Came across an article in Business Week, on How Cisco's CEO works the crowd with his speeches. The article says that John Chambers "..is undeniably one of the most charismatic speakers in Corporate America today. His speeches are astonishing. Now imagine how successful you would be in your business if clients described you as 'astonishing'.. "
I have listened to Chambers speak, and must say, the man's more than astonishing!
Have you ever listened to a great speaker like Chambers and wished you too could deliver such a flawless speech? Ever wondered what makes them so charismatic and confident? Were they born with it?
Well, I guess you do have to be born with some traits (blame the DNA?) But there are other skills you can actually develop - but how? There are probably scores of ways, but for starters, you could try Toastmasters!
Toastmasters International is a non-profit organization committed to helping people improve their communication skills. Their website has all the details you need, so I won't talk abt it here. Namma Bengaluru has its very own Toastmasters club. The club meets every Friday evening.
TM club meetings follow a typical pattern - a couple of prepared speeches, and a few impromptu speeches (what they call Table Topics), followed by evaluations. Your first speech is called the ice-breaker. For every speech that you deliver, there are certain key points that you focus on improvising. After 10 speeches, you'll be awarded with the title "Competent Toast Master". You can then go on to scale greater heights - like Advanced Toast Master and then Distinguished Toast Master.
There are several companies in Bangalore like Infosys, Cisco that have their own Toastmasters clubs (which are inturn a member of ToastMasters International) and are encouraging employees to participate in the club activities. They even organize inter-club contests and stuff like that.
Interesting, right? Apparently, these guys do mean serious business!
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11 comments:
This is neat stuff..must learn more 'bout it. Thanks for putting it up here :)
gud gud...
But did u mention that u are a part of a TM and u never attned it ... :-p
phatichar:
thanks :)
vin: Nope i didn't, cos i knew you would surely mention it :-P
Thanks for the toastmaster link. I had heard about it sometime back, but could not remember the name for my life. Now I will bookmark the site to sit among my other 268 favourites.
A very interesting post. I have never watched him speak. It is a skill to talk well before a crowd. A winning attribute.
PS: Thank you for visiting my blog. Do visit regularly and give your comments.
Intersting and useful piece of information. Must check out their website.
ashish, balaji and pizzadude:
Good luck! and hope u become regular members.. unlike me
Interesting..
Nice initiative! Yeah communication skills matter a lot in the corporate world, and especially in places where more and more people are becoming a part of the global workforce, good speaking powers will carry anyone a long way.
Thanks for dropping by at my blog. I liked your posts too! :)
Oh, BTW, I noticed that your blog title and all have the problem. You need to put in a semicolon after the combination to make it appear as a space instead of being displayed itself.
sudipta: thanks for visiting my blog and commenting!
And thanks for the tip..i wanted to get rid of the html tags from the header but never found the time to search for a solution.
ok so i put a semicolon after the & nbsp and got rid of it but now it shows the strike tag :)
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