along for a minute or two, but unfortunately they didn't bother to download any videos to their computer, nor did they bother to download the links directly to their desktop.

So we got to watch them go into their email for video clip link after video clip link.  Yep, we got to see their email list, and each email that they went into to get the clip. Oh, and there was the nifty "so and so is now online" Skype pop up that entertained us every few minutes as well.

Unfortunately they tortured us with this silliness for about 15 minutes, the last 8 - 10 of which was just streaming download pauses and 10 seconds of video then another streaming download pause.  

The only thing more irritating than sitting at a speech/lecture and watching a video try to download is watching Oscar speeches.

Bad enough.... but then...

Speaker #1/MC: basically just told a story of his father's escape from Germany.  I'm guessing more than half the audience had heard similar stories from their own parents while growing up.  What was the point? 

Speaker #2: basically paced back and forth telling us how evil Eichmann was and how Hannah Arendt's "the Banality of Evil" was completely baseless.  OK... tell this audience something they don't know already.  And stop pacing, it's distracting.

Speaker #3: this lovely older gentleman was the worst, simply because all he did was rant about what a horrible person FDR was and how he was totally complicit in the Holocaust.  Still not sure what he was trying to do either. 

I walked out after Speaker #3.

What are the lessons?

• Organize your conferences even if you are an all-volunteer force. Your audience should be treated with respect and that means respecting our time. Even retired people get annoyed when their time is wasted.
• Prepare your audio and video in advance.  Either:
  • download the video onto your hard drive (preferable), or
  • put the direct link to the video on your desktop so we don't have to see all of your emails and wait for you to find the right link
• When preparing your audio and video clips in advance, you also need to
  • Make sure the facility has adequate streaming capability, or go wired, and still make sure there is adequate streaming capability.  
  • If there isn't, you have to download to your hard drive or find another source.  
  • Make sure you remember to kill all programs on your computer and turn off all alerts, so we don't sit there watching your email, Skype and IM alerts.
• Meet your audience's needs - not your own.  I've said this a million times before. If you make this mistake, you can't recover.  
• Prepare an actual presentation, with an outline and all, or at least a few talking points.'
  • Don't rant. We don't care about your rants.  Rants turn an audience off and make them uncomfortable.
  • Don't rant. Speak to us, be thoughtful, organized, easy to follow.  Have a point.  Have three main points if you want people to follow you.
  • Don't rant. What is the point of your presentation? Decide in advance and create one - don't wing it or you may end up ranting.

Moral of the Story:  Passion is good.  Ranting is bad.  

I just came across this very short post "How long should you practice your speech" and I recommend it for everyone. I get this question at every public speaking training program I teach, i.e. a lot.

And every time I answer the question, I usually get blank stares or looks of disbelief.  It's hard convincing very busy people to add more work to their schedules.  

But there really is no "easy" button when it comes to giving a good speech (much less an excellent one).

So read the post so you know I'm not the only person out there telling you to practice your speech - a lot - if you want to do it well.

I also give a few top tips for improving your public speaking.

Ric Franzi is a great Peer Group Leader/business growth consultant with Critical Mass for Business, located in Orange county. I met him in a peer group I joined a few years back that helped me get through the recession.  I highly recommend peer groups for business owners.  Very helpful and also a great reality check.  It's good to meet monthly with people who have similar challenges, even if they aren't in the same industry.

(Ric is on the left in the photo below).

This edited version, highlighting the most idiotic things Governor Kasich said, is pretty funny.  The speech lasted 80 minutes or so.  Again, those poor kids.

I'm sure somewhere in the jumbled 80 minutes he might have said something of substance, this is admittedly an edited version just capturing the choice phrases, but seriously?

As Vital Speechs of the Day points out... this is the hazard of impromptu speaking.  

Nobody needs to sound this stupid.

Or look this stupid.

Someone really needs to tell this guy how to dress when speaking in public.  That shirt, tie and suit combo is atrocious, sloppy and the colors clash.  There is more to dressing than wearing a red tie.

It is actually very hard for me to narrow my favorites down to three speeches for several reasons.  First, I don't remember every speech I have heard or read, even the great ones.  Second, there are many many speeches I have found to be off the charts fantastic at the time I heard or read them, but I have never actually sat down and created a list of my own. I have several books, however, listing and re-publishing the top "xx" speeches; I guess it's time to go back to them.

Off the top of my head I cited two of my most favorite speeches, both of which have occurred in the last 50 years.

1) Martin Luther King's, "I have a Dream," given in 1963 at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at the March on Washington.  If you'd like to hear it, or read it, you can find it in a million places online, but my favorite isAmerican Rhetoric: "I Have A Dream."

Not surprisingly on American Rhetoric's Top 100 Speeches list, MLK's "I Have a Dream" also ranks #1.  That list was created by some of the most famous and esteemed faculty of Communications, Martin Medhurst and Steven Lucas.  I recall working from both of their texts back when I was studying for my Masters in Communication and when I was teaching undergrads how to speak in public.

The original publication of Lucas' andMedhurst's Top 100 Speeches list can be found at the University of Wisconsin - Madison's website.

I'm not going to go in to why I love MLK's I have a Dream speech right now, maybe later. I will just say - read it. Listen to it. Then read it again. Sometimes the audio recordings aren't great.  But when you read it, you'll see his use of rhetorical techniques. The turns of phrases he uses are poetic and they make the listener think.  Not just his use of repetition, but also analogy, metaphor, antithesis.  He was a brilliant speaker, no question about it. And this is my favorite speech.

I recently read a very interesting book about the history of this speech in particular, written by the son of someone in one of my audiences. I am traveling right now, but as soon as I can I will find that book and give you the information.

And my second favorite speech? (At least right now)

2) Obama's nomination speech of John Kerry when Kerry ran against Bush W.  Great speech, great delivery, made his political career skyrocket right into the presidency as I expected (though several terms before I expected it). 

I didn't have a third speech to offer up today when asked the question, but I should have.  And, like all good speakers, I though of it after the fact.

I don't know if this is my all time #3 speech, but it's up there.  It was delivered in the 1800's by Abby Kelley Foster.  

Abby Kelley was a suffragist before the famous suffragists. And she was an abolitionist before she was a suffragist.  She was courageous, outspoken and a pioneer.  You can read Abby Kelley's bio on Civil War Women Blog.

Her "Bloody Feet" speech was moving and powerful.  I don't have it here either since I am still in New Mexico, but will write more about it at a later time.  The quotable quote from that speech is,

Bloody feet, Sisters, have worn smooth the path by which you come hither.

There was a great book written by Dorothy Sterling about Abby Kelley quite some time ago called "Ahead of Her Time."

It's worth the read.

This is for the ABA's new Premier Speaker CLE Series and is free to ABA Members.  1.5 CLE units are available.  

Sign up for their announcements if you are a member of the ABA.  They expect to have some outstanding speakers during the next 12 months.

Victoria is one of the authors of the Forbes blog She Negotiates.  Check out Victoria and Lisa Gate's website, She Negotiates, for great negotiation skills seminars and training.  

I presented a shortened version of one of my attorney speaking seminars "Improving your Public Speaking Skills." The host of the event invited my company to exhibit in exchange for my presentation, which was great because I (and my staff) stayed for a great deal longer than usual and we had much more interaction with the event attendees as well. 

While walking around the exhibit hall for 2.5 days I chatted up a bunch of the attendees.  And, unfortunately, the consensus was that the vast majority of speakers at the annual convention needed public speaking training - before they presented their CLEs to the bar attendees.

I know this is a pretty common issue, since I used to be a practicing attorney and I know how bad CLE programs can get. Additionally, my company puts on 60 - 70 CLE ligitation skills training programs per year; so I even know that some speakers are resistant to public speaking training and suggestions for improvement.

What I don't understand is why bar associations don't make the investment and offer training programs, or DVDs, to the attorneys who are going to speak at the bar's annual event.  It's a small investment compared to the event budget and income and the rewards always outweigh the cost.

I understand that not all of the speakers will take you up on your offered training, but enough of them will to make a difference and to cut down on attendees' dissapointment and complaints.

Not surprisingly several attendees told me they weren't sure they would return the next year due to the quality of presentations they saw.

Here is an open plea to bar associations:

You don't have to hire me to train your CLE speakers at your annual events, but you do have to hire someone.  Or at least license someone's training program to distribute to your speakers.  

Or maybe even just buy Garr Reynold's Presentation Zen or Nancy Duarte's Slide:ology in bulk and send them off to all CLE speakers booked for your annual event.  Yes, I really wish I'd written one of these books 20 years ago when I first started complaining about Power Point.

Seriously, do something!