Give Your Speech, Change the World: How To Move Your Audience to Action

CHAPTER 2

What to Do? The Audience-Centered Presentation Process

WE ENDED CHAPTER 1 WITH A call for an audience-centered rhetoric for the twenty-first century, one that would respect the audience’s need to come to a decision in real time. We’ll begin at the most important place: the content.

How do you shape the content of an audience-centered speech? Much that is useful has been lost in our evolution to casual, conversational speakers. Public speaking must be more than merely conversation on your hind legs. Have you ever listened hard to a real conversation between two other people? If you’re not looking directly at both parties, it can be almost impossible to follow. Conversations are full of stops and starts, incomplete thoughts and utterances, ...