Nine steps to make you a better speaker
Talk like TED by Carmine Gallo is a book written by a professional speaker and communications expert. It takes you through top tips on how to give presentations according to the TED talks format.
Key points:
- You must be truly passionate about what you are talking about. This will translate into mastery of the topic and your audience will recognise it.
- Tell three stories, or make three key points. Three is the magic number.
- But there should be a single message for the whole talk; one that could be summarised in a Twitter post
- Practice extremely heavily. Do it live, video yourself, and get discerning feedback from objective individuals.
- Convey something new. Novelty grabs an audience’s attention so there must be a unique aspect to your talk.
- Have one emotionally-charged moment that will make it particularly memorable. People remember events when they are linked to strong emotions.
- Use humour but avoid telling jokes. Either use observational humour or borrow a quote from someone else.
- Keep your hands in the ‘power circle’ (above hips and below shoulders)
- Stick to 18-20minutes and the optimum pace is 160 words/minute. People often talk too slowly.
- Slides should be mostly pictures with very few words.
- Remain authentic and be honest. Audiences will know when you are putting it on.
At this point I’d like to also draw your attention to p-cubed (p3), which is an excellent resource from Mr. Ross Fisher. His work is even more practical and I would highly recommend spending time going through his suggestions.
More books like this:
- The charisma myth by Olivia Fox Cabane
Useful links:
