Just for the heck of it, a keynote speech in ten seconds 😀
It’s this time of the year again: the season of the Toastmasters autumn speech contests. All over the world, people are competing in two categories: humorous speeches and improvised speeches. Loads of fun.
This Saturday, I’ll be hosting this speech contest in Helsinki. It’s called an area contest, with participants from Finland and Estonia.
No one, except me, knows the topic of the improvised speeches. 😃 The contestants will find out the topic 30 seconds before they begin their speech. 😬
In the attached video from exactly a year ago, from the same contest, you’ll see a primer in stage presence and body language in ten seconds 😀
Also, you can find a couple of brief thoughts about hosting an event behind this link.
I’ll publish something more comprehensive on the topic of event hosting later this year.
For now, come and see a bunch of superb speakers at the event space ”Vapaakaupunki” at the Redi shopping center at Hermannin Rantatie 5 in Helsinki this Saturday, October 25 at 12:00 (doors open). The program starts at 12:15. The language of the contest is English.
Waiting for my time to shine. Photo credit: Alessandro Rampazzo
Would you like to improve your public speaking skills in a hobby setting?
In addition to paid work in the public speaking coaching domain, the hobby side of practicing public speaking skills is now in full swing after the summer holidays.
Here are a couple of options that I’m familiar with, because I’m there myself 😃
Last Monday I gave a speech at the Stadi Talkers Toastmasters club.
It’s always a pleasure to be on stage at this club that meets at a bar downtown Helsinki. The audience is friendly and supportive. They don’t throw you with a pint of beer, even though based on the feedback I know that every speech of mine, while having its strengths, it also has room to improve for the next time. This club is in English. 🇬🇧
Stadi Talkers meets bi-weekly on Monday evenings at 6pm Finnish time, next time on September 8.
This Wednesday evening I’ll be hosting a Finlandia Toastmasters club meeting.
It’s otherwise the same as described above but this one is in Spanish. 🇪🇸 We have native speakers as well as mere mortals like me.
We are hybrid, so you can also participate via Teams from anywhere in the world. Meetings occur every second Wednesday at 6pm Finnish time. Bienvenid@!!!
The Famous Speeches Reading Club is something I started with a couple of friends last year.
As the name suggests, we practice public speaking skills by reading renowned texts, a method of learning that has been used already since the ancient Greeks. We read traditional speeches, movie speeches, poems… whatever contains impactful language in a compact package. This one is in English. 🇬🇧
We meet on Zoom every two weeks on Tuesday evenings at 6:15pm Finnish time for about one hour. Reach out if you’re interested in joining!
All in all, I would encourage you to use every opportunity you get to speak up and to be on stage, because the best way to improve your public speaking skills is to practice, practice, practice, constantly.
It’s a lifelong journey and today is a good day to begin.
”Le stelle cadenti ci ricordano ogni anno che c’è seumpre qualcosa in cui sperare, c’è sempre qualcosa da desiderare. Ama, sogna, desidera e ele stelle faranno da contorno alla tua luce.”
”Shooting stars remind us every year that there’s always something to hope for, there’s always something to desire. Love, dream, desire, and the stars will frame your light.”
Pretty poetic. Or is it?
Here’s something useful for those who study the art of influencing people through language, e.g. for public speakers.
Note that the key term in this quote is different in different languages and gives a different message to the reader.
Usually something going upwards is understood as positive, and something going downwards is considered negative.
In Italian, ”stelle cadenti”, ”falling stars”, go down. That’s usually understood as something negative and not seen very often in quotes that are supposed to inspire.
So, why are the ”stelle cadenti” still inspiring for us? It’s because of another popular dichotomy used in metaphors: light versus darkness. Light is good, and shooting stars shine a bright light.
Herein lies the reason why the inventor of the above quote didn’t use the term meteor instead of a shooting star. After all, both words are about the same thing.
Our minds visualize a meteor more easily as something going down. In addition, the remains of a meteor are called by a similar term, meteorite, and a meteorite is made of dark stone. No shining light.
So, two bad things in a meteor. We are brought up learning that light is better than dark, and upwards is better than downwards.
Therefore, a ”shooting star” inspires, a ”meteor” does not.
The choice of words is of crucial importance for a writer, as well as for a public speaker.
How do you host an event…and also act as a coach to the speakers?
Here’s a snapshot of my day yesterday, preparing to emcee an international event tomorrow night:
– Change of plans: one of the speakers had to cancel!
– Coaching the speakers preparing for their talks.
– Preparation meeting with the client, the organizers and the production company.
– Update my script and continue rehearsing.
– Visit dentist
Yes, the first thing I saw in the morning was a message from one of our speakers: they had to cancel their participation in the event. Contrary to what many think, this is business as usual and happens all the time. We discussed a plan B (and C, D, E and F ) with the organizers and went ahead with a solution. The content of the event continues to be solid.
Acting as both the emcee of the event and a coach to the speakers.
This is slightly more complex than what it sounds.
Coaching public speakers is fun and rewarding, and there are actually many benefits when the host of the event is also the trainer to the speakers and panelists.
First of all, you get to know the speakers and the content they will deliver in advance. This makes it so much easier for you to interact with the speakers while on stage.
You’re also able to give more insightful comments on the content of their talks to the audience.
In addition, you’re able to coordinate the roles and content of the speakers during the Q&A or a panel discussion.
This makes your panel discussion stand out from 99% of panel discussions, by not being boring.
Finally, you will know that the speakers will deliver fantastic talks as you yourself have helped them prepare and rehearse. …Well, of course only if you’ve done a good job
By the way, there’s an interesting dichotomy here: many emcees don’t exactly shine as excellent listeners, and a speech coach needs to have advanced active listening skills. Many people are both good listeners and good speakers, but not everyone.
Visit dentist: a piece of my tooth broke! I don’t want to have a toothache while on stage! Fixed!
Other activities yesterday included a final planning meeting with the organizers and again, updating and rehearsing my script.
The photo depicts a speaker coach at the end of a rehearsal session with one of the speakers. I guess I’ve gotta shave and get a haircut before climbing on stage.
How do you prepare to be the master of ceremonies and lead a panel discussion at an event?
Well, in many ways. Here’s a snapshot from today, preparing for a gig on Wednesday:
Today, as every day until the event, I’ve been rehearsing my script.
For instance I’ve been thinking on how to make sure my choice of words will work for both native English speakers as well as for an audience coming from all continents except where the penguins live.
How will I handle audience questions to the American panelists if the discussion turns to American politics?
Should I wear orange, my go-to color that energizes both the audience and me, or something else?
One thing I know for sure: the song I want played when I walk onto the stage.
It’s my feel-good song since already for weeks now. Has to do with sauna.
Hosting events is fun and rewarding. I consider to have succeeded when I get the speakers to shine and the audience to be satisfied with the event.
Trying hard to deliver a speech as it was generated on the spot by artificial intelligence. Photo credit: Polina Feshchenko
This week artificial intelligence (AI) and humans competed against each other for the first time at a public speaking club in Helsinki.
The task was to give a short, improvised speech about a topic given to the speakers on the spot. The speakers, including ChatGPT, had just thirty seconds to prepare on stage before delivering the speech.
ChatGPT’s speech topic was “Explain to a five-year-old what the internet is”.
This was the prompt given to the computer:
Write a humorous two-minute speech to a five-year old about the internet, with the past, present, future structure, containing five metaphors, two quotes and including the word contentious three times, and mentioning Tuomas, Topi and Lauri and the Stadi Talkers Toastmasters Club.
Here’s the speech generated by the computer, and delivered by the undersigned:
Good morning everyone!
My name is Tuomas and I’m here to talk to you about the internet.
Let’s start with the past. Back in the day, the internet was like a dark and mysterious forest. It was full of secrets and surprises, but it was also a bit scary. You had to be careful not to get lost in the depths of the internet.
Now, let’s move on to the present. The internet is like a big playground. It’s full of exciting games, funny videos, and interesting people. It’s a great place to explore and learn new things.
Finally, let’s look to the future. The internet is like a giant library. It’s full of knowledge and information about almost anything you can think of. It’s also a great place to connect with people from all over the world.
Now, let’s talk about the people who use the internet. They are like a family. They share their experiences, their ideas, and their stories. They also help each other out when they need it.
The internet can also be a contentious place. People often disagree and argue about different topics. That’s why it’s important to be respectful and open-minded when discussing things online.
As Topi, one of the members of the Stadi Talkers Toastmasters Club, said: “The internet is a great tool for learning, but it’s also full of dangers. We must be careful to use it responsibly.”
And as Lauri, another member of the Stadi Talkers Toastmasters Club, said: “The internet is a great place to explore and discover new things, but it can also be contentious. We must be careful to stay safe online.” So, my five-year-old friend, remember to use the internet responsibly and stay safe!
Thank you for listening.
Let’s look at how the computer did.
What the AI did well and where it failed
The speech is complete and makes sense in many ways.
ChatGPT used the instructed speech format (past, present, future), even though halfway through the speech it completely abandoned it.
The speech contains a variety of metaphors, probably more than we’d see in an average two-minute speech.
There’s plenty of material in the speech that can be used when designing a real speech.
The speech was supposed to be humorous, but humor was missing.
The speech began with a “Good morning”, at 7pm in the evening.
ChatGPT made a wrong guess about the name of the speaker.
“Back in the day”, the internet was NOT like a dark and mysterious forest. It was actually a pretty joyful place.
ChatGPT had no meaningful vision about the future of the internet.
ChatGPT is usually good at finding quotes and addressing them to the correct person. In this speech, however, it put words in the mouths of the wrong people.
Last but not least, AI almost completely missed its target audience. ChatGPT did hardly anything to adjust its message to a five-year-old as instructed.
Who won the speech contest?
The contest was won by one of the humans. His speech was well structured, humorous, and to the point.
Out of the 23 voters at the club, only two gave their votes for ChatGPT.
In my next post, I’ll write about the implications of what happened in the contest. Stay tuned.
P.S. From now on, I’ll include a discussion about using AI in speech writing in all of my public speaking trainings.
The winning speech at yesterday’s World Championship of Public Speaking.
Here’s the great speech that won the World Championship of Public Speaking last night. Watch it for your benefit!
This is my take on what was interesting in the winning speech and what anyone can learn from.
Courage is the key word
The main thing I saw was… courage:
Courage to talk about a topic that comes from a non-Western cultural context.
Courage to avoid exaggerations in body language, use of voice, and props.
Why do I say this? Because in this contest the judges often reward you for such exaggeration, which looks slightly odd even for many Toastmasters members, let alone non-members.
Courage to take a risk by choosing a speech title that is easily misheard and impossible to understand without hearing the speech itself.
This sort of a choice about the speech title usually creates confusion in the audience.
During the speech the audience actually found out that the difficulty to understand the name of the speech matched with the content and the message of the speech.
Other building blocks of a good speech
For me the main thing in any speech is that the content of the speech is clear and there’s a message that is relevant and easy to relate to.
Even better if the speaker is able to make the audience laugh.
The winning speech totally achieved each of the above goals.
I also saw great interaction with the audience. In this case, with a very large audience!
The speaker also did a great job of gradually building expectation during the speech. In this case, he did it by making the audience eager to hear another key word, and having them wait all the way until the end of the speech to hear it. This is a technique used both in suspense movies and in stand-up comedy.
This sort of performance looks easy when you watch it, but it takes not only great talent, but a huge amount of hard work. Like in Olympic sports.
Good to know about the context of this speech situation
Don’t expect to see a speech that takes a strong stance on an important current issue. In Toastmasters contests, you tend to be punished by the judges if you talk about something that can be interpreted as political. This is a challenge for the speakers as they still need to try to say something meaningful.
All in all, great job, incredible achievement, Cyril Junior Dim, well deserved!!
P.S. The topic of the speech was about the difficulty of being proud about what makes you different from everyone else. Because being different from those around you can put you into trouble.
As to myself, life has taught me that where people are different from others, or do something different from what most others do, is usually where they achieve their greatest heights of accomplishment and achievement.
Where we are different from others is what enables us to shine, and also succeed in life, whatever that means to each one of us.
Yes, the first thing I saw in the morning was a message from one of our speakers: they had to cancel their participation in the event. Contrary to what many think, this is business as usual and happens all the time. We discussed a plan B (and C, D, E and F 
) with the organizers and went ahead with a solution. The content of the event continues to be solid.
Acting as both the emcee of the event and a coach to the speakers. 
Visit dentist: a piece of my tooth broke! I don’t want to have a toothache while on stage! Fixed!
Would you like to become a better communicator? 