The value of the National Speakers Association (NSA) Conventions is found in small group workshops and one-on-one meetings as much as in the main sessions.

The day began for me with a late breakfast meeting with my mentor from last year’s convention in Atlanta. Thea Lobell has earned her Ph.D. in counseling since we met last. She spent a month traveling in Japan to celebrate and is now ready to launch her new career outside academia. We discussed cultural differences that were apparent to her traveling in Japan (where a single woman is treated with cautious respect and is overwhelmed by random acts of kindness from strangers) and the street-smarts needed to survive in New Orleans and Baton Rouge.

Then it was on to my first group meeting.

The Diversity and International PEG

The NSA has a number of Professional Expert Groups (PEGs). Diversity and International is for folks with a passion for speaking internationally and an interest in seeing the world beyond the myopic perspective of their own culture.

Mary Francis Winters

A simple role play – a mimed interaction between a man and a woman with her head bowed – challenged us to examine cultural stereotypes. What did we see? Subservience? Looking through a different cultural lens might show us a world where a person only makes eye contact with a stranger when they want to steal a look into a soul. How would that data point influence your evaluation of the next Asian job candidate? What did we really see?

Mary Francis shared five cultural axioms.

1. Shed US-centric thinking

While the world is flat, it’s not a melting pot. 95% of the world’s population lives outside the USA.

2. Understand the impact of worldwide workforce trends

Mandarin in the world’s most common language. 73% of the working population of the world comes from outside North America, which supplies a mere 3%. Do all multinational company HR departments acknowledge this in their communication?

3. Cross-cultural competency is a requirement

Recommended: take Milton Bennett’s Intercultural Development Inventory as a valid measure of intercultural sensitivity. Ethnocentric people see the world from their own perspective (My country right or wrong). Ethno-relative people know they cannot fully comprehend those from other cultures and are open to learning more. Most of us have achieved the mid-point state of minimizing cultural differences. The hallmark of the truly culturally competent is to look beyond the superficial comfort of seeing similarities in all people (All God’s children…) to value real differences between people.

4. Adopt a new language to honor cultural differences

Discussions about diversity in the USA revolve around representation. This is not always effective for corporations with global operations. Other countries are baffled by the U.S. preoccupation with creating inclusive workplaces. Values are different across the world. Honor that.

5. Understand issues from a global perspective

Mergers and acquisitions, back office workers in Bangalore and contract manufacturers in China — the modern corporation requires culturally aware global managers. Seeing Bangalore as an extension of Bemiji won’t cut it.

Recommended reading:

Riding the Waves of Culture: Understanding Diversity in Global Business, Charles Hampden-Turner.

Frank Furness

Frank travels the world and is proud of it.

Frank is a powerhouse on the International speaking scene. A native South African now resident in near the M1 Watford Gap Services, he’s fully integrated into cultures as diverse as Dublin, Dubai and Denpasar. Here’s a man who never met a five-star hotel he didn’t like. His infectious enthusiasm is at a level befitting a sales and motivational speaker.

Frank assures us that we can conquer the world as professional speakers. Just don’t show them the sole of your shoe in Arabia, or ask the Brits to make fools of themselves with sales training techniques that wow them in Wyoming.

After a brief hallway meeting with NSA/NC’s Scott Q. Marcus and Michael Holland it was on to the next small group workshop.

The Chapter Leadership Session

A classic brainstorming session led by Marsha Reynolds.

Teams considered a variety of topics that help manage and grow the different chapters around the country. Some of the keepers I noted:

• Record audio of visiting speakers and podcast via subscription on the web
• Use back-end software such as Constant Contact and Vision Gate Portal to manage newsletters and mailings
• Show videos from the Convention at local meetings for those who were not able to attend
• Include a summary of the best of each meeting under a “Here’s what you missed” banner — or, perhaps, a link to someone crazy enough the blog each and every meeting 🙂

One, Two, Three, Four.

Uno, Dos, Tres, Cuatro.

Numbers are such absolutes, the bedrock of what we know, of how we think. We count the ways of loving and measure out our lives in numbers. So it’s only common sense that these must appeal on a similar level (of pure reason) in each and every listener worldwide – no matter if the audience is in St. Louis or Shanghai. Right?

Not so, reports the Chinese People’s Daily Online. Significant cultural differences exist in the way we process numbers.

Despite using the same numerals in computing, English and Chinese speakers displayed different brain activities in processing them, according to a new study conducted by a China-US research team. For example, the participants might have been shown symbols of an erect scythe and a cleaver and asked to figure out the visual orientation of a tilted knife in relation to the first two.

Right there, the dispassionate focus of the researcher betrays a deep cultural bias. While mental images of erect scythes, cleavers and a tilted knives would draw a blank in most westerners (with the possible exception of those of us who live in San Francisco and are habitues of the Power Exchange ) for the Chinese this is a valid area of research where numbers are represented by pictograms.

Since Chinese characters are more visual that Arabic numbers the brain activity required to process these vastly different written codes are significant.

This is yet another reason to eschew text and numbers in your Powerpoint when presenting at home or abroad. Stick to photographs and images that have more universal appeal. The audience will understand you better. You can count on it.

It was Showtime at Saturday’s NSA/NC Pro-Track Meeting. Team 5 took a turn to Showcase our presentations. In addition, we learned the importance of Marketing for Speakers as a way to showcase our expert talents to the world.

Jill Lublin

The best-selling author of Guerilla Publicity and Networking Magic shared her powerful, street-smart, results-oriented tips and tricks to capitalize on media opportunities and get the word out. Jill has seen that the problem with most CEO’s, independent professionals, consultants, speakers and authors is they have a great message but no clue how to craft it so the media will say “Yes! YES! YES!!� They have a lot of good ideas, but lack the focus and clarity to quickly and easily figure out what their main message is.

A sampling of her admonitions:

I experimented with my own media pitch:

The world is changing. Over 50% of businesspeople must deal with overseas customers, partners or staff. Hi, I’m Ian Griffin with Executive Communications and I help businesses bridge cultures by: building your credibility as an outsider who enjoys hidden advantages over native businesspeople; helping you communicate clearly and understandably with foreigners and, finally, by giving you twelve travel tips to ensure your next overseas business trip is stress-free and effective.

Nan Andrews Amish and Michael Lee

Two of the most experienced members of the National Speakers Association shared their insights on developing an effective marketing plan. Some of the highlights:

Life’s getting complex when you start to see the value in a search engine of search engines. An uber-search engine. Since my previous posts on Search Tools for Savvy Speechwriters I keep coming across ever more useful pointers.

The latest, and best, is in today’s Financial Times where technology columnist Paul Taylor summerizes the “meta” search sites. (Subscription Required).

Dogpile

Three search engines not enough for ‘ya? How about four? More? Gotta use Dogpile for this level of comparison. Great search engine, crap name.

“All the best search engines piled into one.” Gag me with a spoon! An annoying cute clip-art Dalmatian puppy. A ‘Go fetch!” prompt. The branding stinks. (OK, OK, there was a time when Google used to mean a squirrly cricket ball but I don’t see anyone saying “Did you Dogpile that?” anytime soon. )

But wait. I looked up Global Warming and was blown away by Dogpile. It showed me this unique Map. I was able to bring in columns for up to six different search engines. It suggested some useful alternative searches (Acid rain; Greenhouse Gas). For this I can forgive them the tacky brand.

Ask.com blog search update

Paul alerts us to an update from the Ask.com search engine when applied to Blog searches (my single best source of content for many presentations and public speeches). They’ve refined the process of searching blogs by analyzing the use of Bloglines which I’ve written a guide to. Three really useful tools are embedded in the results:

• Binoculars : Roll-over to preview the site without leaving the page
• Subscribe: Subscribe to feeds using your preferred reader
• Post To: Share results by posting them to your favorite sites

You can also subscribe to a search term for daily updates to your Bloglines reader on any topics-du-jour that you need keep an eye open for.

Blinkx

Video killed the radio star. In today’s personal, digital, virtual, converged multi-media world it’s soooo last century to confine your search activity to text, be it web, blog or newsgroup.

You need to get with the program and use Blinkx to search video. It provides access to millions of hours of audio, video, podcasts, viral videos and television content. My search on Global Warming turned up a wide selection of streaming video clips. Top of the list was the Daily Show’s spoof on the Sierra Club’s complaints about CO2. With the right re-use permission video clips can liven up any speech.

Singingfish

Singingfish provides another alternative audio/video search engine. Unlike traditional search engines, it indexes only multimedia formats, including Windows Media, Real, QuickTime and MP3 audio files.

Forget Global Warming – this time I went for the Jugular and got 281 hits of music by Roy Harper and over 7,000 sources of Bob Dylan tunes. Wow.

Answers.com

Answers.com draws on more than 60 titles from brand-name publishers, as well as original content created by the site’s editorial team. The site offers useful answers in categories such as business, health, travel, technology, science, entertainment, arts, history and many more.

My Global Warming search delivered an incredibly comprehensive listing:

• starting with a definition from the American Heritage Dictionary
• encompassing lengthy encyclopedia entries from Columbia University Press and Wikipedia
• summarizing scientific background from Houghton Mifflin.

At the bottom of the results page they even list the correct way to cite these sources in the text of your speech or article. Now, what could be easier than that? Well, how about a free installable toolbar that let’s you Alt-Click on any word on an Internet Explorer screen and get a pop-up definition from Answers.com. Cool, huh? Wait! There’s more, it slices, it dices, it even….ooops, sorry, wrong product.

I’d only just posted 29 Search Tools for Savvy Speechwriters on Friday when I came across a whole new level of info on search tools. I attribute this to the “Green Beemer Phenomena” (you don’t notice green BMW’s on the road until the day after you buy one, then they’re everywhere!).

Andy pointed me to Kris’s listing of tools for the del.icio.us website which then points to a great listing of Quick Online Tips.

I’m continually amazed how these connections work in the blogosphere. Becoming a regular blog reader has allowed me to stumble across all kinds of useful tools, benefit from the knowledge of subject matter experts and gain insight.

As it is, these guys have made me aware of a new generation of search tools which the Savvy Speechwriter can benefit from. Here’s a few pointers to those I found most useful:

Del.icio.us

Del.icio.us is a “social bookmarking” tool . In other words, it’s a way people share the bookmarks of websites they like. One obvious use would be for communities (such as my NSA/NC Pro-Track class) to share pointers to sites of interest. There’s many ways to use del.icio.us:

1. As a search tool

A delicious search on “Public Speaking” uncovers a fantastic series of links including Public Speaking Do’s and Don’t’s; Toastmaster’s 10 tips for public speaking; UC Berkeley’s guide to more effective public speaking and much, much more.

2. As a window into the links others share

Each listing has a link to all the people who share that ‘tag’ in del.icio.us. The list of Do’s/Don’t’s’ is the most popular – shared by 409 others. Click on that link to see their common “tag cloud” and posting history. Both these are avenues down which you can explore bookmarks of interest to the 409 people who deem it worth bookmarking ‘Public Speaking’. This is akin to looking over the shoulder of a knowledgeable professor in Grad School to see what other sources of information they like.

3. similicio.us

A tool to find similar sites, based on their ranking in Del.icio.us. Example, searching on my home page (exec-comms.com) lists Rob Cottingham, the Washington Post, Slate.com and others. Interesting.

4. Built in Del.icio.us search tools

Rather than first having to access the del.icio.us site, Quick Online Tips let’s you load ‘instant’ search tools in your browser (I filed mine in the ‘Links’ button) that trigger searches by keyword, tag or user. Follow the instructions carefully!

Multiple Search Engine Tools

As I reported last time, it’s worthwhile looking for facts and supporting data via more than one search engine. I rather laboriously listed the way to locate multiple options in Google, Yahoo, Ask.com and others.

It’s no surprise that smarter folk than me have built ‘query once, search everywhere’ tools that greatly simplify this process:

1. Simply Google

Here’s a single screen that lets you search all the Google options at once. It also includes Yahoo, MSN, Ask and others. Just cut n’ paste your search terms and get the results you need from across the search universe.

2. Gahooyoogle / Twingine

Gahooyoogle and Twingine are neat solutions that let’s you enter your search phrase once and then see lists from Yahoo and Google side-by-side.

3. Soople

Soople is a meta-search site that meant for all those who are not yet familiar with all the possibilities of Google and all the required syntaxes. For instance, you can specify a search by one particular site or filetype (word, excel, powerpoint and pdf) or an imagesearch by size and type. Scope the many useful tools Google offers; search the latest news, look up definitions or use Google as a phonebook.

Thinking back to my previous post on a Speechwriters Resource List made me realize that, while there are a ton of great reference materials available for speechwriters (and speakers), a Savvy Speechwriter also needs to know how to use search tools.

You can wander through a lush forest of ideas in online encyclopedia, way-back machines and other arcane sources as you prepare to select the timber for your next project. But when you are up against a deadline and need a fact, quote or an opinion, then, like a master-carpenter who reaches for just the right drill-bit or chisel, the accomplished writer needs to know which search tool to use for the job. The faster you can cut through the crap and find the facts, the sooner you’ll finish the project, and the more pleasing the result will be.

Here’s various tools I’ve found useful. They are good starting points to assist you:

Plain old Google

No apologies for starting with Google. It’s my number one search choice. But it’s not my only one.

Let’s say you have an assignment to write a speech on Global Warming. I’m sure 99% of computer-literate people immediately think of going to the main Google Home Page and typing in ‘Global Warming’. Result: 93,100,000 hits. So no shortage of material! But what’s relevant? The first, unpaid, link is to the US Government’s Environmental Protection Agency Site which is as good a place to start as any. Under the heading ‘What is the Problem’ it states “There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities.”

The second site is also from the EPA – the EPA Global Warming Kids Site. This contains Games! Links! and a reassuring note for the little ones that “We CAN make a difference!”

Google internationally

The Savvy Speechwriter might realize that since the US Government is the only major power apart from Australia that refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol to limit Global Warming, limiting your content to that found on Yankee sites won’t cover all the bases, as they say in America.

So, my first tip for the Savvy Speechwriter is to see what the rest of the English-speaking world has to say. Suggestion: expand your search on Google UK (once you access Google UK be sure to click the button for ‘pages from the UK’). Here the highest ranked site is the New Scientist Special Report on Climate Change. In contrast to the EPA’s mealy-mouthed statement that “most” of the warming is “attributable” to humans the UK source is far more direct: “Climate change is with us. A decade ago, it was conjecture. Now the future is unfolding before our eyes.” Depending on the point of view of the speaker, this might be a far more compelling source to quote.

As powerful as Google is, you can’t rely on it to surface all of the right material. If all the carpenter has is a hammer, every issue looks like a nail. If all you use is Google, every speaker will quote the same sources. For this reason, I like to run my searches through a couple of other engines.

Yahoo

I usually turn next to Yahoo . Their listing has an anti-Kyoto organ as number one. This is probably funded by the oil companies — it attempts to refute evidence about the ‘imaginary climate crisis’. No matter which side of the debate you speak on, this is invaluable material. For starters, you could discuss why this site gets such high ranking – might makes right?

Ask

Still other rankings are shown by other search engines. Ask lists a Chevron-sponsored site in the pole position. No surprise which side of the debate their content is on: Abundant energy drives economic development…

Ask has a nice feature to allow you to narrow or expand your search to related phrases:

Narrower options: Global Warming Greenhouse Effect; Facts on Global Warming; What Are the Projected Effects of Global Warming?
Expanded Options: What Is the Kyoto Protocol; Effects of Carbon Dioxide; Causes Acid Rain

Yahoo Internationally

As with Google, you can search for alternative (saner?) views from around the world using Yahoo. How? Simply choose ‘Advanced Search’ and in the lower half of the screen reset the ‘Country’ option. An instant speech on ‘Global views on Global Warming’ could be created in short order using this simple technique!

Here’s a sampling of the top of the list from different countries coupled with a quick quote from each site:

Australia: The particular problem arises in the 8-18µm band where water vapour is a weak absorber of radiation and where the earth’s thermal radiation is greatest.
China: Blue Man Group Global Warming Awareness Ad. (weird, huh?)
France: Russia and Germany subsidize coal mining, and the US subsidizes oil by spending billions on keeping the Mid-East, not “safe for democracy” as anyone familiar with the autocratic regimes of the region can attest, but “safe for oil companies and consumers.”
Italy: Radar altimetry confirms global warming is affecting polar glaciers.
The UK: It’s said that by the time a baby born today is 80 years old, the world will be 6 and a half degrees warmer than it is now.

Google / Yahoo multi-lingually

You could continue to search on views from other countries, in other languages. If your language skills are up to it, look in Google France for the topic Le réchauffement climatique. Likewise, look in Google Germany or Google Italy and see what you find. Be sure to click the button to for pages in the French, German or Italian first or the good old EPA pops up top of the list.

Another approach is to use the ‘Preferences’ option to the right of the US Google search space where you can choose to see web pages in any one of 35 languages. This would be an alternate way of looking up multi-lingual sources.

Yahoo let’s you select ‘Language’ on the ‘Advanced Search’ page.

Google / Yahoo / Ask Images

Many speakers use PowerPoint, or need graphics for a hand-out to accompany the speech. On the main Google Home Page the first option next to the plain Web Search allows you to search for Images. Click on the underlined word to switch to Google Images. You can look at over 50,000 images related to this topic. Click on the thumbnail images displayed to get the larger image. Before downloading, check if it is copyrighted and available for use and be sure to ask permission.

Yahoo and Ask both have an images option. Same search phrase gives you a totally different screenfull of images.

Commercial Image Searching

Commercial stock photography companies such as Getty Images and Corbis provide newspapers and magazines with high-quality photographs on specific subjects. As Garr has recommended, one of the best low-cost sources “for the rest of us” is iStockPhoto. A search on Global Warming turns up nearly 500 photos and graphic images available for royalty-free use for a mere $1 a pop.

More on Copyright

While much content is subject to copyright laws, it’s useful to know that if you access the Advanced Search option in Google (or Yahoo) you can check the box that limits your search to material which is copyright free. You’ll find published content — including music, photos, movies, books, and educational materials — that you can share or modify above and beyond fair use.

The “Usage Rights” feature in Advanced Search identifies websites whose owners have indicated that they carry a Creative Commons license.

That said, note that the Copywrite Laws do allow speakers “fair use” of a copyrighted work:

including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.

Google Groups

Let’s say your speech needs some point/counterpoint arguments to spice it up. Or you need a subject matter expert to assist your research. Google Groups give you access to the world of Internet newsgroups where people debate any and all issues. You’d immediately see there is a specific group on this topic — alt.global-warming — with 141 subscribers passionate about Global Warming. You can read archived discussions, mining them for counter-arguments your speaker can disprove in his talk. You can also post questions relevant to your topic, or perhaps slip in a posting advertising your speech and encouraging people to attend!

An alternate way to contact Subject Matter Experts is by using:

Yahoo Answers

Yahoo Answers is a direct connection to experts who volunteer to answer questions. This is the place to ask questions and get real answers from real people. You can ask questions on any topic—from the serious to the not so serious. Registration with a free Yahoo Login and Password allows you to post a question. Before you send it in, you’ll see other questions that have been asked on this topic, so, as in Google News, you can gather others opinions.

I posted a question on the amount of CO2 emissions from automobiles under the ‘Environment’ category. Within the day I had 3 answers giving me some very precise statistics and references.

Google News

Next in line on the menu of choices is Google News. This allows you to search over 4,500 English-language news sources worldwide. The Advanced Search option lets you search the news published in a specific country. News clippings make great content for a speaker to refer to. Edit for brevity and clarity and you have instant credibility.

Google Shops

OK, it might be a stretch for every topic, but Froogle gives you access to items for sale. There are some cute Global Warming mugs, a Sonny Rollins music track by that name and a ton of books. You could purchase something to raffle as a prize for the audience — a well-know trick to collect attendees business cards and expand your network.

Google Maps

This is the final option on the main Google page. Google Maps won’t be a primary source for most speechwriters. But it does show the location of any business with the name of your search term. There’s a number of Global Warming related organizations and their address and phone numbers are displayed. This might be another way of reaching subject matter experts.

That’s all you’ll see on the main Google page. However, the real treasures are buried on the screen you access by clicking on the ‘More’ button. If you’ve never ventured into this area of Google you are in for a treat!

Google Alerts

This is one of the Savvy Speechwriters most powerful tools. Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic. Some handy uses of Google Alerts include:

Google Blogs

My favorite! The blogosphere is now the best source for informed opinions and offbeat insights to liven up any speech. In contrast to Groups (above) which are more likely to contain rants and instant-message-like one liners, most blogs are articulate, well researched and contain a wealth of cross references in the form of embedded links, blogrolls (other blogs of interest), and reader comments. Google Blog Search has become my primary form of research for many speeches. Searching the blogosphere for Global Warming gets oodles of content from the pundits who publish Global Warming Watch, Carbon Planet and from these, links to many other blogs of interest.

However, don’t rely on Google alone to be your guide to blogs. I recommend using two other resources:

Technorati

Technorati is the authority on what’s going on in the world of weblogs. It is currently tracking 40.4 million sites and 2.4 billion links. A search on Technorati will be a focused one, since it relies on bloggers who embed the search phrase a ‘tag’ in their entries, as I do at the bottom of each of my postings.

Bloglines

Is my personal RSS newsfeed reader and blog search engine. I have written at length about Bloglines here.

Now, back to Google for some serious, in depth, research.

Google Books

Is the fabled attempt by Google to put all the world’s books online. They still have a long way to go, but this is a great way to dig into books on your topic without having to drive over to the Library or your local mall bookstore to read up on it. Google Book Search does require you login with a valid (free) Google account but this is a small inconvenience to be able to access the partial or full text of hundreds of volumes on your topic. Be aware that copyright laws do apply, so be conscious the fair use law.

Another option for digging deeply into published works is:

Amazon.com

I’m amazed that more people don’t take advantage of the ‘Search Inside!’ function available for many Amazon listed books. It seems less restrictive than Google and you can see 3-4 pages each side of the words you are searching on, as well as the Index and Table to Contents. Again, copyright rules apply, so quote fairly.

Google Catalogs

While the ability to search and browse mail-order catalogs might underwhelm you, I was surprised to see there is even useful information on Global Warming here. And if you have to write a speech for the consumer goods, fashion or home improvement industries, this would be a treasure trove of material.

Google Finance

Is the place to visit if you need some hard-hitting business info, news, and interactive charts for your speech. Google Finance gives you great access to company-specific information. Your topic might require researching the Coal Mining industry. You can dig deeper into the background of major companies like Penn Virginia (NYSE: PVR) here.

Google Scholar

Allows you to stand on the shoulders of giants. Google Scholar provides a simple way to broadly search for scholarly literature. From one place, you can search across many disciplines and sources: peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, abstracts and articles, from academic publishers, professional societies, preprint repositories, universities and other scholarly organizations. Many articles only allow unrestricted access to an abstract, but this might be all you need to quote a factoid or verify an opinion with some concrete research from academia.

Google Specialized Searches

This is about as deep a dive as you can take at Google. Google’s special searches enable you to narrow your search to a specific topic. The University Search enables you to search to a specific university websites for things like admissions information, course schedules, or alumni news. Other specialized services include a search for US Government websites (back to the good old EPA Global Warming site!) and a number for the computer industry.

Google Video

Is still a beta (trial) product. However, Google Video is bound to become a force in the future as more video becomes digital, virtual, and searchable. You can quickly locate specific clips from movies, TV shows, and a range of customized videos on many topics. There is a fee to watch some of the videos. As it is, a search for Global Warming found a couple of great free 30 second clips from the Advertising Council as well as an hour-long lecture from UC San Diego on the topic. Many speakers love to include short video clips in their speech. What better way to locate the right content? An added bonus is the option to upload and share the video of your presentation — a nice viral marketing trick that adds to the knowledge bank for others to search on!

Google’s latest projects

At the top of the right hand column on the ‘More’ page you can check out what is under development in Google Labs. There’s a range of projects which are still in early stage development at Google.

Google Trends

I’ve already written on Google Trends, here. The Savvy Speechwriter can easily see what is the relative importance in Google search ranking between two or more keywords. For the Global Warming speech you might want to compare three main forms of power generation. One theme in your speech could be a comment on the relative interest in nuclear power and wind energy since 2004. Also, dive into the major news stories flagged on the chart that stimulated an uptick in past Google searches. Note rankings by Cities, Regions and Languages. Your audience might be interested to hear about these variations.

Google Notebook

Google Notebook simplifies the burden of web research. It’s an easy and efficient way to clip and gather information while you’re browsing the web.

Google Notebook lives in your browser, so you won’t be left with a scattered collection of notes, Word docs, images and browser bookmarks to sort through; all your web findings will be gathering into one organized, easy accessible location that you can access from any computer.

To use Google Notebook you need to login and then download a plug-in for your browser. You can organize your notes, creating multiple notebooks, divide them into sections, and drag-and-drop your notes to stay organized. The Savvy Speechwriter on the go can access their Notebook from any computer by using your Google Accounts login. If you work as part of a team of speechwriters or communications professionals you can share your Google Notebook with the world by making it public.

All in all, Google Notebook is a really cool tool to use.

Google Suggest

If you believe in the power of serendipity when you are searching for themes and topics for your speech, then Google Suggest is for you. I’ve made this my default access to Google. It’s a simple but powerful concept. As you type, Google will offer suggestions. So if you want to do a search on ‘wind energy’ as you finish typing ‘wind e’ you see a drop down list of suggestions:

wind energy
wind electricity
wind energy or wind turbines
wind energy association

and so on.

Some of these might be phrases other than the ones you’d originally planned to research.

Yahoo Directory

Back in Yahoo-land, the Directory option let’s you see Sub-Categories to your main topic. So we are shown:

Each provide new avenues to explore, new content to review.

Conclusion

I’ve covered some of the search tools the Savvy Speechwriter can use to speed the plough on your next keynote or Toastmaster’s practice run. There is a whole Internet of content out there. You’ll find other tools as you develop your craft. The trick is to find compelling evidence that makes the audience sit up and take notice. Edit wisely. Good hunting.

Al Gore’s new movie opened in this week in Hollywood. I watched it today in a theatre at Sunset and Vine while LA County freeways throbbed with the ceaseless roar of SUV’s, convertibles, sedans and hybrid vehicles. Steeper gas prices have not put a dent in the Southern California lifestyle, any more than they’ve changed American’s driving habits in any of the other 49 states.

Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth aims to change some of these very truths that American’s hold self-evident: the inalienable rights to execute tight right turns on red in a set of wheels that gets the lowest average mileage of any nation on earth.

No matter if you voted for Gore (which the majority of us did) or for the current President (which slightly fewer did, but enough in the right parts of Florida) you owe it to your children to see this movie. It convinced me. And one of the reasons it is convincing is that Gore gives quite simply the best executive presentation I’ve ever seen.

One reason might be is that he knows his content.

He’s delivered the same presentation over 1,000 times – in most American cities and many places overseas. He has seen what works with audiences, and where he saw the need for more compelling content he created it.

One highlight of his stagecraft is when he shows how increased CO2 emissions are literally “off the chart” by ascending 20 feet above the podium on a hydraulic lift to reach the high-point on his graphic where recent increases in pollution have spiked in comparison to the 650,000 year-old records we have (core samples from the polar ice don’t lie).

Time and again a relaxed, tanned, slightly overweight Gore uses compelling images and animations onscreen to support his argument. I did not see one bullet point in the whole thing. What I did see were:

Pictures worth a thousand words

Beautifully executed animations that support the speaker but don’t distract

A little humor

Simple, elegant charts with graphs that explain, not obfuscate

The graphics are simple, compelling, effective. Time and again we see Gore the road-warrior as he jets around the world delivering his speech (shades of do as I say not as I do in terms of his own beefy carbon footprint on the planet this travel schedule must have imposed – but I guess he can be forgiven given the message he carries. At all times he has his trusty Apple (whose Board is he on) laptop open, tweaking a slide or three.

Garr points out that it’s not a “PowerPoint” presentation – he used Apple’s more elegant product, Keynote.

Perhaps Steve Jobs the master of effective presentations schooled him. Someone did. This is not the Al Gore who used t’joke about he being the wooden one in the roomful of Secret Service agents (a joke that itself was so wooden, so scripted, as to be a parody of an effective speaker).

Agree or disagree with Al, if you’re a professional speaker or speechwriter, ya gotta see this film.

Garr Reynolds recently remarked that stand-up comedy is the most terrifying presentation skill to master. Very few of us want to try doing a set at the local comedy club, no business person really needs that experience on their resume. But knowing the right and wrong way to work humor into a business presentation is a valuable skill for both speechwriter and/or speaker to master.

But surely no mere mortal is funny enough to make audiences laugh in the way Seinfeld, Woody Allen or the talk-show hosts make ’em laugh? Many speaking coaches warn that attempts at humor in a business speech are doomed to embarrassment and failure. Audiences want the facts, just the facts, ma’am. Fun has no place in the business world, damn it! This might be true…in Germany. But in many countries, a little humor goes a long way to connect with an audience. But what to do – if you don’t have the talent or courage? Are there any sure-fire techniques to build a laugh machine to turn ’em on?

The May meeting of the vibrant (and growing!) NSA/NC Chapter was the place to be Saturday to see two masters of the comedic arts share their trade secrets.

We leaned about “The Rule of Three”; “The Call Back”; “The Topper” as well as a bunch of funny lines and plain zany ideas to plant in your next script to wow your audience. These were not the idle suggestions of amateur funny men – they were practical, tried and tested techniques to get any business audience laughing.

David Glickman – ‘Be More Funny, Make More Money’

David is a superb stand-up comic in the tradition of the best of the Borscht Belt. His tips for creating great humor include:

David shared other great insider tips. Such as using a graphics professional to create a glue-on cover that parodies a well known book with a new title the specific audience will find funny – Harry Potter and the Mystery of Hotel Banquet Pricing for a speech to a Meeting Planners Convention.

Business audiences love jokes that are customized for them. Poke fun at the competition, mention product names, use corporate lingo. They’ll love being in on the ‘Inside Joke’.

All this and more in his excellent book.

Brad Montgomery – Got Mirth? Milking Your Material For All The Humor It’s Worth

Wow! A stand-up comic who started in the business when he was 16, is a magician and he has his own blog! What’s not to like!

Brad took an analytic approach to generating mirth in front of the mike. He spent time putting our fears to rest by sharing some groundrules:

Brad gave us great tips for livening up business audiences.

Let the audience see you are having a good time.

Laugh and the world laughs with you, fail and they’ll let you die.

The Fourth meeting of the Pro-Track training sponsored by the National Speakers Association, Northern California, took place on April 22. This month’s focus was on choosing a topic to speak on.

Webster defines a topic as:

Etymology: Latin Topica Topics (work by Aristotle), from Greek Topika, from topika, neuter plural of topikos of a place, of a topos, from topos place, topos
1 a : one of the general forms of argument employed in probable reasoning b : ARGUMENT, REASON
2 a : a heading in an outlined argument or exposition b : the subject of a discourse or of a section of a discourse

The bottom line for professional speakers is that your topic must appeal to audiences willing to pay to hear you speak. We heard from two consummate professionals who had picked topics that packed ’em in.

Adrian Pearson

Ms. Pearson (I state her sex since the British mostly expect Adrian’s to be men – Adrian Mole, Adrian Cockcroft, ‘Adrian’s Wall…) is a market research expert who highlighted the importance of measuring the interest people have in a particular topic before writing the speech. Why choose to develop a topic that will be difficult to sell?

Simply ask a small sample of people to rate your subject on a scale of 1-9. Anything that scores a 6 or higher deserves your attention. Otherwise, fuggedabout it!

My homework – finding what specific topics in the area of international business and doing business overseas people are willing to pay good money to hear about.

Craig Harrison

This craigslist of ways to find your topic included:

– Ask yourself what gives you most pleasure as a communicator (shocking audiences? storytelling? inspiring them?)
– Examine what qualifies you as an expert on your topic – where does your credibility come from?
– Find out what audiences value enough to pay for – what are the hot topics they are interested in?

We then spent time developing an elevator pitch to showcase our uniqueness. He coached us to think in terms of the listener, clearly stating the benefits of what we do and inviting them to connect further with us.

At the end of the day I had the following rough draft for my elevator pitch:

I speak on the secrets of success in international business. I’m Ian Griffin and I’ve experienced first hand how to survive and thrive in foreign lands. If you want to feel at home anywhere in the world I can teach you 35 tips for productive overseas trips. Are you ready to do business, worldwide? Call me.

I’m sure I will modify and refine this over time. And at some point I might actually develop 35 tips that people will pay to hear. Meanwhile, on a scale of 1 to 9 (1 = terrible, 9 = fantastic) tell me how you rate my elevator pitch?

Thanks to the Ragan Speechwriters Newsletter for acknowledging my blog on their Speechwriters Conference. For those of you who want to read those blog entries, you’ll find them starting here and continuing here, here, here and here.