Public Speaking

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Mentorship

Toastmasters have a mentorship role integrated into the growth curve for members. We use it, adapt it with our youth club.

  • Participation as a mentor helps a member grow personally.
  • Mentorship is all about doing something and not being something. It’s more like peer to peer support, teamwork.
  • A member can be both a mentor and also mentee to different people.
  • If buddies help each other with speech preparation, that is fine, too.

Ideas that came from brainstorming at one of our meetings:

  1. A mentor can help the mentee prepare for the speech.
    • Brainstorming speech topics
    • Helping with speech preparation – compiling ideas, logical organization, etc.
  2. A mentor can guide and support mentees after the speech, continuing the feedback loop (what was planned, how it went …etc.). A mentor can help mentee implement suggestions from the feedback.
  3. A mentor can be friends with peers (other members), make them even more comfortable, and be a valuable resource for them.

Keys to success of this:

  • If anytime, the mentee isn’t ready to talk or open up, the mentor pulls back. As a mentor, you are a resource, you make yourself available, but you aren’t there to impose anything if the mentee isn’t ready. So, it’s more of a relationship that develops over time during the session. Again, if the mentee isn’t prepared to receive, the mentor should take a step back, and think of ways to make the mentee feel comfortable. When mentee initiates conversations, it becomes so much more fun, meaningful, and productive.
  • Relationships develop over informal, friendly exchanges outside the meetings.
  • If any member thinks of this as interference, he or she would rather not deal with, no need for this in that case. Coaches are still there to support.

Why do this idea of mentorship?

  • A similar age group and friendships hopefully bring more fun for teenagers.
  • Mentor and mentee both learn teamwork.
  • Mentorship is a strong leadership skill to develop; teenagers can use this rest of their lives.
  • If it works, members have additional support.

We will figure projects in the Competent Leadership (CL) manual where members can get credit. That way, it contributes towards their Competent Leadership (CL) award.

Other areas where mentors can help:

  1. Help coaches with meeting planning, coordination for a week (just one week, or maybe two if you can make time for it). For that week, communicate with all in the group, get speech titles, confirm roles, budget meeting time, bring printed agenda to the meeting.
  2. Bring table topics around a specific theme, and run table topics session (be a table topics master).
  3. When you have ideas, insights, observations as to where members need more help, bring it up to any of the coaches; this can be a priceless feedback loop. Coaches will listen to your ideas.
  4. If you’d like to do this and have time:
      • Create fun video clips to explain specific ideas; we can publish this to our blog (this website).
      • Take any of the blog posts we have for the theme, and start conversations among members using comments area.
      • Create new blog posts even if you have ideas.

Every single bit that you contribute to help others helps you grow and develop further as well.

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Table Topics – Impromptu Speaking

At the Toastmasters meeting, the table topics master brings table topics for members. They might develop a theme around a series of questions. For example, it can be about colors, friendships, sports, movies, fiction, high school locker room, or Halloween … the sky is the limit where you can take table topics.

You have 20-30 seconds to think about your answer as a speaker. Why is that? Because that’s all, you got. Remember now that with toastmasters, nobody judges where you are taking it. Okay, to be a contrarian, totally okay to have humor in there; bring in a surprise, maybe. You are talking to your friends, after all.

 Use the P-R-E-P technique (Point – Reason – Example – Point)

  • Make your point.
  • Give your reason for that.
  • Give a few examples from your perspective, experience, and thoughts.
  • Close out the talk by making your point again.

 Use the Pros and Cons Technique

Explain the pros and cons of the potential direction, or answer. After that, give your recommendation.

Learn more about these two techniques in this video:

 

Make a point, and tell a story about it.

“Let me tell you what happened when I was doing that last …”

Make your story specific with details of where/when it happened. Use real names in it as well. That will make it so much easier to open up.

 When the topic is about a social issue, or something generic, think of how it relates to you, how it can impact your life personally, and develop it.

 

Example One: What do you think of the year-round school schedule?

Personal angle to it in your answer. Are you on a schedule like that? What would you do if you had a program like this? What does it mean to you personally? How does it relate to you? Talk about it. Pull in a personal story maybe (for example, we were able to have a two-month vacation to India last summer because …). It also naturally helps you connect with your audience since there is an emotional pull to it that usually comes from inside.

If you take to a direction to talk about the overall advantages and disadvantages of the schedule to students in general, it will require that you come up with a list of reasons in real-time. You can still deliver a compelling statement; it may not be as easy as a personal angle.

 

Example Two: What do you think about the legalization of marijuana?

Personal angel to your answer: How can it impact your safety and well-being? How can it change or improve your options and prospects?

 

Note: Now, if it is an actual job interview or something at school, would you be more careful about what to say? The answer is yes, of course. With the Toastmasters table topics, we are developing “muscle” to think on our feet. So, okay, and even better, to have fun with it. Also, remember that for situations at school, you are much more prepared naturally, as a question is related to the subject matter (and not something random). At a job interview, if it is about what you put in your resume, then you know so much about it, to begin with, that’d help you.

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Let’s Connect: Three Techniques

LET’S FOCUS ON THESE THREE IDEAS:

  1. Develop ideas in your own words. What does it mean?
    • Have a list of critical points to develop in your speech. Think about how these points tie into your overall message.
    • Develop each key point in your own words as they come to you naturally.
    • Avoid trying to memorize the whole speech verbatim.
    • Avoid reading the whole speech from paper or phone.
  2. While delivering your speech, think of meaningful eye contact with at least a few in your audience, if not all. You make eye contact with a person just long enough so that person feels a personal connection to you. Do this with many people in the audience, if not all. When you do that, public speaking becomes one-on-one speaking with people in attendance, one person at a time..
  3. Make a conscious attempt to deliver the message with vocal variety.
    • Change in projection
    • Change in pace of your speech delivery
    • Vary your pitch
    • Pauses to take deep breathes, pauses when you are trying to develop words (no need for filler words 🙂 )
    • Stretch critical words in your message for emphasis

Deven had given this speech below at his club in Orange, Paul Revere Toastmasters, to record video on this. It has more on the three ideas, and specific things to try with each:

[Deven’s note: While watching the video recording of my speech, I noticed that my eye contact didn’t come through for someone watching it now. This room set up is such that the width of the room is almost four times as much as depth. When I speak, there are more people to my sides than in the front. If I were to do it again, I’d look at Mark much more, or more specifically, at his iPhone, so the video shows my eye contact. 🙂    

How about hand gestures? I didn’t try anything specifically for the hand gestures.   

While practicing the three things, you naturally develop hand gestures over time. Every person should and probably would have his/her gestures. There are specific techniques about making your hand gestures full/big and holding them for impact, useful to develop awareness about it. Use feedback loop at toastmasters to cultivate a mindset for hand gestures, try the ideas, you will build your body language in time.

Click on this link to see Deven’s notes for this presentation.  (It is a .PDF file, opens in a new window/tab).]

CONTENT ORGANIZATION

  • Deliver your message in a clear direction. Organize the message with clarity. Use our speech preparation framework (click to download – opens in a new tab).
  • Read and think about your project objectives. Toastmasters manuals have explained each project well, take your time to understand it all, absorb it, and then most importantly, try to use it in your speech preparation and delivery.
  • Prepare and make a sincere attempt.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT:

  • Stay true to your natural self when you speak, no need to pretend to be someone else.
  • Be vulnerable. Show, express, channel your emotions.
  • Trying is all we ask at toastmasters. Give it a shot. There are no judgments here, neither from your peers nor from the coaches.
  • Maintain your speech bank. When an idea comes up to you, jot it down. It will become an excellent repository of topics for you. Keep it with you at every Toastmasters meeting.
  • Think about your next speech now; no need to wait till the last week. Think about potential topics, what you would/could do for it, …etc. It will do wonders for your confidence and comfort level.
  • Have fun with your speech; it is your speech topic, after all. You can take it wherever you like.
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Cultivate Credibility using Different Roles

  1. Evaluations and constructive feedback
  2. Three specific techniques for prepared speeches
  3. Different roles at toastmasters meeting
  4. Impromptu speaking with Table Topics

Learn to give meaningful constructive feedback using speech evaluations (one-on-one evaluations). I think this should be our top priority this session.

This helps in a number of ways:

  • Effective listening
  • Critical thinking
  • Understanding speaker from his or her perspective
  • Cultivate empathy – ability to feel like the way other person does
  • Articulating a coherent message combining different ideas you capture when speaker speaks and objectives for a specific objective
  • Striking one-on-one conversation with the speaker to share your feedback, your opinion, your reaction to the speech in a constructive way

See more on it in this post on Evaluations (click on this link).

Emotional connection with individuals in audience is so critical. If they love you as a speaker, they will want to listen to you, they will root for you when you stand up and speak.

We focus on specific ideas and techniques that’d help develop emotional connection with audience.

Learn more about three specific ideas to focus this session, video talk on it, and also your support system as a speaker(click on this link).

Click on this link to see more on this.

Table topics forces you to think on your feet.

It is an empowering skill to develop. So much of our speaking is impromptu, whether that is in group meetings, interviews, customer support, answering questions during training, etc.

Why emphasize table topics with the theme of credibility?

  • Table topics help us stay in the flow of the moment. When you do that, your ability to connect emotionally grows very quickly.
  • You develop “muscle” to think on your feet and develop ideas on the spot. It will make you better in all kinds of communication.
  • It makes you more comfortable under your skin, it makes you more natural.

See more about table topics (click on this link).

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Storytelling

Stories are compelling. Storytelling is around for thousands of years. We, humans, are hardwired to tell and share stories. It comes so naturally to us.

  1. Stories create an opportunity to tap into our emotions, and then to express them naturally.
  2. Stories can help you develop vocal variety, facial expressions, hand gestures, eye contact, and body language much faster.
  3. Stories can help you be more comfortable under your skin, and that is an empowering asset to have as a person, as a communicator, and as a leader.
  4. Stories can help you make friends, warm up to others, cultivate relationships.
  5. Stories can be a powerful catalyst to mold people’s views, perspectives, opinions.
  6. Stories create help create a new perspective to look at a situation; they can help you, and your audience sees it in a different light.

A Story Can Be … 🙂

  • A story can be inspiring.
  • A story can be fun.
  • A story can be based on an experience you might have at school, so people get to see it, hear it, feel it, from your perspective.
  • A story can be hilarious, making people laugh.
  • A story can be emotionally touching to people’s hearts in some way.
  • A story can be persuasive – a story can shift someone’s opinion or perspective on a specific topic.

What Makes up a Good Story?

A story should have one of two things:

  1. Fighting a bad guy who can either be a real person, or a struggle, or challenge, or anxiety, or some kind of disturbance, or a situation, or some type of barrier character(s) in the story might have faced.
  2. A shift in perspective from inside for one or more characters: Your opinion changes. The way you might be looking at yourself, or someone else, or your relationship to someone or something changes. It helped you grow in some way. Maybe there was something that surprised you leading to a fun, or excitement, or anxiety.

The story has a climax – a pinnacle moment.

When the story is personal, keep this in mind – it should be more than merely sharing experience.

Example One: “my trip Hawaii” – what all you did in your trip – can that be a story? The answer is yes, and no.

  • Yes – When for example, you develop how the trip changed you in some respect (experience of Hawaiian culture, appreciation for the island, anything else that molded you in some regard). Think of event(s) or moment(s) that might have stirred your thoughts, or somehow left an imprint on you, or changed your perspective.
  • No – Simply sharing the experience and telling what you saw and did, wouldn’t necessarily make it a story for our purposes here.

Example Two: Your experience from the basketball season last year – can that be a story? Your journey to earning your Tae Kwon Doe (or Karate) black belt – can that be a story? Your journey leading up to the on-stage performance for dancing or music – can that be a story? The answer is yes, and no.

  • Yes, when, for example, you share from your heart what you had to overcome, or how it became a transforming experience for you, or how it changed you as a person.
  • No, when you simply describe timelines of different things along the way and explain what you did.

Insightful nugget from Leonard Szymczak, my fellow club member with Dana Point Coastmasters:

A great story involves the acronym MICE

M = Milieu or setting that is interesting.
I = Idea or message that touches the heart, mind, body, and soul.
C = Characters with a burning desire who must overcome obstacles to achieve what they desire, and in the process change.
E = Event that propels the story forward.

About delivering your story …

  • Simply tell the story. Go right into it.
  • Let people experience your story; feel your account. Telling a story is an emotional experience. Keep it that way. Avoid explaining the logic behind it, or analyzing it for your audience. For example, when a movie ends, you walk away with the impression it might have made on you, the reaction it might have inspired in you. However, there is no analysis in the movie; in the end, it merely ends the story.
  • While telling stories at toastmasters, avoid giving moral of the story to your audience, let them feel it, and extract their takeaway. (That is unless your speech objective is to develop and articulate the message behind your story.)
  • Open yourself up. Be vulnerable. As we know by now, showing vulnerability is an incredibly powerful way to connect with others. It requires courage, and our toastmasters club is an ideal stage to explore & learn that, as no one is going to judge you. We are all friends trying it together.

Examples of Stories – Personal Topics

  • Your struggles and triumphs in sports
  • Goal you are striving to achieve, or you might have achieved – for example, recital for your dancing program, or music program, earning your black belt in Tae Kwon Do/Karate, earning a merit badge with your boys scouts or girls scouts initiative
  • Story of your basketball team
  • Story of your school MUN team trying to advance to the next level
  • Story from a fun experience with friends
  • Story from something hilarious at school
  • Your account on starting or joining a club
  • How many times do you laugh with friends? There is probably a story to tell from every one of those instances.
  • What makes you nervous – there can be a compelling story to share from that.
  • Friends and experiences you might have had with them
  • Impact or shift in a perspective from a vacation trip

Stories from Books

  • How many stories can you tell from Harry Potter books?
  • How many stories can you develop from Hunger Games?
  • Parcy Jackson books and movies (check out the link, it has info about other novels and sequels)
  • Maze Runner
  • Lord of the Rings
  • Divergent Series
  • Eragon
  • Les Misérables
  • John Grisham books
  • To Kill a mockingbird
  • The Giver
  • What else – what have you read? What are your favorite books? 🙂

Movies Have Stories – a Lot of Them

  • What thrilled you the most in Mission: Impossible – Fallout?
  • What was memorable for you in Incredibles 2?
  • What captured you the most in the movie Ready Player One?
  • How do you think the young king accepted challenge in Black Panther?
  • What did you find fascinating in any of Harry Potter movies, or Star Wars movies, or Tomb Raider?
  • What is story of Woody in Toy Story? Can you develop a narrative from his perspective and deliver it in your own words?
  • What is story of Dory in Finding Dory? A simple narrative from Dory’s perspective can be powerful.
  • What can be an exciting narrative to tell from the movie Jurassic World? What is the plot in the movie?
  • What is story of Katniss Everdeen in Hunger Games?
  • What is story in Hotel Rwanda?
  • The King’s Speech
  • What is the story of Forest Gump?
  • What’s the story in Bridge of Spies?
  • What are the different stories you can develop from the movie Passengers?

Which movies did you watch last summer?

When you think of any movie or TV show that you might have watched, what would say about it to a friend without any preparation?

  • Maybe that is the part close to your heart, use that to develop your story.
  • That will be your own story for any book or movie, as everyone is unique in his or her takeaways from what they read, see, feel, perceive, interpret.

Ideas from School Work, Classes?

  • What do you learn in history at school?
  • What do you read for your assignments?

Stories of Other People

  • Successful leaders – Abraham Lincoln, Ben Franklin, Mahatma Gandhiji, Steve Jobs, Mother Teresa, Mohammad Yunus, Charles Schwab, etc.
  • People you follow, admire
  • People excelling in something that you are passionate about – sports athletes, video game designers, singers, coaches at school, actors in movies and/or TV shows

Who are your favorite people? Who do you admire? 

This is presentation from Carmine Gallo at Google Talks. He has brought up a number of insights in this talk.

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Losing Power AND Point with Power Point? … :)

Can you lose power because of Power Point (or Keynote for that matter)?

Can power point get in your way to make a clear point?

The answer can be yes. When you are presenting, you are the focal point of your presentation. Or, rather you should be the focal point of your presentation. You are in charge, and not your power point presentation.

Here is one hilarious, energetic and yet insightful video on it from Don McMillan… check it out… 🙂

And see how his vocal variety is adding impact to his presentation.