The “big wins” of better speaking

TL;DR

1. Looking for speechwriting’s ‘big wins’

2. I learnt to check this every time I write

3. It’s not the greatest country. Enough?

Looking for speechwriting’s ‘big wins’

When I was learning to swim, it didn’t go well.

My father spent ages trying to teach me the finer points of the ‘frog kick’ in the breast stroke.

Let’s just say after it ended in a shouting match, I decided to teach myself.

Now, partly that was a personality thing.

But the truth is, although I could always swim enough to save my life, it took me nearly 2 decades before I became a GOOD swimmer.

And just to be clear – I always loved swimming, so it wasn’t that.

So what was I doing wrong?

See, it turns out my father and I both made the same mistake.

And it’s the same mistake I saw when I signed up for lessons at a professional school.

The mistake is focusing on perfecting movement first.

Everyone thinks that’s what will propel their swimming further than anything.

And it will definitely help.

But the truth is, if you spend some time working on your breathing first, EVERYTHING will take a huge leap forward.

Then – and only then – is the physical as important.

The point here is simple: by focusing on the ‘big win’ of breathing, you can improve everything about your swimming.

This is a lesson I try to bring into everything I do – including speechwriting.

So what are the ‘big wins’ of speaking?

They’re NOT clever turns of phrase, incredible imagery, or anything else your English teacher taught you.

Those things can help a lot.

But they’re not the big wins.

The big wins are sentence length, word length, active voice, pacing, and rhythm.

If you keep your sentences and words short, you’re almost guaranteed to write more actively.

Writing more actively makes your words stronger – and usually clearer.

Shorter words also tend to have a stronger and clearer rhythm.

And that makes it easier for your audience to follow.

And pacing?

Well, you tell me – don’t you find a speaker who pauses at the right moments so much more interesting?

And easier to understand?

Yeah, I thought so.

So work on your big wins first.

Then sweat the small stuff.

I learnt to check this every time I write

Here’s a little ‘hack’ to help you get those big wins.

It’s called the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level.

And it’s a secret weapon.

Essentially, it’s a scoring system invented decades ago to measure the complexity of any given piece of writing.

There used to be a formula for working it out.

But rather than bore you with that, let me just tell you you can get it done in a heartbeat with readable.io

Much easier.

Anyway, you always want to aim to make your speech under an FK score of 10.

That’s an absolute MINIMUM.

But the lower you get it the better.

I aim for 7 or under.

Now, when I tell them to bring their FK score down, some people think I’m telling them to ‘dumb down’ their speech.

Not at all.

I’m telling them to SIMPLIFY their speech.

Not to make it simplistic.

And the more you can simplify your message – without being simplistic – the stronger that message is.

You can’t make a low FK score unless you cut your sentence length down.

Unless you use shorter – i.e. more direct – words.

In short…

…the FK score is a godsend for getting you those quick wins.

Ignore it at your peril.

It’s not the greatest country. Enough?

Let’s look at an example.

We’re going to use the opening monologue from the TV series The Newsroom.

A great series. And a great monologue, which you can watch here.

It’s 4:48 long, so pretty short.

But damn is it powerful.

Now, when I put the speech into readable.io it has an FK score of 7.3.

Not bad.

Let’s look a little deeper.

The average syllable length is 1.5.

Average words per sentence: 15.3.

Nouns are 33% of the words – a third is a good average to aim for.

The next most common words are verbs.

In other words, it’s active.

How does it start?

It starts by making its claim (America is not the greatest country) instantly without beating about the bush:

[In answer to the question “What makes America the greatest country in the world?”] “It's not the greatest country.”

Boom.

Then he hits out at the other panellists.

In general attacking isn’t great in a speech – but here it sets him apart and makes his case.

It shows why his opening statement might actually be right.

This is important because his other panellists have assumed America IS the greatest country.

“there is absolutely no evidence to support the statement that we're the greatest country in the world. We're seventh in literacy, twenty-seventh in math, twenty-second in science, forty-ninth in life expectancy, 178th in infant mortality, third in median household income, number four in labor force, and number four in exports. We lead the world in only three categories: number of incarcerated citizens per capita, number of adults who believe angels are real, and defense spending, where we spend more than the next twenty-six countries combined, twenty-five of whom are allies.”

He then backs up his claim with evidence.

An important point.

When you make a claim, give proof.

And do it fast.

Then he shifts from negative to positive – despair to hope.

“We sure used to be. We stood up for what was right! We fought for moral reasons, we passed and struck down laws for moral reasons. We waged wars on poverty, not poor people. We sacrificed, we cared about our neighbors, we put our money where our mouths were, and we never beat our chest. We built great big things, made ungodly technological advances, explored the universe, cured diseases, and cultivated the world's greatest artists and the world's greatest economy. We reached for the stars, and we acted like men. We aspired to intelligence; we didn't belittle it; it didn't make us feel inferior. We didn't identify ourselves by who we voted for in the last election, and we didn't scare so easy. And we were able to be all these things and do all these things because we were informed. By great men, men who were revered.”

This is also an important point.

If you only criticise, you lose.

Always.

You have to offer an alternative.

You have to offer vision.

You have to offer hope.

Otherwise people are just going to switch off.

Now for the best bit.

He started by saying “It’s not the greatest country.”

He finishes by saying “America is not the greatest country in the world anymore.”

This is great for two reasons.

He starts and ends making the same statement.

This gives direction and unity to his speech.

But he also gives it a slight twist the second time by adding ‘anymore’.

This makes his statement more nuanced, because it implies two things:

1. America WAS the greatest country

2. It could be again

So the speech has built on the message and made it more meaningful.

And the last word offers hope.

Something to keep in mind.

That’s all for this week.

Alexander

P.S.

Need speechwriting, corporate training, or coaching? DM me on LinkedIn or send me an email at [email protected]