Comments on: Toastmasters International Speech Contest: No Manipulation

By: Joe

Joe — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 19:29:34 +0000

Having just lost an Area International Speech Contest to a young man who told us about his drug addictions at age twelve, I researched the TM judges criteria for International Speeches. If the judges were required to know and apply those criteria, this issue would be resolved. As the Bard doth say: “though it make the unskillful laugh, it cannot but make the judicious grieve.”

Joe

By: Barbara Kryvko

Barbara Kryvko — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 17:36:27 +0000

We have one very good speaker in our district that once said, “I’ll never win the Int’l Speech Contest - My life hasn’t been hard enough.”

Anyone who attended the Int’l contest in Phoenix probably needs the fingers of both hands to count the number of deaths or illnesses that were covered. Without fail, if the speech started with, “The best advice I ever received was from Uncle Joe…,” then Uncle Joe was going to be dead by the end of the speech.

By: John Spaith

John Spaith — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 18:28:41 +0000

Kia - the pain/solution approach to a speech is very effective so you’re right I’m not trying to make it so you don’t talk about bad things completely. As far as ratios, I thought about that while writing this post and I didn’t put any guidelines because I don’t know what the ratio would be. There may not be one. *Based only on my preferences and not any insights I have into judging* — I’m thinking 1/3 of speech on pain is as high as I would take it. You also don’t have to do “2 minutes of how life is hell, 4 minutes of how everything fell together great for me.” Another approach could be “vivid background on something that is painful but keeping it pretty short timewise, how you decided to solve it, then when you talk about fixing it that’s when you get into the real pain.”

Think of a talk about running a marathon - the marathon is painful physically and there’s a lot to talk about pain there that can engage the audience. But it’s not the same as “Oh, my life is so awful and here’s why for 2 minutes…” - the marathon runner has a positive goal he’s going towards.

I got a mail from someone in Australia about manipulative speeches being out of control there. Since I’m in Seattle, I’m wondering if being near the Pacific makes these speeches more common

By: Kia

Kia — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 07:02:28 +0000

In fact in Singapore, I heard a lot of manipulative speeches… You are saying that we shouldn’t focus too much on the problem, and solutions should be the essence of the speech. Then, I would like to ask, what is the ratio between PROBLEM/SOLUTION do you recommend? The approach that I use for my speech is always PAIN->SOLUTION approach. I’m wondering how long time should I spend on the PAIN? and the SOLUTION? Please advise. Thanks!

By: Public Speaking Blogs: Week in Review [2008-02-02] | Six Minutes

Public Speaking Blogs: Week in Review [2008-02-02] | Six Minutes — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 17:48:19 +0000

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