Tom Peters said “You shouldn’t give a public speech unless you want to make something happen”. Before you give a speech, you really need to define what you want or expect to achieve in the talk. This is really the core reason or the purpose of your talk, which can be any or a combination of the following:
• To inform
• To educate
• To arouse
• To persuade
• To move to action
• To entertain
It is important to make a personal statement of what you want to achieve before even starting to write your speech. For example, “In speaking to this group, I want to persuade them to consider our product or my service, while also entertaining them with my stories and humour.”
What do you want to happen when you finish speaking? What results are you looking for? What do you want the individuals in your audience to do? If you are not sure about what you want to happen, then the audience is unlikely to make any changes. There is that famous saying “If you don’t know where you are going, it does not matter much which road that you take”. Clarity of purpose is key in being an effective speaker.
