The length of the speech doesn’t always matter

Time doesn’t matter when it comes to public speaking.  Five minutes or fifty, the act of creating and polishing a presentation is remarkably similar, both in time and energy. There is false security in the statement “It’s just a five minute speech.”  A five minute speech can be as difficult to craft as an hour…

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Call for Input: tell me what you want to learn!

I’m in full planning mode for the January – April season of classes and workshops, and I’d love to hear what you want and need.  Is there a particular speaking skill that is eluding you? Is there something about your presentations that is stressing you out?  Have you ever wanted to take a fun class to learn…

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Wooing with honesty and generosity

I don’t fall in love quickly.  If a really fantastic thinker crosses my path, I might follow her videos and blog for a year before really falling in love.  A great speaker might cross my radar, but I won’t giggle like a besotted teenager until I’ve figured out if the rest of his stuff is…

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TL:DR and the Marginal Utility of Words

If you strip away some of the more complex quantifications, there are many economics concepts that can be applied to business and public speaking. (If you are new here, you may not have encountered a full blast of my nerdy nature.  Consider yourself initiated, and hang on for the ride). Right now, I’m delighted by…

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Things don’t always go according to plan

Actually, things rarely go according to plan. Take today, for instance.  Take this very post. I had planned to re-launch my blog today after months of inactivity.  I had temporarily suspended active posting while I re-vamped my website and created a raft of new content ready for regular publication.  Planning, writing, designing, building – for a…

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Editing Heavily

It is hard to chop content out of your presentation.  You worked on it, you had a vision of where you wanted to go and how you would go about getting there.  You filled that presentation chock full of ideas.  It was loaded with stuff that you wanted to share with your audience.  You crafted…

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Conversations with ourselves

People like you and I spend a lot of time planning words that we are to deliver to other people.  It’s impossible to get away from it, really.  Every speech is a conversation, every conversation contains mini-speeches, and this is true whether the speeches or conversations are pre-conceived, rehearsed, or utterly spontaneous. We focus so…

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So you are not outspoken…

There are people who come to me for help because they love speaking and want to get better at it. There are people who come to me for help because they are terrified of speaking, because they are desperately uncomfortable being heard and raising their voice, or because their shyness has started to get in…

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