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Everyone probably has some good advice for public speaking. Here's my #1 piece: Slow the fuck down! You don't "win" at public speaking by getting more words

by beloch 13y ago

Everyone probably has some good advice for public speaking. Here's my #1 piece: Slow the fuck down! You don't "win" at public speaking by getting more words in. In fact, you'll likely lose your audience by going a mile a minute. It makes perfect sense, but it's still hard to do. You can practice your talk in private a hundred times and it'll be X minutes. You can present your talk to colleagues and co-workers and it'll be X minutes. Then, when you get in front of a room full of strangers, the adrenaline will hit, you'll go into manic-caffeine-squirrel mode, and you'll blast it out in X/2 minutes! Some people deliberately make their talks too long, knowing they'll finish early if they don't. This is a mistake. They're just cramming too much material into the time allowed and will shell-shock their audience. Slow the fuck down! The method by which you slow the fuck down is going to be somewhat personal. Different things work for different people. Personally, I do a lot better if I've gotten to know even just a few people in the room a tiny bit. If I can get a few people (hopefully in the front row) into the colleague-zone, I can focus on them during the talk and ignore the strangers.

JoeAltmaier 13y ago
Famously Kennedy talked fast because he learned that people can talk at most ~200 words per minute but can understand ~600 (or some such). So talk fast to keep people's attention. If you're going to talk slow, make sure you say something worth thinking about in there, so folks' wheels are turning during the silences. With practice you can judge where the wheels have got to, and feed right into that with your next remark.
- beloch 13y ago
  Kennedy doesn't speak that fast compared to people in manic-caffeine-squirrel mode. He downright ambles through his talks compared to many I've heard, and he slows down for the important bits too! Also, comprehension doesn't always result in retention, which is what you really want your audience to come out of your talk with, unless you're a politician and you just want to leave an emotional impression like "Wow, this guy is really great and I'm so happy I'll probably even vote for him again!". In fact, I bet the very last thing most politicians want is for you to remember everything they said four years ago! For most of us, public speaking is about sharing ideas, and if you can say something with fewer words your audience has a better chance of remembering it.
HCIdivision17 13y ago
I've repeated advice given to me: speak so slow you feel silly, then slow down. This is great advice or large audiences. Speaking slowly ensures that the audience can understand every word, even non-native speakers. More than that, large groups may be varying distances from sound amplification, meaning the only way to cope with the inevitable rumble/echo is to modulate slower than it. This isn't such a big deal in groups that are easily in ear-shot without amplification, but it will definitely help prevent the speech from turning into a race to decompress an idea fastest! And it also helps prime your style, so that when you inevitably hit your stride, it fails normal, not fast. Granted, if you have a strong command of yourself, then you needn't worry about it, but then you already have a style you're comfortable with and works.
jrockway 13y ago
I get this piece of feedback a lot when I give my talks, since I usually try to pack about 6 hours of material into 20 minutes. But honestly, I get really bored when speakers do slow down, so I'm kind of conflicted: am I aiming my talk at myself, or am I aiming it at a person that supposedly exists but I don't intrinsically know?
- randomdrake 13y ago
  This has absolutely nothing to do with who you're aiming at and everything to do with our general tendency to speak way too fast publicly. As a techie who has given talks that was a professional actor for many years as well, I can tell you, with confidence, that "slow down" is just generally good advice for absolutely everyone who must be on stage in front of a crowd. Some people are just fine and don't have to worry about this. However, for most people, even well trained stage actors, it is completely unconscious that you are speeding up and you will almost certainly not be aware when it's happening. So, if you just remember: "slow down" whether you feel like you're talking fast or not, chances are you're just slowing down to "just right."
  - jrockway 13y ago
    Hmm, OK. I'll give it a try.

by beloch 13y ago

JoeAltmaier 13y ago

Famously Kennedy talked fast because he learned that people can talk at most ~200 words per minute but can understand ~600 (or some such). So talk fast to keep people's attention. If you're going to talk slow, make sure you say something worth thinking about in there, so folks' wheels are turning during the silences. With practice you can judge where the wheels have got to, and feed right into that with your next remark.

beloch 13y ago
Kennedy doesn't speak that fast compared to people in manic-caffeine-squirrel mode. He downright ambles through his talks compared to many I've heard, and he slows down for the important bits too! Also, comprehension doesn't always result in retention, which is what you really want your audience to come out of your talk with, unless you're a politician and you just want to leave an emotional impression like "Wow, this guy is really great and I'm so happy I'll probably even vote for him again!". In fact, I bet the very last thing most politicians want is for you to remember everything they said four years ago! For most of us, public speaking is about sharing ideas, and if you can say something with fewer words your audience has a better chance of remembering it.

HCIdivision17 13y ago

I've repeated advice given to me: speak so slow you feel silly, then slow down. This is great advice or large audiences. Speaking slowly ensures that the audience can understand every word, even non-native speakers. More than that, large groups may be varying distances from sound amplification, meaning the only way to cope with the inevitable rumble/echo is to modulate slower than it. This isn't such a big deal in groups that are easily in ear-shot without amplification, but it will definitely help prevent the speech from turning into a race to decompress an idea fastest! And it also helps prime your style, so that when you inevitably hit your stride, it fails normal, not fast. Granted, if you have a strong command of yourself, then you needn't worry about it, but then you already have a style you're comfortable with and works.

jrockway 13y ago

I get this piece of feedback a lot when I give my talks, since I usually try to pack about 6 hours of material into 20 minutes. But honestly, I get really bored when speakers do slow down, so I'm kind of conflicted: am I aiming my talk at myself, or am I aiming it at a person that supposedly exists but I don't intrinsically know?

randomdrake 13y ago
This has absolutely nothing to do with who you're aiming at and everything to do with our general tendency to speak way too fast publicly. As a techie who has given talks that was a professional actor for many years as well, I can tell you, with confidence, that "slow down" is just generally good advice for absolutely everyone who must be on stage in front of a crowd. Some people are just fine and don't have to worry about this. However, for most people, even well trained stage actors, it is completely unconscious that you are speeding up and you will almost certainly not be aware when it's happening. So, if you just remember: "slow down" whether you feel like you're talking fast or not, chances are you're just slowing down to "just right."
- jrockway 13y ago
  Hmm, OK. I'll give it a try.