Speak with Impact

USING THIS BOOK

Where do you go from here? I hope this book has inspired you to look inward to determine why you are called to speak. I hope it has given you the courage to seek out more speaking opportunities at work or in your community, and to use your voice to have an impact on the world around you. And I hope that you take action based on your words.

Review all the speaking opportunities described in Chapter 1 and make a commitment to find one speaking event in the coming month. Then, seek out another one. The more you apply these skills, the faster you will build your skills and see improvement.

If you haven’t found a practice partner to go through the book with, find one now and use this person as a trusted advisor to help you apply what you learned.

This book is filled with tips and techniques, but where do you start once you have a speech on your calendar?

When You Have Two Hours or Less to Prepare a Speech

We’ve all been in the situation where we have to prepare a speech with thirty minutes’ to two hours’ notice. In that case, look at the sidebar “How to write a speech in thirty minutes” and spend as much time as you can practicing and using the practice methods we discussed in Chapter 5.

When You Have One Week to Prepare a Speech

You can also use the sidebar “How to write a speech in thirty minutes,” but now add in the polishing component from Chapter 5.

When You Have One Month to Prepare a Speech

Read this book with your upcoming speech in mind.

Use Chapter 2 to ask the Three Questions and determine the main message of your speech.

Use Chapter 3 to walk you through the writing process.

Read Chapter 4 for ideas to connect with your audience through persuasion, stories, or humor.

Use Chapter 5 to polish and practice your speech.

Use Chapter 6 to add engaging delivery tools.

Chapter 7 will calm you down and help you center yourself.

Chapter 8 will prepare you for being in front of an audience.

For more specific situations, look at Chapters 9, 10, and 11 to help you prepare. At the end of nearly every chapter, there are exercises to help you apply the learning. You can go from one exercise to the next to continue building your skills.

HIGHLIGHTING COMMON THEMES

I started out as an opera singer, performing the works of others before I had the courage to write my own songs as a folk singer. I now believe that both opera and folk music have much to teach us about public speaking. While opera teaches us the techniques and discipline to build our skills, folk music teaches us the power of authenticity over perfection.

In this book, I’ve given you a process for many of the common public speaking opportunities, from day-to-day presentations to career-changing speeches. There will undoubtedly be updates as technology changes and as our understanding of human behavior changes. I myself am constantly learning new techniques and strategies from colleagues and clients around the world. Visit www.speakwithimpactbook.com for new tools and to read the experiences of others who have used this book successfully. Send us your feedback so we can share it with others.

I’d like you to keep in mind some important themes that I’ve weaved in throughout this book:

• Public speaking is a skill, not a talent. My teaching philosophy rests on the belief that each one of us can be a powerful public speaker with practice and feedback. The more you use this skill and the more you focus on making progress, the better you become.

• Public speaking is something we do every single day. From phone calls to webinars, presentations to meetings to town halls, we have daily opportunities to speak in public. It can happen anywhere in the world, at every stage in our career, no matter our background.

• We all get nervous. If you feel nervous before a presentation, remember that you are not alone. The fear of public speaking is universal, and most people will sympathize with you. Remember that everyone in the audience wants you to do well.

• It’s about being authentic, not perfect. Nobody wants to hear a perfect speech or presentation; they want to feel that the speaker is authentic and genuinely cares about his or her subject. Forget the need to be perfect and you’ll reduce a lot of your stress.

• It’s about connecting with your audience and building trust. Giving a speech or presentation is an opportunity to build a relationship of trust with your audience, whether it’s one person or a thousand people. The tools in this book will help you focus on your audience and your message in a way that connects on a personal level.

• It’s about exercising leadership with your voice. Professor Marshall Ganz says, “Mobilizing others to achieve purpose under conditions of uncertainty—what leaders do—challenges the hands, the head, and the heart.”¹ Once you determine what you want to say, it’s about finding a way to mobilize others to act.

BUILDING ALLIES AROUND YOUR IDEAS

Throughout this book, I’ve referenced the importance of speaking up, even if you are afraid to do so. Speaking in public comes with certain dangers. What you say may be politically or culturally dangerous. Speaking up may bring with it physical danger based on what you have to say or whether cultural expectations allow you to speak. You might be a new political figure speaking out against the current system’s corruption or a young woman speaking out against dangerous cultural practices in your community. I’ve met women who had the courage to speak publicly about their rape in order to change the public taboo in their country and give other women the courage to confront their attackers. When we speak out about things that challenge society’s norms, there is danger in our words.

The last thing I’d want you to do is read this book and give a speech that puts your life in danger. When you ask the Three Questions (Who is your audience? What is your goal? Why you?) you’ll have a sense of whether or not your speech will be controversial. If you believe your message will be dangerous, take steps to build allies along the way. Find people—in your political party, in your organization’s leadership, in your community—who support you and will be willing to support you publicly. Build up those allies so that when you do speak, you don’t have to speak alone.

At the same time, don’t just seek out those who think like you. Reach out to those who disagree with you so you can better understand their point of view. You might do this in order to better address their issues, or perhaps adjust your own view. Unfortunately, we have a tendency to accept comments that already support our worldview and discredit those that push back, leading to a dangerous mind-set that can’t accept opposing viewpoints. Have the courage to listen to others, and have the humility to accept that you may be wrong.

From a more practical perspective, finding allies to help you with your public speaking is a critical part of your success. In all of our workshops, participants speak and receive feedback from their peers. Oftentimes that feedback is richer and more nuanced than I could give, because those peers know the subject matter better than I do. The friendships that emerge from those workshops continue to this day, as people call on each other to practice their most important speeches and presentations. The process of asking for and receiving feedback creates a powerful bond with others, as you are willing to look vulnerable in front of them. Find allies who can give you honest feedback on your speaking strengths and where you can improve.

LISTENING TO OTHERS

This entire book has focused on the art of speaking up, which makes it easy to forget the importance of listening.

Listen to your audience members and their needs before you draft your remarks. Who will you be addressing, and what is important to them?

Listen to how your audience reacts to your remarks in the moment. What is their body language saying and, when they ask questions, what are they really saying? In a meeting, listen to those around you instead of simply thinking of what to say next.

Listen to the views of others, even when you don’t agree with them. In the United States, we are fiercely proud of our First Amendment right that protects the freedom of speech, a freedom I wholeheartedly embrace. With that right comes a great responsibility because our words matter. With our words, we can build someone up or tear them down. We can monopolize air time with our beliefs, or we can respect other people’s right to speak.

Listen to your own inner voice and acknowledge what you truly want to say, not just what you think others want to hear. When you feel an ethical conflict between what your organization tells you to say and what you feel is right, listening to this inner voice may cause you to rethink what to do with your life.

Know When Not to Speak

I learned a humbling lesson during one of my leadership courses in graduate school. We walked into the classroom one day to find that a group of students had written six student names on the board along with the words “Today, could these people please refrain from speaking and leave some air for the rest of us?” My name was one of the six written on the board. I was shocked and embarrassed. I liked speaking up in class because the subject interested me and I believed I had an important perspective to offer my peers. But after consulting with a few friends from the class, I learned that my behavior was predictable. Whenever there was a challenge or question thrown out to the group, I would jump in with the answer before others had had time to grapple with it. I became a crutch for others.

You no doubt have something to contribute in nearly every situation. As a result of reading this book, you may feel particularly emboldened to do so, but remember to do so strategically. If you constantly speak up and monopolize the meeting, you are taking away other people’s time to speak and grapple with challenges. As the Dalai Lama says, “Sometimes one creates a dynamic impression by saying something, and sometimes one creates as significant an impression by remaining silent.”²

ENDING WITH A CALL TO ACTION

I believe that each of you has something powerful to say—on behalf of yourself, your organization, or your community. Public speaking is about finding your own voice, building your communication skills, and finding your courage to speak. It’s about recognizing what’s important to you and what needs to be done in the world, then mobilizing others to address it—from a new corporate strategy to a vision of social change. That is how you exercise leadership with your voice.

On March 24, 2018, during the March for Our Lives in Washington, DC, volunteers were handing out posters along 7th Street NW. One poster showed a group of people, one shouting into a megaphone, and the word ACT! in big red letters across the top. I was struck by the correlation between speaking and acting. You could look at that sign and say, “Well, they’re just speaking; they’re not actually taking action.” But in fact, speaking up is the first step to taking action. Because when you speak up about an issue, you start to take ownership of the solution. Gordon Whitman, author of Stand Up! How to get involved, speak out, and win in a world on fire, says that you go from being a passive member of society to an agent of change.³

My call to action is that you use these skills for good and not for evil.

For centuries, dictators and despots have used public speaking to divide people instead of bringing them together. Recognize the incredible power that comes from the spoken word, and use it to create community, connection, and trust. We need this in business, we need this in politics, and we need it in the world at large. When you use these skills for good, you will have a powerful and positive impact on the world around you.