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THE ELEMENTS OF
SPEAKING
Powerful speaking combines 2 elements: content and delivery.
Both are crucial: a great speech that’s delivered in a shambling, dull
monotone will fall flat, while the most passionate delivery can’t make
nonsense memorable. However, for most people, the greatest value lies in
working on delivery because a person with excellent delivery is
immediately impactful; most people fall far short of their potential simply
through having never worked on the basics.
We’ll be covering both content (what you say) and delivery (how you say
it), in reverse order for the above reason, in Chapters Five and Six. But
first check the panel to see what Chris Anderson, TED’s curator, sees as
the essential elements of effective public speaking. The panel also
contains instructions for accessing the complete interview in audio and
transcript forms online.
What makes a great talk: Chris Anderson
This is an excerpt from the transcript of a conversation with Chris Anderson. For
the full transcript, and the audio recording, visit www.howtobeheardbook.com and
use the password
consc1ous
.
After a long career in journalism and publishing, Chris Anderson became
the curator of the TED Conference in 2002 and has developed it as a
platform for identifying and disseminating ‘ideas worth spreading’, and
as the gold standard for public speaking. In June 2015, TED posted its
2,000th talk online. The talks on www.ted.com are free to view, and they
have been translated into more than 100 languages with the help of
volunteers from around the world. Viewership has grown to
approximately one billion per year.
Julian Treasure: What are the essential elements of a great talk Chris?
And I know you’re going to say, at the heart of it is that powerful idea… is
that enough or is there anything else?
Chris Anderson: There are many different types of great talk. I think
one important piece of advice is not to take any single set of guidelines as
definitive, because that can be the recipe for something formulaic, and
what matters is that you say what you want to say in your authentic way:
that really matters more than anything. But, I think mostly talks work
best when the speaker comes with an attitude of generosity, not
selfishness. If a speaker comes on stage and is basically pitching in some
way, whether it’s a business, a cause, a book, whatever…
Julian Treasure: …or just to be liked…
Chris Anderson: …yeah, or just to be liked, it’s frustrating and
fundamentally ineffective. The stance to come with is a belief that you
have something you’re really excited about that is going to be valuable to
people in the audience and your job is to offer them that gift and to try
and do something, which is kind of a miraculous thing to do, which is to
recreate in their minds the same idea that is in yours. And, usually the
way to do that effectively, is to just be very clear about what is the core
that you want to communicate, and anchor everything in your talk to that
– to have a crystal clear through-line to the talk, which every element
connects to in some way.
Julian Treasure: Achieving that lovely Holy Grail – I know there’s been
research showing that the brain waves of audiences actually attune to the
brain waves of the speaker if they’re doing it really well. Okay, next
question, the 3 most irritating things that people do on the stage. When
would you say, just don’t do that?
Chris Anderson: The single most irritating to me is visible
manipulation of an audience, and that can take several forms. It may be
emotional manipulation – that’s telling an emotional personal story in a
way that just doesn’t feel authentic, it feels formulaic in some way, or
feels contrived. Or, an attempt to grandstand. There are a lot of people
who are just seduced by the idea of “I want to be a charismatic presence
on stage” and they come over as full of themselves. Those are really the
things that irritate me. It’s when people are in it for their own ego.
Julian Treasure: Okay, so, how about some tips if somebody’s about to
speak in public for the first time, what things would you suggest they
focus on?
Chris Anderson: I think one of the key things is to basically delete most
of what you want to say. You just don’t have time to say most of what you
want to say and it’s the hardest thing to do, to get rid of the excess and
instead pick the one thing that is most important but then develop it with
enough depth. It’s far, far better to be narrow but deep than broad and
shallow, by and large. And so, for a talk to be meaningful, people need to
know why it matters; they need to have their curiosity about it
stimulated; they need to engage with you; probably stories need to be told
that connect to this thing; and the explanation needs to go deep enough
to be interesting. Often that means exploring to some extent dead ends,
and showing why they’re dead ends, which helps reinforce why the idea
you’re trying to communicate is the right one. That’s the single biggest
tip: focus the scope of the talk so that you can go deep enough to really let
it land.
Chapter
4:
How to listen consciously
“I like to listen. I have learned a great deal from listening
carefully. Most people never listen.”
- Ernest Hemingway
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