Speaking tips blog
Communication matters. What are you saying?
Public Speaking Don’ts: What NOT to Say
In a series of Public Speaking Don'ts, I wrote last month’s article, The Graduation Speech No One Wants to Hear. I got a number of notes (which I love getting!) giving me first-person accounts of various graduations. “The student speaker was amazing!” “The invited...
The Graduation Speech No One Wants to Hear
The Top Ten Tips for giving a graduation speech people will talk about for years to come.
How does Culture affect communication?
How does Culture affect communication? Last fall I was privileged to travel for clients to far-away lands: South Africa, Egypt, and the Philippines, with a travel layover in Paris thrown in as a bonus. As an infrequent international traveler (although that seems to be...
Four Steps to Become Great at Anything
There are four steps to becoming great at anything. This includes learning how to drive. It’s my second (and last!) experience training a teen driver. Driver #2 has a different outlook, a few challenges (a few months off due to a surgery which equated to less...
Storytelling in public speaking: Match your story to a moral
How do you match your story to a moral? And how do you use it in public speaking? Match your story to a moral... I had a dream. Not a Martin Luther King, Jr. dream. A real dream. One while I was sleeping. I suppose that I have lots of dreams, but I don’t...
The worst compliment ever
Worst compliment ever? When I first heard this worst compliment ever at one of my high school reunions, it struck me hard. “You haven’t changed a bit.” I’m sure it was meant as a compliment. I wish they were applying it to my weight, physique, innocence, or maybe even...
Community: Connecting with your audience is key!
The word community has a new meaning in my life. I was in the audience of a presentation where the word community (for reasons of space on a PowerPoint slide) was hyphenated and split across lines, like this: comm- unity I made a mental note that the presenter had...
How Can I Become a Professional Speaker?
It’s starting to be a common call here at MillsWyck Communications. “How can I become a professional speaker?” or maybe the more tentative, “Do you think anyone would pay me to speak?” Usually it’s a person with an amazing story that’s been told repeatedly they...
Fear of Public Speaking: Reducing Anxiety
Tips for Reducing Anxiety When Speaking Fear is real and it's the main reason for most of the calls we get here at MillsWyck Communications. The callers are from all walks of life, all levels of experience, different cultures, have ranged from age 7 to over 70, and...
NEVER mention TIME when giving a presentation
The one thing a speaker should never mention A speaker should never mention TIME when giving a presentation. I was coaching a group presentation the other day and (predictably) one of the presenters ran over their allotted time. While we know a presenter should NEVER...
Mentorship: Three Necessary Elements
Much of what I find myself doing as a speech coach is falling more into the mentorship category than the instructing category. I recently got an idea from a client. He had called to discuss hiring me to speak to his staff, something I’ve done several times for his...
Don’t Remember a Speaker for the Wrong Reasons
For an audience to remember a speaker for the wrong reasons is a failure on the speaker's part. It can go one of two ways. One great; one… not-so-great. It begins with someone who appears to be a total stranger approaching you and opening conversation with, “I saw you...
