Speaker - October 2011

REALITY CHECK
Putting a fine point on the speaking industry
Three Cheers for NSA

This month—on October 8, to be exact—I celebrate 20 years working on staff at the National Speakers Association. In the past wo decades, I have worked with 20 different convention planning teams. As I write this column, I am preparing to meet with the 21st team for the 2012 NSA Convention in Indianapolis. If you haven’t already marked your calendar to attend this event, please do so now.

The most exciting part of the convention planning process is watching each team take a different approach to planning the NSA annual event, which is always colored with a genuine desire to serve the membership while creating new, better and different ways to celebrate the speaking profession.

While each convention experience has been unique and memorable in its own right, there are key messages that every team eventually returns to when crafting their education tracks on achieving success as professional speakers. There are three key messages that consistently emerge in one form or another:

1) Be original, 2) Bring value, and 3) Speak more to speak better.

own. They bring their own expertise, experiences and stories, and share them in a way that motivates, educates or moves an audience to action.

Value comes in what you personally deliver as well as what you help the client achieve, even when you are not the right speaker for the program.

Bring Value

Successful speakers not only come to
share their message and expertise, they
also make sure they understand how
their message relates to their particu-
lar audience, business or industry. And
just as important, they evaluate their
message for its value to the client. If
their message does not have the value
the client is seeking, then the speaker
does not accept
the engage-
ment and
will refer
the client
to a more
appropri-
ate speaker.

Be Original
Speakers with staying
power do not simply
read someone else’s
book and then share
it from the platform or,
worse yet, use someone
else’s story or materials as their

Speak More to Speak Better

If you want to be a better speaker, continually seek opportunities to share your message. Sometimes that will not be for a full fee or even for any fee at all, but speak whenever you can and hone your craft to become known as the best at delivering your message in your unique style.

I realize there have been many other messages shared at NSA conventions and some may have been stronger than these three messages. Those messages were right for the time, the economic environment, or for different stages of speaker development. But these three particular messages happen to be the ones that resurface repeatedly in building the foundation for the speaking profession. In some cases, they compose the professional ethics for our profession.

A lot has changed in 20 years, and a lot more will change in the coming years. NSA will continue to help its members speak more, speak better and make more money! Thank you for the privilege of being part of NSA for the last 20 years.