I wrote last time about how I felt Obama needed to find something special for his conference speech – something that would transcend the actual the actual speech itself. I have to confess that when I wrote this I’d actually forgotten that the speech would be given on the anniversary of Martin Luther Kings “I have a dream“. Well, that says it all, doesn’t it, about what I mean… the fact that I can refer to the speech by that one simple phrase and you know what I mean.
Obama himself quoted such a moment of romantic transcendence when he started to recite “We hold these truths to be self evident; that all men were created equal”.
But did he find his own?
It’s too early to say because – by definition – such a phrase has to stand the test of time but there are a couple of ‘early contenders’ as it were (and it’s interesting to note the intro music, U2’s City of Blinding Lights!)
“We are a better country…”
“eight is enough!”
“he just doesn’t get it”
“Now is the time….”
“It’s about you”
“America, we can not turn back!”
My personal opinion is that none of these will quite make it – it’s a great speech, I’ve watched it through – but there’s not the one key killer phrase I was looking for. Maybe I’ve just missed it. Maybe he won’t need it.
Of course, I’m not suggesting that his speech – or any speech for that matter – should be a simple string of sound-bites (and I don’t think Obama’s speech was that!) but to help pass the message quickly and effectively a moment of romantic transcendence will certainly help!
For those of you lucky enough to be able to listen to the (generally wonderful) BBC Radio 4, and who were awake and listening this morning (this morning is a holiday in the UK so I guess many of you weren’t) there was a brief interview with an American political commentator about the Democratic Convention, which starts today. All fairly standard stuff, until a question about what the Convention was for, what he hoped for from it as an observer.
He hoped, he said, for a moment of romantic transcendence – a moment, for example, such as “Read my lips: no new taxes” or (my interpretation here) “It’s the economy, stupid”. Given that Obama’s strengths lie in being new and his ability to speak and inspire (and from the UK perspective that is perhaps his only strength?!) there’s a lot riding on his ability to pull some such phrase out of the air, to create a moment which has its own political momentum and which, almost on its own, will drive towards the White House.
Failing to hit now, to hit while all the media are his and his alone – failure to put clear air between him and the opposition – will mire his campaign down in places where the Republican candidate is stronger. So said the commentator in question.
So is that what it comes down to? The post of ‘the most important man in the world’ is perhaps going to be settled one way or the other on the basis of a couple of presentations?
I train people to make presentations and speak in public – it’s what my company does to pay for our homes and food! – but even I wonder if that’s sensible!
Mind you – sensible or not – it’s the way of the world and like it or loathe it, it’s a sure-fire indication of the importance of being able to put your ideas over to a (sometimes sceptical) audience. Assuming Obama doesn’t blow it, it’s going to be a fascinating lesson in how the rest of us (we ‘normal people’ ) can affect the world around us.
We might not all be able to create such self-sustaining phrases (how about “I have a dream”?) but it’s a great idea to aspire to that, isn’t it? If we can create something which exists in our audience’s minds after we’ve finished our presentation we’ve created something important.
I really mean that – why bother with competitions. I honestly and genuinely can’t see the point. I don’t want to be rude to people who are entering (and doing will in such things – see here, for example) but to me it seems to be akin to such things as
competitive ironing;
combat yoga.
You see, to me, a competition in public speaking and/or presenting seems to defeat the whole point of speaking in public – you’re not (or at least you shouldn’t be!) doing it for yourself. If you’re doing it for anyone at all, it should be for the audience. That said, personally I think you should be speaking for the sake of your subject. “Don’t speak unless you can’t not” would be a good Yoda-like mantra, wouldn’t it?
If you’re speaking to compete, almost by definition you’re doing it to see if you can do it better than the other people there – and that’s just plain ol’ ego, isn’t it? Well not entirely, but I’m sure you see what I’m getting at, even if I am overstating my case. You’re certainly speaking to speak, not speaking to say something. You’re even being marked on things like technique!
Now don’t get me wrong, I believe in good technique – good techniques makes it easier to give a good presentation – but it’s not an end in itself… it’s a means to an end. You can deliver damned good presentations with only mediocre technique, sometimes.
Seriously, I can see that there’s a use to “low-level” competitions – they’re a bit of fun and they give some focus to improvements and so on (they’re also a harmless hobby, of course!) but when it comes to things like a World Championship I’m a bit lost.
Quite apart from the innate pointlessness of it all, it gets worse because of the necessity of imposing rules (such as a seven minute time limit). That’s arbitrary. By all means speak for seven minutes if that’s how long it takes to say what you’ve got to say but if it takes four, take four. If it needs nine, take nine.
Add to that the self-referential elements of it (quite a few of the presentations are simply about making presentations ) fact that the “world championship” only involves Americans and it really does start to sound like not my cup of tea.
Some things have to be see/heard to be believed. If you have an hour spare take a look at the video. Randy Pausch is dieing and gives a lecture about how to achieve your childhood dreams. Setting aside the ‘last lecture’ thing, it’s a fantastic lecture.
I said just now if you’d got a spare hour you should watch. I’ll go further than that….. make an hour spare.
A lot of the Powerpoint slides are pretty shoddy but who cares……!
I’ve spent over 20 years working as a researcher in Universities and in all honesty, this is the best lecture I’ve seen. There’s an element which suggests that there’s too much ‘entertainment’ compared to the amount of information but I’m pretty firmly of the opinion that if you’re going to inform people you’ve got to have their attention first… and to do that you need to be at least a little entertaining……!
