Categories
Speechwriting

How to Write a Speech: 3 Effective Methods with Examples and Tips for Business

Photo by Unseen Studio on Unsplash

Crafting a compelling business speech is essential whether you’re delivering a presentation to clients, motivating a team, or pitching a new idea. A well-structured speech can convey confidence, professionalism, and persuasion. This guide covers three effective methods for writing impactful speeches, along with practical examples and tips, with a specific focus on business communication.


Method 1: The Problem-Solution Approach

This approach is highly effective in business settings where you need to solve a problem, pitch a product, or present a strategy. It allows you to engage your audience by identifying a challenge and offering a clear solution.

Steps:

  1. Identify the Problem: Begin by outlining a problem or challenge your audience faces. Make it relatable and ensure it connects with their needs or concerns.
  2. Present the Solution: Offer your solution with supporting evidence, facts, or success stories to prove its effectiveness.
  3. Call to Action: Conclude by urging the audience to take specific actions based on your solution, whether it’s adopting a new strategy, investing in your idea, or implementing a change.

Example:

Problem: “In today’s competitive market, many companies struggle to retain top talent, resulting in high turnover rates and loss of productivity.”
Solution: “Research shows that companies with robust employee engagement programs reduce turnover by up to 25%. By implementing recognition and development initiatives, we can boost morale and retention.”
Call to Action: “Let’s start by introducing a recognition program next quarter to not only retain our employees but also increase productivity.”

Tips:

  • Make sure the problem is relevant and pressing for your audience.
  • Use data and case studies to back up your solution.
  • Keep the call to action clear and actionable to drive your message home.

Method 2: The Pathos, Ethos, and Logos Approach (Persuasive Speaking)

This classical method, rooted in rhetoric, is highly effective for business speeches where you need to persuade stakeholders, clients, or employees. It engages the audience on emotional, logical, and ethical levels to deliver a convincing argument.

Steps:

  1. Pathos (Appeal to Emotion): Start by connecting emotionally with your audience. Use a personal story, a vivid example, or a situation that stirs their emotions, making them care about your message.
  2. Ethos (Establish Credibility): Establish your authority or credibility by mentioning your experience, sharing testimonials, or citing respected sources. This builds trust in you as a speaker.
  3. Logos (Appeal to Logic): Use facts, figures, statistics, and logical arguments to support your key message. This makes your solution or idea feel rational and feasible.

Example:

Pathos: “Picture this: a talented employee leaves your company, not because of salary, but because they didn’t feel valued. It’s a scenario too many businesses face today.”
Ethos: “As a leadership consultant with over a decade of experience helping companies boost employee retention, I’ve seen firsthand how recognition transforms workplace culture.”
Logos: “Studies show that companies with strong recognition programs see a 15% increase in employee engagement and a 12% rise in productivity. By investing in these initiatives, we can prevent turnover and create a high-performing team.”

Tips:

  • Use Pathos to create an emotional hook right from the beginning.
  • Keep Ethos subtle but strong, showing authority without sounding self-promotional.
  • Ground your speech in Logos with clear data, ensuring your message feels both emotional and rational.

Method 3: The Classic Structure (Introduction, Body, Conclusion)

This traditional method is ideal for business presentations, where clarity and logical flow are essential. It provides a well-organized framework to deliver key messages in a structured way, making it easy for your audience to follow.

Steps:

  1. Introduction: Start with a strong hook to capture attention. Introduce your main idea or theme.
  2. Body: Break down your speech into 2-3 main points. Each point should be clearly articulated and supported with facts, examples, or anecdotes.
  3. Conclusion: Summarize your main points and end with a strong, memorable closing statement—something that leaves the audience thinking or inspires action.

Example:

Introduction: Good afternoon, everyone. Today, I’d like to talk about a crucial factor that often goes unnoticed in business: employee well-being and its impact on company success.


Body:

  • Point 1: How employee well-being boosts productivity.
  • Point 2: The connection between well-being programs and employee retention.
  • Point 3: Practical strategies we can implement immediately to improve well-being.

Conclusion:

Investing in employee well-being isn’t just the right thing to do—it’s a smart business decision that will drive long-term success. Let’s commit to creating a healthier, more productive workplace starting today.

Tips:

  • Keep your introduction clear and engaging, hinting at the value the audience will gain from your speech.
  • Use transitions to move smoothly between each main point in the body.
  • Finish with a powerful conclusion to reinforce your message.

Additional Tips for Business Speechwriting

  1. Know Your Audience: Tailor your speech to the specific needs, interests, and concerns of your audience. Are they executives, clients, or team members? Adjust your tone, content, and delivery style accordingly.
  2. Keep It Concise: In business, time is valuable. Ensure your speech is focused and to the point. Avoid going off on tangents or adding unnecessary details.
  3. Use Clear, Professional Language: Avoid jargon, complex terminology, or overly technical language unless you’re speaking to an audience that is familiar with it. Clarity is key in business communication.
  4. Practice Delivery: Rehearse your speech multiple times before delivering it. This will help you identify areas where you can improve clarity, pacing, and delivery. Practice in front of colleagues or friends to get feedback.
  5. Engage with Your Audience: Ask questions, even rhetorical ones, to keep the audience engaged. For example, “Have you ever wondered why some teams outperform others despite having the same resources?”
  6. Use Visuals: Incorporating visuals like slides or charts can enhance understanding, particularly when presenting complex data. Visuals also break up the speech, keeping the audience engaged.

Conclusion

Writing a speech for a business setting requires a balance of clarity, persuasion, and engagement. Whether you’re pitching a solution, inspiring a team, or delivering a strategic message, the methods outlined—Problem-Solution, Pathos, Ethos, Logos, and Classic Structure—offer practical frameworks to structure your thoughts and communicate effectively. By understanding your audience, using clear language, and delivering with confidence, your speeches can motivate, persuade, and leave a lasting impact in the business world.

Categories
AI Evaluation

Paramoji Speech Flow

I love crafting and making speeches.

I love tools which analyse and give insights into my speeches.

Last week I attended a AI Innovators meetup organized at KI Reply in Munich. One of the sessions was “Human emotions at scale” presented by Stefan Dirnstorfer.

I liked the way he compared the tweets and opinions of Trump and Biden before and after the debate, Rishi and Keir before and after the election results using Paramojis.

A paramoji is a parametric smiley face that represents facial expressions on continuous scales” – Stefan Dirnstorfer

I was wondering if I could follow the emotional rollcoaster that a speech takes the audience through.

Using ChatGPT, GitHub Copilot and the PHP code snippet from Stefan I wrote a small application which created the above Paramoji Speech Flow.

I like the way in Page 1, you can note that emotionally in every 5 sentences there is happy and sad emotion (deliberately simplifying emotions for discussion)

I like the way in Page 4, you can notice the excitement in the mouth and eye gestures.

How do you analyse and learn from insights from your speeches?

Links:

[HYBRID] AI in Software development lifecycle, Wed, Jul 10, 2024, 6:00 PM | Meetup

Paramoji

Categories
Training

Quality Club Meetings

Why does “Made in Germany” bring up such positive feelings from the audience?

We heard “High quality”, “Predictable”, “Reliable”, “Manufactured goods”, “Good beer”, “Changeable” and “Long-lasting”

We switched “Made in Germany” with the “Club” and asked members to talk about what came to their minds?

We heard “Team spirit”, “Fulfillment”, “Improvisation”, “Support”, “Energy”, “Loving” and “Joy”.

Quality is a perception. This perception is created by the members of the club, members of a product, members of a service. This perception can be molded to be something that is remembered for generations.

We delved into how we can change the perception of Quality before, during and after meetings and we had a lot of input from the officers.

By having a full agenda and setting up the stage we could increase the quality before the meeting even starts.

By focussing on the Agenda and ensuring that it runs sequentially and on time we can exude Quality during a meeting.

By talking to guests after a meeting and helping them we can show the Quality in after meeting care.

All in all when the officers together with members do their bit before, during and after a meeting we can proudly the quality of the club is “Made in Germany”

Links:

1111 Distinguished Club Program (toastmasterscdn.azureedge.net)

Division and Area Performance (toastmasters.org)

Toastmasters International -Club Officer Training Materials

Categories
AI

GPT4All for Insights into speeches

A lot of speakers have made speeches over the years and a have quite a collection of them.

What are we doing with these speeches?

Are we mining them for insights into the messages that they had?

Are we dissecting to find common messages that we are comfortable and good at talking about?

I played around with GPT4All with my district level speeches and tried to understand the message from one speech and the common message across multiple speeches.

Check out the YouTube video and see if you would try something similar with your speeches?

Link: GPT4All

Categories
Speeches

Prompt for Contest speech

Can you use AI to impove your speech?

Yes, you can!

I used the Judging ballot criteria on Content from Toastmasters International and connected it with ChatGPT from OpenAI to get some ideas to improve the speech. Try it out and see how it works

Here is a simple prompt to do so:

You are a judge for the World Champion of Public Speaking in Toastmasters with these criteria:

Speech Development is the way the speaker puts ideas together so the audience can understand them. The speech is structured around a purpose, and this structure must include an opening, body and conclusion. A good speech immediately engages the audience’s attention and then moves forward toward a sig nificant conclusion. This development of the speech structure is supported by relevant examples and illustrations, facts and figures, delivered with such smoothness that they blend into the framework of the speech to present the audience with a unified whole.

Effectiveness is measured in part by the audience’s reception of the speech, but a large part is your subjective judgment of how the speech came across. You should ask yourself such questions as “Was I able to determine the speaker’s purpose?” “Did the speech relate directly to that purpose?” “Was the audience’s interest held by the speaker?” “Was this speech subject appropriate for this particular audience?”

Speech Value justifies the act of speaking. The speaker has a responsibility to say something meaningful and original to the audience. The listeners should feel the speaker has made a contribution to their thinking. The ideas should be important ones, although this does not preclude a humorous presentation of them.

Use the above criteria to provide feedback on the speech below in two parts:

1. What was good with examples

2. What may be improved with suggestions

<<Insert speech text here>>

Links:

ChatGPT: https://chat.openai.com/

Copilot: https://copilot.microsoft.com/ (Use the Notebook for more than 2000 words)

Gemini: https://gemini.google.com/

Toastmasters International -International Speech Contest Judge’s Guide and Ballot

Categories
Scribbles

Sky lantern

This New Year, I let a Sky lantern fly next to the sandy beaches of Goa to the sound of fireworks.

A Sky lantern requires a few steps before it can fly.

  • You need to fix the burning camphor like substance to the base of the lamp.
    • One guy in front of me broke the burning disc and had to start again with another disc
  • You need to open up the lamp on all four sides so that the fire does not get to the sides of the lamp.
    • Another guy did not open the sides and they burnt the sides and he had to start again
  • You need to wait for the warm air to build up in the lamp
    • Another impatient guy could not wait for 2 minutes and let it fly only to have the lamp come down crashing and he had to start again

I watched all these guys and thought I had learnt all the ways to fail and managed to get that lamp ready!

But my lamp would not rise up.

A friend walked up to me and told me to give it a nudge upwards and let it fly.

I did just that and there the Sky lantern raised up and started flying.

Sometimes we are like Sky lanterns.

There are so many things that need to be right for us to fly.

But when all the conditions are right, you might need that little nudge to get flying.

Do you need a nudge to kick start your speaking journey and be a Sky lantern?

Let me help you shine as a speaker in 2024!

Give me a call or contact me for individual and team coaching.

Categories
Scribbles

5 years to learn Motivational Strategies

It took me 5 years from 2018 till 2023 to complete my Toastmasters learning path on “Motivational Strategies”.

I reflected on this path this week in my club and I shared my Personal and Toastmasters achievements in this time period.

The two personal achievements I shared were getting my blue belt in Brazilian Ju-Jitsu (2023) and running 5K with the Couch to 5K (2023) program.

The Toastmasters achievement I shared was winning the International Speech Contest in English at the district level in 2022 (District 95 – Germany, Norway, Sweden and Denmark).

I needed motivation at different points during these 5 years. I got it from my daughter, BJJ coaches (Laurien and Alex), BJJ sparring partners (Basti, Dimi, Norbert and others) and Toastmasters members.

Motivation is not an easy thing to have.

  • One needs strategies to have it.

Motivation is not an easy thing to keep.

  • One needs strategies to keep it.

Listen me out for around 12 minutes to hear what motivated me and what kept me motivated 🙂

Links:

TLA – Deine Kampfsport und Yoga Schule im Münchner Norden (team-laurien-alex.de)

Get running with Couch to 5K – NHS (www.nhs.uk)

(1) Motivational Strategies | Reflection on Path – YouTube

Toastmasters International -Pathways Motivational Strategies Path

Categories
Humorous

Learning 3Cs of Comedy with Mel

Yesterday I attended a humour workshop run by Mel at the Munich Prostmasters Toastmasters club.

I have always been amazed by the energy that Mel brings to the stage and his ability to break the ice with audience from different cultures. Yesterday was no different.

He discussed the different comedy structures with the audience. They came up quite a few of them.

You knew that you were dealing with room of eager learners of humour!

Connection

I liked the part where he explained how to set up the premise, step 1 (positive), step 2 (very positive) and step 3 (negative). My group came up this joke:

“The United States has produced amazing Presidents.

Abraham Lincolm with the Gettysburg address

John F Kennedy with ‘Ich bin ein Berliner’

and

Donald Trump with ‘Make America great again'”

We did not get many laughs. We had complicated the simple structure. The premise was that the USA had produced amazing Presidents. The step 1 and 2 was complex with the name of the President and the speech they were famous for. Step 3 was very predicatable so it did not get many laughs.

We realised that writing humour is NOT easy. It was interesting to see the different groups trying their hand adding humour with the “rule of three” structure.

Confidence

This was the first time I heard about Uptalking and Downtalking.

Mel helped us practice multiple times with Uptalk and Downtalk. It was interesting to see how using conscious intonation when needed made such a big difference to the confidence projected.

Convincing

Mel helped us understand the value behind calling a room. That is addressing a disturbance in the room and not just assuming that it did not happen.

We had a lot of fun disturbing the speakers while they were talking and waiting for them to address us and get us to stop.

The other strategies of Smiling, using Names, asking questions were also used by the speakers on stage.

All in all, I learnt the 3Cs of Comedy from Mel yesterday and I am raring to give it a go with my next speech!


Links:

About – Mel Kelly

About | Comedy Club Munich (comedy-club-munich.com)

Get your book! (comedybooks-melkelly.com)

What Is Uptalk? Why, When, & How to Stop Doing It (yoodli.ai)

Categories
Workshop

Building a great membership journey

I had the opportunity to train the Toastmasters officers in the COT (Club Officers Training) last week. I had watched a German theatre piece last Friday and I was inspired by that. It was about 3 women and 1 man living in some apartments next to each other. They get together every now and then and have coffee and cake (Guglhopf) in the inner courtyard. They go through ups and downs in life. They suspend the coffee and cake tradition but make peace with each other and get back to it.

I believe any Toastmasters club is similar in some ways. We meet up around 12 times in 6 months and follow a routine. These 12 times also kind of decide the future of a member about whether they stay or leave the club. What helps us keep members in the club in a way that they can thrive?

Why does a new member stay after 6 months?

  • Maybe they made their first speech and are hungry for more

Why does an experienced member stay after 6 months?

  • Maybe they feel like they are contributing by giving good evaluation speeches and adding value and motivating other speakers

Why does a member stay after 6 months of being an officer?

  • Maybe an officer who is a Treasurer learns about budgeting with income and expenses and is keen on serving

Each member has a reason to stay. Can we as officers give them a reason to stay?

I find that Toastmasters has many pillars that one can build on.

Communication pillar

  • Build communication skills with different Paths available in Pathways

Contests pilllar

  • Learn about competing in club level, city level (area), state level (division) and country level (district)

Leadership pillar

  • Learn and serve as different officers in the club and higher levels with more responsibility and commitment

And these pillars are possible when the club creates that Social platform that we can build on. Each club has the opportunity to create this psychologically safe place where members can shine as speakers, leaders and contestants.

When officers can create this strong (social) platform where members have a strong basement to build their pillars (communication, contests and leadership), we know that we have an amazing member journey to offer to each Toastmasters member.

Links:

Unser Theaterstück im November 2023 – Milbertshofener Bühne München e.V. (milbertshofener-buehne.de)

Toastmasters International -Club Officer Training Materials

Categories
Workshop

Authenticity, Clarity and Enthusiasm

Photo by Angshu Purkait on Unsplash

I recently did a officer training for Toastmasters online on “How to be an engaging communicator” and really enjoyed the active participation of the officers in training.

We discussed the ACE method for being an engaging communicator. We used impromptu speeches “Table Topics – Toastmasters Talk ;)” to dive in and explore the method.

Authenticity

One of the officers talked about his brother and an activity that they did together in his younger years. When the listeners were asked why they felt it was authentic, we heard some interesting things.

One was his eyes. They were sparkling with excitement while he was recounting something he was doing with his brother. My eyes light up when I remember or recount something I did with my sister.

Second was his smile. He had a genuine smile when he was talking about his brother. These two things immediately connected us with his authentic self. We opened up to this story.

Clarity

One of the officers talked about increasing his club membership fees. He explained why he wanted to improve the quality of the club meeting and how it cannot lie with one or few officers.

One listener noticed that he had talked about improving quality of the club meetings. However the case for increased membership fee was not clear.

One listener noticed that it was about working together to improve club meetings. However the clarity on increasing the membership fees was still missing.

Clarity in our message is one of the most difficult things to achieve. When we can get our message clear and simple we will earn the respect of the listener.

I have to admit the officer had only seconds to come up with his arguments. Normally you would brainstorm it together with officers and come up with a clear case.

Enthusiasm

One of the officers talked about her next vacation. She talked about why vacations were for her about spending time with her friends and less about seeing new places.

One listener noticed the joy in the eyes of the speaker when she was talking about spending time with her friend. This joy transcends from the speaker and gets to the listener and is infectious.

One listener also mentioned that he was willing to consider his next vacation to be one to be spent with a loved one or a long lost friend.

The ACE method helps us use simple tools like “Authenticity, Clarity and Enthusiasm” to get be an engaging communicator.

Links:

TM COT | How to be an engaging communicator.pptx (slideshare.net)