No one is a born speaker

Today an intriguing caption in my office inspired me. It was about elephant and its mind-set. The master ties a rope around the young elephant’s leg to secure it. It attempts to break free, initially, several times, but fails to succeed. The process conditions the elephant to believe that they can never break free. They gradually grow, as magnificent creatures, carrying a strong belief that they can never break free.

I am sure you would have observed this. If the elephant wanted to, it could easily break free from its bond. Nevertheless, it does not attempt. Why? Because these creatures continue to believe, that it is impossible for them to break free. The powerful and gigantic creature has limited its present abilities by the limitations of its past.

Now tell me, like the elephants how many of us go through life holding on to a belief that we cannot do something, simply because we failed at it once before? How many of you refuse to attempt something challenging and new because of our so-called mind set?

Although I have had success in many areas, I was always hesitant to write articles, even for an in-house newsletter. I was hesitant because I failed few times before, some years ago, in my attempt. I never tried again, until last month, when one of my friend Sailesh inspired me with his blog. I thought why not try it? I challenged my own belief system, broke free, and started writing. Today, I am able to write better than yesterday, and tomorrow I am sure I will write even better. Had I not made this attempt, I would have lived an ordinary life of a powerful gigantic creature, limiting my present abilities by the limitations of its past.

Like me, I know many who aspire to speak in public and want to make a difference, are hesitant to take action. However, they dread doing it attributing to their previous failure. I tell them, “Friend, believe in yourself and say that you can do it, and you will certainly do it”.

However, while a speaker delivers a powerful speech, flawlessly, I know many who admire the speaker’s ability and think they are born speakers. The fact is we seldom realize that what might seem to be ‘effortless’, is a result of days and even weeks of editing and practice. We can learn to speak effectively.

Speaking is a skill that you can learn. Let me narrate, you can learn how to select points to inform, entertain or persuade. You can learn to structure it in such a way to make the listeners follow you clearly, you can learn to hide nerves and anxiety, you can pretend to exhibit confidence, verve, and happiness. You can learn to modulate your voice, increase or decrease the rate, alter volume, and choose to use the right pitch. In addition, you can learn to exhibit natural gestures, eye contact, and body language, introduce stance and even learn to pause to add power. There is a lot more, but I can tell you one thing, you can learn these skills by practice.

Now, let me tell you for this to happen, you must break free. Break the rope of ‘mind set’ and attempt continually no matter how many times you turn unsuccessful. You must not waste your life, by limiting your present abilities by the limitations of its past. Refuse to live the life of an ordinary elephant. Try, the responsibilty is yours.

I wrote this article for those who aspire to speak, and deserve more from life, and who wishes to break the rope. Grab the speaking opportunity you get. After all no speaker is a born speaker!

If you feel this article has helped you, please tell others. If not, tell me how I can improve further.

Are you broadcasting on wrong frequency?

On a cold December evening, I walked through the breezy meadows of Ooty golf links while the sun gradually dipped. I rubbed my palms to generate some heat. Jaggi, my wife was with her father, walking few steps ahead of me. We were getting late for a bon fire that was about to start at the sterling holiday resorts, the hotel where we stayed. I knew that, we had to bear the freezing cold waves for at least another 20 minutes. Jaggi as she walked, turned suddenly, looked at me, held my hands and asked ‘Zenith, are we cooking our dinner today?’

Before I could respond to Jaggi, the time keeper who times every session of a toastmaster meeting, awakened me by a tap on the resonant stainless steel bell, describing the 20 seconds time limit for speaking on a round robin session. It was yet another day I went ‘down route 350’. How often have you drifted away, like me, from the speaker, while he seriously delivered his speech? This happens because you broadcast on wrong frequency. Let me first explain briefly, what this down route 350 is all about. Are you ready for it?

Okay, let me ask you a question. Do you know that communication is a two way process? Since it is a two way process, it is important to know how people really listen. Human mind normally processes 500 words per minute. Whereas, we listen at approximately 150 words per minute, some times even lesser, when it comes to the Asian continent. The difference between the two is 350. When listeners switch off, and stops listening to your speech, chances are that they are on 'down route 350’, drifting their thoughts away from you.

Having known what this ‘350’ is, let me now take you to a typical listener and his brain processes. While listening, the listener is assessing, digesting, rejecting or accepting. The fact is, listeners judge both you and your content continually. The moment the speech becomes predictable, the moment you do not answer the questions the audience have in their mind, chances are that your listeners are walking along with me on the meadows rubbing their palms and generating some heat.

I cannot give you a quick fix solution here, as this is a vast subject and is a challenge for even professional speakers. However, I will suggest an archaic, but quite effective technique that the press, media, moviemakers, speakers and organizations are effectively using. It is called 5W1H (Why, When, Where, What, Who & How). While writing your speech ensure that, you have answered these powerful six questions. It need not be a straightforward answer, again, you could answer some question later to build climax and twist. Nevertheless, you must answer these questions. Some of you may be aware of 5W1H, all what I am asking is to apply it in your speech.

Before you deliver your next speech, see if your speech clears the 5W1H test. Believe me, I do this not only for my speeches but even while reporting an incident to my boss, or even while preparing for a meeting etc., It has been working fabulous for me, in that, I am able to broadcast at the right frequency.

While I may not be successful in eliminating the ‘going down route 350’ completely, I will certainly be able to reduce the gap!

If you feel this article has helped you, please tell others. If not, tell me how I can improve it further.

Don’t marginalize your audience, speak like Ronald Reagan...

Last week, I fell sick and visited a nearby doctor in the evening. He was a general physician, middle aged, smart and well dressed, with some medical books piled on his table. My wife and I returned dissatisfied and confused, unable to understand the technical terms he used. My wife Jaggi said, “Zenith forget it, he appears to be new to Dubai, and must have applied the terms he just learned”. How often have you experienced such people, who confuse you either with jargon, or with a word that is uncommon?

I know some people delivering speeches, mostly the address, the same way as the doctor did. You might have wondered after hearing to such speeches, what was he trying to convey? Many people do this inadvertently and some others deliberately. This article would help both.

Reagan all the time speaks to people and not over them. His speech was understood from an ordinary road worker to a delegate of Harvard. He never marginalized the audience, instead engaged them through out the speech. His words were simple, understood by all, and had the audience buying to him and his message. Do you want to know how? It is simple, and you can also do it with three simple steps. I have been addressing diverse audience week after week, and have little time to prepare; however, the three steps have helped me most of the time. Here are they:

Number one, organize your speech. When I say organize, I mean tell the audience what you are going to tell them, tell what you wanted to tell them, and then tell them what you have just said to them. Believe me, audience wants to get spoon fed, in that, they want you to structure it for them, right from the start. This will also help them learn, what is in store for them from you. This is the truth of the matter. Try it.

Number two, make it easy for them to follow. You may arrange the points in such a way that you encourage the audience to follow. I prefer arranging it numerically, the way I have written this article. Okay, stop reading for a moment and look at the previous paragraph, how does it start? You got it! I said, Number one, organize your speech….Number two, make it easy to follow and so on…

Number three, make your finest point at first and last. It works! This will help you to start with a bang and come off stage with a bang.

Try speaking to people and not over them, next time, using the recommended tips. If it works, write to me and also tell others. If it doesn’t work, write to me without fail, because one anonymous reader said, comments are crystals of buildiing blocks. I value those crystals to build a quality blog.

The highest compliment you get is when some one in the audience leaves your discussion feeling as though you were talking to them.

These are doable, and let us become a lovable doctor who communicates powerfully.

Building a Speech with any Topic

Writing a speech sounds simple – you start with an attention grabbing opening, move on to some really interesting stuff, and then finally end with a strong conclusion. Now, it might sound simple, but where do you go for the ideas?

Many friends have told me, “Zenith I have chosen a topic, but don’t have ideas to develop it”. This is the truth, and most of us get stuck at some place, unable to make progress, having faced with ‘writers block’. How often do you face with ‘writers block’ while trying to write a speech, article or even an email to your colleague? If you haven’t faced with ‘writers block’ yet, then, this article is not for you. It is meant for those who keep thinking, chewing and eating the back of the pen, without much of ideas.

A fortnight ago, the President of Creek toastmasters club, Mr.Kishor Mathew met me at the DTAC, in Abu Dhabi and said, “Zenith, we have a problem. We want to know how to choose a topic and further, how to develop it into a speech”. Can you do an education session to our members?” I liked his passion, the glint in his eyes, and the desire to help his club members. I accepted the call, and developed a three step formula to build a speech from any topic. It was Mr.Kishor, who created the impetus in me to produce a specially tailored presentation for creek members. I am sharing the very same presentation with you in this blog. Read on and see if this technique works for you. If it does, I would have the fulfillment that I have touched another life. If it doesn’t, at least I have shared a method that works for me and some of my friends. I have been using this technique, and it has worked for me most of the time.

First, before we proceed to the three steps, we must understand one thing, ‘the doom’ – doom is a little voice sitting in our head and telling all the time, your ideas are stupid. The key to success is to find a way to make that ‘little voice’ shut up for a while and then putting ‘something’ on a blank of paper. Good or bad, some ideas listed on a paper are better than a plain blank paper. And, the best way to do this is by allowing your mind to wander free. When you stop trying to control your thought, ideas surface gradually.

Now that you know what the ‘doom’ is, and you know what to do with it, let us start the three steps:

One, Getting Ideas
Two, Choosing Ideas and
Three, outlining your ideas

Getting Ideas, for this to happen as said earlier you must allow your mind to wander freely. Never try to control your conscious brain and force a thought. No, instead allow it to wander, and to your surprise you will find that, suddenly from some where the ideas start flowing. This happens because your ‘conscious’ brain is switched off and the ‘unconscious’ brain is switched on. It is the ‘unconscious’ part that gives you prolific ideas. The unconscious brain is like the 2/3rd of an ice berg that is below water and bolsters the 1/3rd that is above the waters.

Ideas could be listed freely in a piece of paper or may be placed in small ‘idea bubbles’ that develops in to a ‘cluster diagram’ or a ‘spider group’. Messier the clusters, better your ideas and writing would be. Believe me, it works fabulous for me. Now, research each of the ideas from the list or cluster diagram using search engines, books, or real time experience of people. This real time experience would add value to each of your ideas and also would add another dimension. A research could convert your ‘ordinary and lifeless’ speech in to a vivid one that is believable. I searched google with the words ‘speech title’ to find 29.8 million pages. Ask.com threw 24.4 million pages on the same topic. This demonstrates the plethora of information that is available for us today in this scientific world.

Once you have the ideas, the next task is to choose the ones that will work for you and discard the ones that may not work. Let me tell you something, this is your writing, and no one is going to see it unless you show it. Hence, do it with no inhibition.
To choose the right ideas, I use three tests to determine if they qualify for my speech. I place the acronyms, ‘F’, ‘S’ and ‘D’, against each of the ideas. The letters expand as below:

F = Feeling test
S = Story test and
D= Description test

Idea passes the ‘F’ test, if you get an answer to the question, ‘Could I use this idea to get the reader’s feelings involved to make them amused, frightened, angry, or pleased?’.

An idea passes ‘S’ test if the idea is a part of any ‘event’. And, an idea passes the ‘D’ test if you are able to draw a picture out of it.

Once you have chosen your ideas and discarded the ones, that fails the above tests, you are almost ready to move to the next step, called outlining.

‘Outlining’ is nothing but a plan. You need a plan in place, before you start writing your first draft. I used the power of ‘outlining’ to write this article. Outlining can be done using Index Cards. Writing one idea in one card is a great idea, as it gives the flexibility to shuffle and rearrange the ideas in the sequence you desire. Writing and re-wring may take hours, while index card could be moved around to see those connections that you would never have seen otherwise.

Now, before moving the cards to arrange, I suggest to use a theme that is flowing from these cards. The ideas are developed from one ‘word’ and then you progress with supporting ideas. If you take the example of ‘water’ which is what I used at the Creek Toastmasters, because one of the speakers did a good speech on water. The word ‘water’ could be developed further in to types, advantages, purifying and cleansing effects, its presence in human body, and its presence in earth etc etc.

You have the index cards; you have the theme, now I suggest you use the ‘Burger’ method to arrange your cards. Few cards for the beginning, few for the middle and few for the end. The beginning and end referred here are not the ‘Attention Grabbing Opening (AGO)’ and the ‘Powerful Conclusion (PC)’. Never overdo your burger, or it will look something like this…

Never ever start writing with AGO and PC, as these are normally perfect sentences and written with care in the end after forming a structure. If you are determined to start writing with AGO and PC, then I can assure you that, you will have a tough time with your own ‘Doom’.

Having organized your sequence using the index card, in line with the theme, using the burger method, you are now ready to write your first draft. Write it without stopping and turning back from start to end, with good or bad grammar, whatever it is, keep writing sentence after sentence till you reach the last index card. Once done, you can edit, proof read, polish and finish a well structured speech. This is the time you embellish the speech with an ‘attention grabbing opening’ and a ‘powerful conclusion’.

The aim of this article is only to touch upon the three steps; getting ideas, choosing the ideas, using the ‘FSD Tests’ and outlining the ideas to tailor an appealing speech by helping you reap ideas from your own ice berg that is hidden beneath. For full presentation in PDF format, please click the below link.

If you like this article and if you feel it has made some sense, please post your views. On the other hand, if you feel this article could be improved, please post your suggestions.

http://www.scribd.com/full/16359838?access_key=key-19d3lu9rwvmeszcrrwbc