Posted: Aug. 25, 2011

Reprinted by Permission of Professor Chris Palmer - School of Communication, American University

How to be a star speaker

1. Start preparing at least a month in advance.
2. Make one of your goals to create good theater that has a motivating and magical effect on your audience. Your goal is to speak compellingly from your deepest convictions. Make a commitment not to be boring, mediocre or colorless.
3. List the desired outcomes from your presentation. Establish clear goals (e.g. advance an agenda, produce some action, or build a stronger relationship). Write these goals with emotional juice. For example, instead of writing ‘Give a good speech,’ write ‘Give an electrifying speech that moves the audience to feel passionate about joining our campaign.’
4. Don’t begin by drafting an outline. Instead, act like a madman and free up the creative idea-generator within you by brainstorming. Only after that non-judgmental brainstorming should you produce an outline.
5. Write out the whole speech word for word based on the outline. Never let anyone write it for you. Use simple, vivid and conversational language.
6. Revise it relentlessly. Then revise it again. (Ed: then again…)


Read more: http://realscreen.com/2008/03/01/page66-20080301/#ixzz1W6RHHwoQ

Professor Chris PalmerAuthor of Shooting in the Wild: An Insider's Account of Making Movies in the Animal Kingdom  (Sierra Club Books, 2010)Distinguished Film Producer in ResidenceDirector, Center for Environmental FilmmakingSchool of Communication, American Universitycell 202-716-6160; office 202-885-3408Center website: www.environmentalfilm.org SOC profile: http://www.american.edu/soc/faculty/palmer.cfm Shooting in the Wild on Facebook: http://on.fb.me/gOTUlc Shooting in the Wild website: http://bit.ly/a4L3LU Chris’s Facebook site: http://www.facebook.com/#!/chrispalmer47 Follow me on Twitter @chrispalmer_au Chris’s blog: http://soc-palmer.blogs.american.edu/  President, One World One Ocean FoundationPresident, MacGillivray Freeman Films Educational Foundationcpalmer@mffeducation.orgwww.mffeducation.org Chief Executive Officer, VideoTakes, Inc.chris@videotakes.comwww.videotakes.com