Where to get ideas for your speeches

You can research a speech generally to get idas for  theme, and then specifically once you know what it is you want to talk about.  You can research on the internet and in libraries, and you can consult your treasure chest of ideas saved over years of clipping and tagging.

But never forget your human resources.  You cannot interview a website or book for clarification.  Humans can expand on an idea, give you more information, or give you that quirky perspective that just might give you the winning angle on a topic.

 

How will you make your image and your message work together to make a great speech?

This is one of  the most powerful choices you will make in designing your speech/presentation – how you get the image that you project to support your message – how you put the two together.

It may be totally supportive, in that the image is unobtrusive; seamlessly part of the message and the complete package – an incredibly effective combination.

Or you may choose to create an edge, a mystique.

Your body language, your facial expression and gestures, your clothes and your grooming all need to work towards the impact you choose to make.  They will contribute just as much as the content, the language and the structure.   And they will contribute as powerfully to the impact you choose to make as a person as they do to the impact you choose for your presentation to make.

How will you make them work together?

Public Speaking nerves? Good! Put them to use!

If you have public speaking nerves, chances are you are running adrenalin.

Forget the other symptoms for a minute – the shaky knees, the dry mouth, the sweaty palms.

And that awful feeling that you want to run away? Good. You’ve heard of “fight or flight”? Good … because what you have is “flight”, the need to escape. And that is a symptom of your pumping adrenalin. You have a speech to make, so escaping is out of the question, so you might as well to turn it around and make use of the adrenalin.

Channel it so that you create excitement and enthusiasm. Use these in your presentation to speak quickly with enthusiasm, or hold attention with power pause. Use them to communicate passion for your subject.

And that channeling, that conversion of your nervousness to passion, combined with other techniques, will build an incredibly strong confidence.

Your secret treasure trove of ideas for speeches

You have a speech coming up. You want to do it well, put together some great ideas, present relevant information.

Research will bring in much of what you need.

But for the material that will help to make or break your impact because it is not so academic, has more value than basic information, you need to go to your secret collection.

Particularly if you are speaking regularly, you need to develop the habit of collecting material on your subject areas – articles from magazines or the internet, quotes, sayings and anecdotes. 

You can keep these in a paper file of notes; or for the on-line material, save useful websites in your favourites file or a tagging system like del.icio.us.

Not only will it save you time in researching, it will provide the personal angle on your material. And if it appealed to you at the time you collected it, chances are that you will use it with enthusiasm. And if it appealed to you it should appeal to your audience if you use it well.

Reearching the content of you speech

When you begin researching your speech, it may be that you have no specific message articulated at the beginning.

If so you will need to range wide in your research to cover the whole subject until a suitable message
becomes clear.

Then you will see sub-themes developing and you can direct your research along those lines.

What does your family think about public speaking?

Your family yes, the one you grew up in.

What did they think about public speaking? What did they say about it? Did they participate in public speaking? or did they talk about how awkward it was, about how they would avoid it if possible, and about how much they feared it?

If you are comfortable with public speaking, or if you fear it, you may be able to trace that reaction back to your family.

If it is fear, and this may be the cause, then you have a great basis for overcoming the fear. You are not your family, and the reasons they feared pubic speaking may not apply to you. If you can acknowledge that you have this source for the fear, then you can create a whole new replacement set of attitudes about public speaking that belongs just to you. Replace fear with confidence (if only to learn!), replace discomfort with comfort (if necessary through practice), replace awkwardness with cool (again through practice) and you are on the way to overcoming the nerves.

Before your write your speech, visualise

Before you start writing your speech, before you start collecting the ideas and information, you will need, try visualisation. Visualise the feelings you have as you present. Visualise the audience – who they are, what they are thinking, how they are responding. Visualise them as they stand to leave. What are they thinking now? What will they do in response to you presentation? What you see will guide you to define the purpose of your speech and what you want to achieve with it. And *that* will give you the guidance in what ideas and information to collect.