Public Speaking Stories, Skills, an Tips...

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strayfoxx

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I'm a doctoral student and lecturer at WVU, and I have been tasked with coming up with advice on Presentations and Public Speaking skills. Since many graduate students often have overblow tics, or social phobias my job is to present my advice while addressing the social foibles which develop as introverted grad students are forced to present in crowds of 50+ people. I know people don't like reading long posts, but below, in the spoiler tag, I have pasted some of the advice I have come up with. The advice is tailored to a mix between a lecture/presentation style which we history grad students have to give at job talks.

To get me thinking more on the subject, and since I know many of you are in varied positions which entail speaking in public forums, I was wondering if you had any Public Speaking/Presentation tips, advice, or any SUPREMELY AWKWARD or Funny stories to share. You'd really be helping me out.
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Public Speaking Tips
Presentational Tips

1. Always begin with an anticipatory hook. An anticipatory hook accomplishes numerous things: it establishes a rapport with the audience, it hooks the audience, it allows the audience to be invested in the topic at hand, and it also establishes a backdrop for what you intend to convey.

2. Be loud, upright, and confident

3. Don’t read off your notes as much as possible. Yet come back to your notes if you find yourself lost, or meandering. The audience won’t think lowly of you if you re-collect yourself.

4. Find basic ways to establish a rapport with the audience.

5. Eliminate nervous cues in your body, voice, and various tics. If you do ‘bad’ the audience will start to feel nervous for you instead of focusing on your presentation.

6. If you build material into your lecture guaranteed to elicit audience feedback, not only will the audience remain interested, but their positive response will renew your energy which improves your presentational style and attitude.

7. Slow down your rate of speech. Enunciate, and emphasize.

8. Sometimes preface important, interesting, or lively information with a “builder statement.” Something which telegraphs the nature of what you’re about to talk about. (Ex: ____ was huge. One of the most important ______. An incredibly hilarious example is_______) Cues and telegraphs are an integral part of presenting.

9. Use transitions in long speeches- Transition from idea to idea, theme to theme, PowerPoint slide to PowerPoint slide. This gives the audience thematic, conceptual, or narrative linkages.

10. Don’t cover too much. Coverage overload is bad, ruins the investment of the audience, and will damage your presentation.

11. Be cognizant of your presentation length. Even if your presentation calls for an hour presentation make it 45 minutes. AS LONG AS WHAT YOU COVER ACCOMPLISHES ALL OBJECTIVES AND MAKES THE AUDIENCE FEEL INFORMED. Shorter presentations are better than longer presentations.

12. People, even smart people, love easily compartmentalized narratives. People buy into narratives. Narratives are ever present in movies, music, books, every major part of media we consume in daily life. The more you can fit your lecture or presentation into an overarching narrative, the more highly an audience will think of you. Due to your narrative semblace to a story or plotline, the audience will think you know more than you actually do, and they will come away truly feeling as though they experienced something. However, nothing betrays someone more than a forced, or false narrative. Don’t romanticize or sensationalize to achieve this objective. Balance people’s desire to believe, with their skepticism of the false.
 
You've gotta be true to yourself. And you are all about authority. The great speakers throughout history were not joke tellers, they were people of passion. So, if you wanna do well today, you gotta do what they did. You gotta wave your arms, and you've gotta pound your fists. Many times. So as to emphasize your point.
 
rub one out before you give a speech ( maybe an hour or 2 before) your delivery will be more relaxed and calm and you wont feel any stress.
 
Powerpoint helps some people, but I find it distracting.

I remember a talk I gave about the Turing test being a poor gauge of intelligence by drawing a diagram to improve a security system with NOT, AND and OR operators on a chalkboard. The diagram took no more than a few minutes and the speed of the drawing was to demonstrate how simple the improvement was.

Most of the suggestions were for me to create a Powerpoint demonstration. Philistines!
 
Small world, I did my undergrad at WVU, got my Ph D at Maryland.

Anyway, those are all good tips. It's really a case of practice makes perfect. Most everyone is nervous as hell about public speaking, and it's something that gets easier the more you do it.

All your points are spot on.

One has to start with some hook, minimize nervous ticks etc. You have to talk loudly, and slow enough for people to follow. It's key to have the talk well organized and present it in a way that it will stick (tell them what you're going to tell them at the start, tell it to them, then summarize what you just told them at the end--just like you'd organize a paper).

Maintain eye contact as much as possible--I'm still working on this, my bad habit is to look down when I'm thinking of what to say next.

If you use powerpoint, keep the bullet points short and to the point. They should be listening to you, not reading.

So yeah, you've got it all pretty much covered.
 
Thanks for the tips. I will definitely keep those in mind next time I have to give a speech. I've always been horrible at public speaking. I almost failed one semester of sophomore English in high school (and I am quite good at English) solely because that semester's grade and curriculum was based in large part on delivering speeches.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114'] You have to talk loudly, and slow enough for people to follow. [/QUOTE]

This really cannot be stressed enough.

Having done a fair bit of acting in my lifetime, I can say for certain that the most important rule is to PROJECT. People always undervalue this, and it's arguably central to delivering a speech properly. There's a few things to help enhance this:

You need to speak toward your audience - i.e., face them, even when showing materials like diagrams and things. If you need to point something out, turn, gesture/laser pointer/whatever, but DO NOT TALK during that time. This requires that you have an idea of how your material is laid out (which you should to begin with), so that you can quickly switch between it and speaking back toward your audience. DO. NOT. Start talking with your back turned, your head sideways, looking down at notes, etc. This ruins speeches all the time.

Speak more slowly than normal conversation speed. Enunciate your words. Project. You've got to think in terms of the back of the room - is your voice reaching it, and are you talking clearly enough to be understood? Yes, you can rely on mics and so forth, but making sure you're being heard is absolutely essential.

Note cards should be bullet points at best, made to remind you of important terms.

YOU SHOULD PRACTICE! Practice it a few times. Do it in front of a mirror, in front of some friends, etc. Just memorizing it isn't enough - you need to think about where you're breaking for breath, if there's asides you want to include, hand gestures, voice levels to help emphasize different emotions, etc.

These are all simple things. Too many times I see people giving a speech and they panic, so they speed through their material while looking down at note cards, continuously getting more nervous as they go, which only makes them go faster, over and over, like a vicious circle. If you're not the speaking type, at least do the fundamentals. It'll help much more than anything else.

I never bought into the hokey stuff like "picture everyone in their underwear" and so forth. Those tips are trash. Just speak loud, clear, slow, and practice. You'll be fine.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114'] If you use powerpoint, keep the bullet points short and to the point. They should be listening to you, not reading.[/QUOTE]

In one of my publc speaking courses (I am a teacher) I was taught to use the "rule of 8" and it has been very valuable.

Rule of 8 = No more than 8 words per line and no more than 8 lines per slide on ANY Powerpoint, no exceptions.
 
Do it more frequently. In two of my graduate classes, we had to do several presentations over the course of the semester to the class. After awhile, it became much less daunting. It's still harder for me to present to a bunch of people more knowledgeable about the subject than myself, than to peers, but it's mostly because I lack more experience. I've also had to cover a few lectures for my professor in a class of ~45, which also helped me alot, especially since they were also my students.

Know the material. If you're unsure about something, leave it out of your slides. It's never happened to me, but I've seen many presentations where the speaker gets asked something and they don't have the answer. It not only looks bad, it breaks the flow and it must make the rest of the presentation that much harder.

There's also a professor at the school where I did my grad work that was infamous for interrupting presentations if something wasn't explained by the next slide. So plan your presentations well. Most other professors I know won't ask until at least 3 slides after, and it's still not addressed.

Practice in front of people. Ask your peers to listen when you practice, and do the same for them.
 
Oh, and don't make your presentation too short either. We had to do 10-20 minute presentations in one of those classes, and one guy showed up with 4 slides. That included the title page. Needless to say, the presentation lasted under 5 minutes. Most people probably won't be this bad anyways.
 
[quote name='ChibiJosh']The hell?
We should totally hang out.[/QUOTE]

PM me. Although I'm so busy at this place, I can rarely muster an evening at the Brickyard once a month.

But thanks for the advice guys. Strell you are right about projecting. A failure to project, often reflects a lack of self-confidence which pervades nearly every part of the presentation. Projecting will probably replace "loud, upright, and confident."

I remember Jay Leno talking about David Letterman, and he remembers the one thing about Letterman's stand-up days in his 70s, was that no matter what he was loud. And that loudness makes his demeanor more confident, and gives more confidence to his delivery. The same goes with public speaking where a measured loudness is key. Also thanks demaul, Jimbo, and elsear. My tips are a work in progress and your advice will help take this near completion.

In response to the poster who mentioned Powerpoint, linked below is a great article about Powerpoint and Academia which I often consult. The best line: "Do not conflate education with entertainment." Something which should be remembered, even outside Powerpoint.

http://www.historians.org/Perspectives/issues/2008/0803/0803vie2.cfm
 
Good points, but one fundamental problem I see is that people aren't always aware of their nervous tics. Having other people (say, yourself) present (that is, attend - to be present, not pree-sent, as it were) to evaluate might enhance nervousness and thus tics, but if the point is to develop a recognition of said tics, then it's not a problem to have them enhanced in that context.
 
[quote name='mykevermin']Good points, but one fundamental problem I see is that people aren't always aware of their nervous tics. Having other people (say, yourself) present (that is, attend - to be present, not pree-sent, as it were) to evaluate might enhance nervousness and thus tics, but if the point is to develop a recognition of said tics, then it's not a problem to have them enhanced in that context.[/QUOTE]

True.

But since he's teaching public speaking apparently, he can point them out in his written evaluations to the students after their presentations, and then they can be conscious of them in future presentations etc.
 
[quote name='Matt Young']Thanks for the tips. I will definitely keep those in mind next time I have to give a speech. I've always been horrible at public speaking. I almost failed one semester of sophomore English in high school (and I am quite good at English) solely because that semester's grade and curriculum was based in large part on delivering speeches.[/QUOTE]


Don't let the whole process get you down. I've observed many job talks, from doctors and scholars in their field, who just self-implode when tasked with giving a public presentation. Just practice and put yourself out there. And video or audio-taping yourself is perhaps the most enlightening thing you can do.

I've seen speeches ruined by one supremely odd nervous tic. One man sat one a desk, and gradually contorted himself until he was sitting Indian style (for lack of a better term) Another was asked a question by a female faculty member (this was in a lecture hall with stadium style seating) and he approached the lady, redirected his body to address the wider audience, but unknowingly positioned his crotch directly in front of the question asker's face. To his luck, the female faculty member was our resident faculty feminist. Needless to say, he didn't get the job.

And thanks Mykevermin, I have to think of a simple, less imposing things I can do to minimize the stress of being observed.
 
No one has mentioned alcohol yet? If I have to give a public speech I ALWAYS have one or two drinks (usually shots) beforehand. Obviously don't get drunk (or even buzzed) but I find it helps me to relax and loosen up. I should note I don't make public speeches all that often and I hate doing it more than just about anything.
 
Good stuff, but here's some things I'd edit in your tips based on my knowledge and experience with oratory:

Presentational Tips

1. Always begin with an anticipatory hook. An anticipatory hook accomplishes numerous things: it establishes a rapport with the audience, it hooks the audience, it allows the audience to be invested in the topic at hand, and it also establishes a backdrop for what you intend to convey.

I really have no idea from this tip on how to implement this. You need to either give an example or use less jargon (what the hell is an anticipatory hook? It's a hook that you make because you anticipate something? What? Your next point? Also, what's a hook? Isn't that a rap chorus?)


2. Be loud, upright, and confident
Yup, but you should make it distinct the difference between yelling and projecting.


3. Don’t read off your notes as much as possible. Yet come back to your notes if you find yourself lost, or meandering. The audience won’t think lowly of you if you re-collect yourself.
I think that, depending on the presentation of course, you should endeavor to not reference notes at all. If you need to look at your notes, you're simply not prepared enough -- the major source of stress, anxiety, and issues with public speaking stem from not being prepared and therefore not being confident.


4. Find basic ways to establish a rapport with the audience.
Like what?

5. Eliminate nervous cues in your body, voice, and various tics. If you do ‘bad’ the audience will start to feel nervous for you instead of focusing on your presentation.
This is true, but it's easier said than done. I'd suggest like what others have by taping yourself: viewing yourself has a lot more...gravitas than being told what your tics are.

6. If you build material into your lecture guaranteed to elicit audience feedback, not only will the audience remain interested, but their positive response will renew your energy which improves your presentational style and attitude.

7. Slow down your rate of speech. Enunciate, and emphasize.

8. Sometimes preface important, interesting, or lively information with a “builder statement.” Something which telegraphs the nature of what you’re about to talk about. (Ex: ____ was huge. One of the most important ______. An incredibly hilarious example is_______) Cues and telegraphs are an integral part of presenting.
Ah, the rising tricolon! Not really a presentation device but more a compositional one, but still useful for rhetoric nonetheless.

9. Use transitions in long speeches- Transition from idea to idea, theme to theme, PowerPoint slide to PowerPoint slide. This gives the audience thematic, conceptual, or narrative linkages.
Again, you need to be more specific. What do you mean by transition? Something from George Lucas transitioning between scenes?

10. Don’t cover too much. Coverage overload is bad, ruins the investment of the audience, and will damage your presentation.

11. Be cognizant of your presentation length. Even if your presentation calls for an hour presentation make it 45 minutes. AS LONG AS WHAT YOU COVER ACCOMPLISHES ALL OBJECTIVES AND MAKES THE AUDIENCE FEEL INFORMED. Shorter presentations are better than longer presentations.

12. People, even smart people, love easily compartmentalized narratives. People buy into narratives. Narratives are ever present in movies, music, books, every major part of media we consume in daily life. The more you can fit your lecture or presentation into an overarching narrative, the more highly an audience will think of you. Due to your narrative semblace to a story or plotline, the audience will think you know more than you actually do, and they will come away truly feeling as though they experienced something. However, nothing betrays someone more than a forced, or false narrative. Don’t romanticize or sensationalize to achieve this objective. Balance people’s desire to believe, with their skepticism of the false.
 
[quote name='c0rnpwn']I really have no idea from this tip on how to implement this. You need to either give an example or use less jargon (what the hell is an anticipatory hook? It's a hook that you make because you anticipate something? What? Your next point? Also, what's a hook? Isn't that a rap chorus?)[/QUOTE]

Oh, the anticipatory hook, from what I know it as, is something that grabs the audiences' interests, and "hooks" them in into being more interested in what you're going to be talking about. For example (albeit a bad one), "Have you ever slept through an alarm and wished there was a better way to wake up in the mornings?"

Also, I personally don't think this is really useful unless your presentation is relatively short (5~10 min vs 30~60 min). People have short attention spans =)
 
Yeah, that's a huge key. The first minute or two of your talk has to hook the audience and make them want to listen to what you say.

You need to tell them what you're going to talk about, and do it in a way that grabs their attention right from the start.

It varies on what you're talking about as well. Presentations for me are presenting research at conferences etc., so my hook is selling what my study is about and why it's important to get the interested from the start.

And yep, length matters, as conference presentations are 15-20 minutes. Though hooks are still key for long presentations--I've seen a lot of job talks (30-45 minutes) that were great as the person had a hook, and lots that fell flat as the person just rambled from the start and people lost interest.

But again, giving a speech (at graduation, a politician) is different than giving a presentation. And if you're talking teaching, that type of presentations/speech is very different as well. So the purpose of the public speaking will impact the tips you give as well.
 
Yeah, I essentially knew what a hook is -- I was just playing devil's advocate to make his advice more complete. In classical rhetoric, this 'hook' is simply just the introduction, which is a more intuitive term IMO.
 
True. But every presentation, paper etc. has an introduction, but not all introductions have a hook that suck the audience in.

So that's the key to promote when teaching speaking, writing etc. The intro has to have a hook (or whatever you want to call it) to make the audience give a crap about what you have to say in the rest of the speech or paper etc.
 
[quote name='dmaul1114']True. But every presentation, paper etc. has an introduction, but not all introductions have a hook that suck the audience in.

So that's the key to promote when teaching speaking, writing etc. The intro has to have a hook (or whatever you want to call it) to make the audience give a crap about what you have to say in the rest of the speech or paper etc.[/QUOTE]

Yeah, I agree. We're just arguing semantics really :p

I would posit that an introduction is not even an introduction without intriguing (or as the ancients said, 'preparing the audience') the listener.
 
Just 2 things based on my personal experiences:

1. Stay away from something called propanolol. I've heard stories of and know of graduate students (mostly in pharm/tox and neurosci departments) that take it prior to presenting. One guy I know took too high a dose (some say he admitted to taking 2 instead of 1) and everyone said he sounded drunk, like slurring speech, during the last 3/4 of his departmental seminar.


2. If you're allowed something (non-alcoholic) to drink during your presentation, stick to water. I once made the mistake of bringing a soda (leftover from lunch) and it made my mouth super dry. During my Q&A, my advisor had to bring a bottle of water up to the podium.
 
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i read a lot about public speaking but in the end didn't feel it helped me. i got better, but it was just from practice, not from learning anything from others. best thing public speakers can do is speak publicly as often as possible. join a local Toastmasters chapter, volunteer to speak at every opportunity, TA quiz sections, etc. practicing bullshit public speaking not only helped me get better at important public speaking, but also helped my communication skills in general, particularly interviewing. confidence is the biggest factor.

[quote name='TedwardRoberts']Practice will always make or break a speech.[/QUOTE]
problem is speaking isn't always a speech, hard to practice a long lecture or a Q&A session

[quote name='dmaul1114']True. But every presentation, paper etc. has an introduction, but not all introductions have a hook that suck the audience in.

So that's the key to promote when teaching speaking, writing etc. The intro has to have a hook (or whatever you want to call it) to make the audience give a crap about what you have to say in the rest of the speech or paper etc.[/QUOTE]

in a TED talk i watched recently the speaker's hook made me think he was a moron and ruined his speech (well, other things ruined his speech too, but his bullshit hook was the beginning of it). he said something along the lines of "our ancestors are the key to understanding the meaning of life". my first and only thought was "he thinks he understands the meaning of life? what a jackass. why am i wasting my time listening to him again?"

not to say hooks are bad... just... don't force a hook if you dont have good one.
 
I took a speech class. I thought it was the best class I've taken so far in college and I always recommend my friends to take one. I don't regret it. A lot of my friends would probably classify me as the shy type, but that's only one a one-to-one basis (if you've taken a speech class, you'll learn that there's different types of nervousness that one may have on a communication level). However, I enjoy speaking in front of a crowd or group, especially in a class setting since people are forced to listen to me. After completing the class, I felt really confident just talking in general. The class taught me a lot.

I ended up giving the best man's speech at my brother's wedding. Can't say it didn't go as well as I wanted to. Oh well, I got good feedback. =]

I'd post a lot of tips, except that I feel that I'd have to go over EVERYTHING. So I'll try to keep it short.

1. Have an outline. Thesis and main ideas. Sounds simple, yet people skip and try and to improvise. Err...

2. Make sure the audience is following through and that your main ideas are linked together. Example, introduce main ideas in your introduction like, "First I will go over... second... and finally..." Then repeat those main ideas when you get to them. "First..." "Now that I've gone over (first idea), let's move on to (second idea)..." "The (second idea) now brings us to the (third idea)..." "Today, we have gone over (first idea), (second idea), and (third idea)." Again, this sounds kinda elementary but it really helps the audience follow along cause you're repeating the same stuff and they notice it. It's better for them to notice your speech rather than why you move your left foot too much.

3. Like it was mentioned in the OP, you want to begin your speech with an attention getter. And you want to bring back the audience to the attention getter back around in the end of your speech. Could be a small story, a joke, whatever (make sure it's clean). I remember in my speech class I gave this attention getter that went alongs the lines of this: "I didn't realize that I had a second family. I would rush home after school and see them just before dinner. They would make me laugh all night. This family is known as The Simpsons." Obviously my speech was on The Simpsons, and I tied back to that attention getter at the end of the speech.

4. Practice. Anywhere. Whether you recite it or not, you will benefit from it. When I practiced my speech, I would kinda go through the main ideas and time myself. All of our speeches were timed and I'd always go overboard during the runthrough. Though I never practiced again to fit within the time constraints, I somehow would never go over the time limit when I actually recited the speech. Why? I knew what parts of my outline I could skip. Why? I practiced. It helps in so many ways than just that: nervousness, the way you'll look when you're standing their, enunciation, tone, etc.

5. If you can, videotape yourself. In my speech class, we always videotaped our speeches. We had five speeches and after every speech, we would have to go back and watch ourselves to do a self-evaluation. A LOT of mistakes can be seen. You'll probably notice a few when you're up there actually giving the speech, but there definitely more than what you think. Anyways, this just teaches you about your mistakes and the steps you can make to minimize them.

looks like I wrote more than I thought I would... crap. Positive reinforcement is also good. You never want to tell yourself, "I'm gonna do so bad," cause then you're just increasing the chances that you'll perform badly.

there's a lot to go over. I think that's good enough. =p
 
[quote name='shinryuu']5. If you can, videotape yourself. In my speech class, we always videotaped our speeches. We had five speeches and after every speech, we would have to go back and watch ourselves to do a self-evaluation. A LOT of mistakes can be seen. You'll probably notice a few when you're up there actually giving the speech, but there definitely more than what you think. Anyways, this just teaches you about your mistakes and the steps you can make to minimize them.[/QUOTE]

I actually freeze up whenever a camera is introduced. I have no idea why. I have less trouble speaking in front of 50 people, than 5 people with a camera, even if I know I'll never see the recording myself.
 
[quote name='c0rnpwn']Yeah, I agree. We're just arguing semantics really :p

I would posit that an introduction is not even an introduction without intriguing (or as the ancients said, 'preparing the audience') the listener.[/QUOTE]

Thanks for your earlier advice, c0rnpwn. I hate to constantly interject and say thanks, but I truly appreciate all of this.

One of my friends mentioned a speaking club in Florida where if any presenter had an established "um" or "uh," people observing the speech would ring a bell everytime the presenter stammered on those words. That sounds intimidatingly helpful.
 
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