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No. 118: Speak to Impact, and Your Audience Will Be Impressed
Your speaking success depends on making yourself understood they way you intend. I can say “Please pass me the sugar” or “Please relocate that receptacle of sugar, into my hand”. Both mean essentially the same thing. But anyone – regardless of age or educational level – will easily understand the former!
Even When Your Audience Will Understand Complex Language, Speaking Plainly Works Better
One anecdote has it that Defrees, a friend/printer of Abraham Lincoln’s queried his intended use of the phrase “sugar-coated” in his first speech (which Defrees was to print) for congress. Defrees believed the phrase was not “dignified enough” for a paper of that importance. Lincoln wisely remarked as follows:
“Well, Defrees, if you think the time will ever come, when the people will not understand what ‘sugar-coated’ means, I’ll alter it; otherwise, I think I’ll let it go.”
Some people think using big words or complex language makes them look good. A result-focussed speaker should avoid making that mistake!
When your speech difficult to comprehend, you alienate your audience, and they will leave without the message you wanted to give them.
Why waste their time and yours? And why deny them the useful wisdom you offer by being needlessly sophisticated in your use of words?
Big Sounding Words May Sound Nice, But If Those You Address Don’t Understand, You’ve Failed!
We must make the effort to always speak with consideration for every audience member.
According to Dale Carnegie, a one time Senator of Indiana, “Beveridge” once advised speakers to identify the “least intelligent looking person” in their audience, and aim to win his/her interest.
He further recommended possibly focusing your delivery on a child attending your talk with parents. Then announce to yourself, and if you wish, the audience, that you will strive to use simple and clear language, so that the child will understand, and be able to explain what you said, after the event.
I strongly believe all serious minded speakers should take the above advice to heart.
A Tragic Movie Scene That Illustrates The Importance of Speaking For Every Single Audience Member to Understand
Interestingly, a movie I once watched, offers a useful lesson consistent with the above theme.
It was titled “Eastern Condor”. In a particular scene, one member of a Chinese-American military team died an avoidable death, when they parachuted into the Vietnamese jungle.
You see, when the others landed, they did a head count and noticed “Sunny” was missing. They hurriedly searched around, and soon found him lying half-dead, struggling to say “Sixteeen”.
Why Was Sunny Trying to Say Sixteen While Dying…?
Well, the 10 team members were convicts selected for a covert operation, by military top brass.
They were led by a Lieutenant Colonel, also Chinese-American, who told them they would be granted full pardon if they succeeded.
But only few had any military training. All they got were brief instructions, for instance, on how to open their parachutes while in the air.
With their aircraft at high altitude, the Lieutenant Colonel reminded each man, to “Count to 20 before you pull the cord.”
When it was Sonny’s turn, the same thing was said to him. He nodded, and jumped.
Even I did not realise the mistake the Lieutenant Colonel made at the time…
It was when Sunny was later found still struggling to say “Sixteen” that it struck me!
You see, when the men had chatted earlier in the aircraft, Sunny had tried to join in. But most times he got told to shut up, because he stammered a lot, and took too long to say whatever he had in mind.
Sunny’s speaking handicap naturally made counting out loud a major challenge for him.
Unfortunately that did not occur to anyone when the instructions about parachuting were being announced by the Colonel.
What Could Have Been Done Differently For Sunny?
Well, in asking them to “count to 20”, if the Colonel had considered Sunny’s challenge, he could have said “count mentally to 20” – looking at Sunny (and repeating that to him before he jumped).
Why? Because for Sunny, who stammered, counting out loud took much longer!
That was why the poor guy was still struggling to count “sixteen”, when he hit the trees and landed on the hard jungle floor, sustaining fatal injuries.
Few seconds after fully saying “Sixteen” he died what I consider an avoidable death.
The Lesson to Take Away…
I know it was just a movie.
But you will agree with me that such incidents could – and do – occur in real life.
So, for those of us who speak, this is a lesson worth keeping in mind:
Tailor your use of language to the comprehension needs of EVERY single member of your audience!
Have a lovely week!
Tayo K. Solagbade*
Self-Development/Performance Improvement Specialist
*Sole Agent For Burt Dubin’s Speaker Mentoring Service In Africa
Mobile: +234-803-302-1263 (in Nigeria) or +229-66-122-136 (in Benin Republic)
http://www.spontaneousdevelopment.com
Self-Development/Performance Enhancement Specialist – Tayo Solagbade – works as a multipreneurial freelance writer providing zero risk article and report writing support for website owners, while travelling slowly across West Africa as a Location Independent Multipreneur.
He’s presently based in Benin Republic, where he’s preparing an English-French Language Guide, City Travel Guides, and a Commercial Rabbit Farming Guide.
In a previous life, before leaving to become self-employed, Tayo served for seven years as a high performing manager in Guinness Nigeria. He rose from Shift Brewer, to Training & Technical Development Manager, then later acted in senior management roles as Production Manager and Technical Manager.
When he’s not amazing clients with his superhuman skills (wink), Tayo works as the creative force behind his Self-Development Nuggets™ blog, and Public Speaking IDEAS newsletter (which he publishes to promote Burt Dubin’s Public Speaking Mentoring service to experts working across the African continent).
For a limited time, Tayo is available to speak to your group or organization for a moderate fee. Send e-mail to tayo at tksola dot com. You can also visit www.tksola.com to learn more.
Connect with him on Twitter @tksola.com and Facebook.
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