27th Apr2011

Toughest public speaking – the street entertainer

by Rich

I’ve set myself another challenge – to find the toughest public speaking gig ever.

For the purposes of this challenge, tough will equal ‘the most technically demanding’.

So what are my first thoughts?
I’m going to go with street performing as the toughest public speaking gig.

Why?
So much of what we read and learn about public speaking encourages us to put our audience first, to understand them and then to tailor our content for them.

Now lets think about the audience of a street entertainer – ever changing (day-by-day and minute-by-minute), nothing in common other than their desire to shop and to top it all – not actively seeking to hear to your message.

Imagine trying to give a presentation in your workplace if your colleagues kept getting up and leaving, or entering the room, were from teams irrelevant to your particular presentation topic and had a full to-do list they needed to get away and work on – tough, eh?

So how does the street entertainer overcome these obstacles? What sort of public speaking tactics does he/she employ?

- Consistently repeat your core message or reason for your actions, as your audience may have only been watching you for 30 seconds, not the last 30 minutes. That is, if you’re stood on a stool juggling knives, remind everyone ‘why’.

- Focus on the one thing your audience has in common. Oh dear – what is this amongst such a diverse and random group? In truth, it’s the last five seconds of your act, and everything that the audience can see (you, your knives, your stool, etc). From watching the very best street entertainers I’ve realised all of their humour focuses on visible and recent elements – there are very few running jokes.

- Be loud, and use your body to illustrate your message – wide gestures, big movements, indicative movements. Remember, in a noisy public place not everyone can hear you or see you fully.

I’ll keep thinking about the toughest public speaking gig, but I’m pretty sure after writing this post that I’d rather be giving a Powerpoint presentation tomorrow than juggling knives on a stool in a town centre!

Category : Speech analysis
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19th Apr2011

5 tips for increasing audience participation in training workshops

by Rich

This afternoon I ran a training workshop focusing on blogging and blogging strategy. The session was three hours long, and I was keen to break up a talk of this length with some interactive breaks to help promote thinking around the topic and the application of the ideas I was presenting by the audience to their business.

I was fortunate enough to have a quite responsive audience who were keen to throw ideas around and discuss the points raised. It got me thinking though – what if I hadn’t had such a willing audience?

Here’s five quick tips to increase audience participation in training workshops.

1. Give your audience the chance to participate. It sounds so simple, but so many speakers and trainers do not design their talks with supporting activities, materials or breaks. Make the interactive parts a natural piece of the talk to avoid it feeling stilted.

2. If the audience are struggling with a task, or are not vocal, re-ask the question, reframe it, or ask them to apply it to a fictional scenario. Often, not talking about themselves or applying ideas to others encourages an audience to air more radical, forward-thinking views and shake off what they see to be their own limitations.

3. Always have your own answers. If the audience isn’t forthcoming with answers to your questions, give example answers from your own experience to help fuel the discussion or activity.

4. Make an ally. There will always be one character in the room that is more dominant than the rest of the audience, use this character to start discussions, use them as a conduit to get others talking. For example, ask the character of the group, ‘what would (other member of the group) think about this, in your opinion?”. Once the character has given his/her opinion, the person in question will no doubt respond and a conversation begin.

5. Bring a thought provoker. If it’s not going well and it seems nothing will inspire your audience or get them animated, always have some relevant and thought provoking videos/images/concepts to present to them to really switch the whole atmosphere of the session and reframe the thought processes behind their thinking on your topic.

These were my first five thoughts after my workshop today – has anyone else any lessons that they have discovered in increasing audience participation in training workshops?

Category : Featured, Public Speaking Tips
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