The Talk of Your Life.

Which way do you read that?

The TALK of your life.

or

The talk of your LIFE.

I want to talk about both.

In coaching speakers toward a major talk – i.e. a Keynote address to 1000, a major presentation and of course, many TEDx talks – I have seen a recurring theme as one of the outcomes. Many, if not all, as a result of preparing the talk of their lives change the talk of their lives.

“I have not taught the same way since I delivered that TEDx talk in 2011,” reported Dr. Maryanna Klatt, a professor at The Ohio State University.

So what can be learned about how we prepare, organize, sequence and deliver our more casual deliveries of messages from the times that we have to stand at the podium with blaring lights in our faces, headsets taped to our cheeks and an audience of people expecting to be engaged.  Even if you never have a chance to delivery that “platform” speech, you will more deeply understand what speakers like Maryanna experienced to apply to your own everyday deliveries.

In this series I hope to tease out many lessons I have learned over the last few years from my clients and TEDx speakers. I have read most (if not all) the books on presentation skills, public speaking, storytelling, but I have yet to find one that anchors from the point of view of the speaker him or herself.   As I collaborate with dozens and dozens of individuals in helping them find their voice, their content and their story for the talks of their lives, I hope to reveal insight about mindset, organization, structure, story curation, practice and delivery that others can learn from.

I’m thrilled to have the collaboration of Rich Bowers who last year, during TEDxColumbus, built an archive of video footage for a documentary of a few speakers working their way through the TEDx pathway — from being selected to actually presenting.  We expect to do the same again this year to compare with last year’s findings.  We wanted to better understand what it took to prepare for this Talk of their Lives.  Stay tuned for the findings.  They may surprise you.

From the collaboration with Rich in addition to a host of data I’ve collected from my own ongoing clients, I hope to produce a useful series of posts that will help anyone prepare for any talk. Many of these topics I have blogged about for the last few years, but hope to sequence and relate to you, the speaker, in the order you need them.  And the expectation is that it may change the way you change every talk you give in your life, not just the TALK of your life.

By RuthM. on 1/23/13, In Speaker Tips, storytelling, TED, TEDxColumbus, The Talk of Your Life, Tags Presentation, Public Speaking Preparation, Public Speaking Skills, storytelling, TED, The Talk of Your Life