I’ve previously given you the extensive benefit of my free advice on How to Start a Speech (or Presentation). The authorities agree. You start STRONGLY. One good idea is to treat the opening formalities, greetings and expressions of gratitude as not part of the speech. Depending on the occasion they […]
This ever-interesting subject is featured in my e-book, Speechwriting for Leaders. Coming to your tablets soon, I hope. Here’s part of what I say: How do you achieve that strong start? For a speechwriter it’s mainly about words. But a speaker engages an audience on many different levels simultaneously: eyes, […]
Welcome Iain Dale readers I was helping someone the other day with some well-chosen words for a senior private occasion of some 100 people. The task? Suggesting ideas for the seemingly simple task of opening the proceedings and introducing the main speaker(s). Of course … not so simple. The words […]
Any audience for a speech quickly works out what it has to face. Boring or Interesting? Routine or Inspiring? Getting off to a good start is essential, as top US speech-writer John Shosky explains in the latest Total Politics: Audiences decide if they like you, and if you are a person […]
This is my most popular answer on Quora with over 20,000 views, replying to an interesting question: What is the funniest opening line that you have heard (or said) in a public speech? Hmm. Right Ho, Jeeves “Boys,” said Gussie, “I mean ladies and gentlemen and boys, I do not […]
My post on the (ab)use of quotations in speeches prompted this comment from always alert reader Nigel Sedgwick: Charles is IMHO likely amongst the very best current advisors on speechmaking. But I must challenge him on a bit of material missing from his latest offering. The word spoken and heard […]
Getting back to working on my e-book, Speechwriting for Leaders. Some of this is fruity and unexpected and highly operational stuff, if I say so myself. How about the current chapter on e-heckling: Some events make a virtue of the interactivity provided by IT. Screens round the walls of the […]
I am still in deepest Warsaw, poised to give Polish officials training tomorrow and Tuesday in Speechwriting. On Thursday I swung by TEDxWarsaw, having given some speech-coaching to several participants the night before. One of the points I made was that a presentation at an event like TEDx is not […]
Here is a quite splendid and magisterial view of the rise and rise of Brexit as seen through many different speeches down the decades, written by John O’Sullivan. John has been tackling this question ever since the UK joined the EU. He has form: I first became a Brexiteer (or, […]
So here’s a nice question for the new decade that came my way today. Is THIS how I should present myself to my fellow speechwriters? I’m Charles, I used to be in the Foreign Office a long time ago, but everything has moved on now. I’m really here to listen […]
