Why and How to Use/Not Use Quotations in a Speech

Christopher Witt — March 14, 2018

Using quotations in a speech There are as many reasons not to use a quotation in a speech as there are to use one.

I’ll confess. I like using a quotation in a speech. And I do it quite often. Still, it’s perfectly permissible — and sometimes recommended — not to use a quotation.

Why Use a Quotation in a Speech

Quotations can add credibility to your speech. Quoting someone famous or important makes it seem like they’re agreeing with you or your idea.

Quotations can add poetry and punch to your speech, because they are often well phrased and to the point.

Quotations make your speech memorable, because (again) they are often well phrased and to the point.

Why Not Use a Quotation in a Speech

Using a quotation can lessen your credibility. Why do you have to call on some higher authority to back up what you’re saying? Don’t you have any authority of your own? Isn’t the idea you’re proposing clear, strong, and persuasive on its own merits?

Using a quotation to add poetry and punch to your speech is an admission that your own words are prosaic and uninspiring. Why not make your own words sing?

Using a quotation to drive home your point and make it memorable is lazy. I believe that, for the most part, you should be able to sum up your speech in a single sentence. But it should be your sentence. One that you’ve labored over and honed to a fine point.

How to Use a Quotation in a Speech

Use only one quotation per speech. You don’t strengthen your speech by citing several quotations; you weaken it. Be selective.

Get it right. Get the words right. A quotation is only a quotation if it is word-for-word accurate. And make sure you cite the right person as the source of the quotation. (Just because you see it on the internet doesn’t make it so.)

Know who you’re quoting. By quoting someone without qualification you are in essence endorsing that person and what they stand for.

Make sure the audience knows who you’re quoting. Most of the time it’s best to quote someone you know the audience knows: Einstein, Gandhi, Roosevelt, Steve Jobs (in certain fields). When quoting someone your audience may not know, you need to frame the quote, providing just enough information to give your audience reason to believe the quote.

Emphasize the quotation by pausing before and after saying it. Mark Twain said, [pause] “Loyalty to a petrified opinion never broke a chain or freed a human soul.” [Pause]

Keep it short.

How Not to Use a Quotation in a Speech

Avoid opening or closing your speech with a quotation. The first and last words of your speech carry the most weight; make them your own.

Don’t use a quotation that everyone already knows.

Don’t expect the quotation to prove anything. At best, a quotation adds credibility. Resorting to authority is a weak argument.

How about you? Any thoughts? When and how do you use quotes in your speeches?

In Lead, Speak quotation, quote, speech

How to Inspire Audiences

Christopher Witt — January 23, 2018

how to inspire audiences In spite of what you might think as a result of witnessing motivational speakers at work, you don’t inspire people by jumping up and down excitedly, thumping your chest, and passionately proclaiming a slogan from a Successories™ poster.

You inspire people, not by being louder and more animated than you normally are, but by engaging their deepest values and most authentic emotions.

Inspiration means, literally, to “breathe into.” In this case, to breathe life and vitality into your audience. You do that not by giving them step-by-step instructions but by giving them a motive, a desire to act.

You give people the hope that they can achieve what they want and be the best self they can imagine.

First, you influence people. You shape how they look at their situation, how they envision it, how they think and feel about it. Then you show them what they can do about it.

In Lead, Sell Ideas, Speak influence, inspire

Why Reason and Logic Don’t Counter Trump’s Rhetoric

Christopher Witt — August 22, 2017

Using reason and logic to counter Trump’s rhetoric — his tweets, off-the-cuff remarks, speeches — doesn’t work.

You can fact check his statements, and cite glaring errors. You can point to his tweets or video clips in which he made contradictory statements. You can punch gaping holes in the logic of his arguments.

All to no avail.

It’s as if reason and logic — the mainstays of traditional rhetoric — don’t apply to Trump. Nor do they sway his supporters.

Why not?

The knee-jerk response is to write off Trump and his supporters as illogical and irrational. Defective in some way.

But I don’t think that’s the case. And it doesn’t give us any insight into their behavior or how we might influence it.

For most of us — not just Trump and his supporters — reason and logic aren’t the main drivers that inform our thinking or guide our behavior.

At some primal level we function in a pre-rational — not an irrational — manner. We act not illogically, but without logic.

Logic is a mental discipline with its own rules and processes. Many of which are counter-intuitive.

Logic isn’t something we naturally pick up: it has to be learned. Usually later in life.

In our earliest, most formative years, our brains simply are not wired for logic.

There’s a reason why we use logic infrequently. It’s hard work. It takes time. It requires a detached, somewhat cool and calculating mind.

After all, it takes time and energy to think things through. To examine the evidence and weigh its validity. To make conscious our personal biases and account for how they influence our thinking. To formulate an argument and test its logic. To engage others in an open dialogue, with the willingness to change our thinking as a result.

Most of us don’t take the time, make the effort, or know how to think things through rationally and logically.

It is easier and faster to react to new people, events, or ideas reflexively, relying on a largely unconscious set of gut instincts, inherited beliefs, and deeply ingrained habits.

We can’t reason people out of beliefs, prejudices, erroneous assumptions that they didn’t reason themselves into.

If we want to influence people (like Trump supporters), if we want to change how they think and act, we have to take a different approach.

We can — and should — use reason and logic to develop our own positions, proposals, solutions. But in advocating for them, we need to present a message that speaks to people’s more basic, instinctual, gut-level fears, hopes, and attachments.

It’s fire in the belly that moves people, not the cold light of logic and reason.

In Lead, Sell Ideas, Speak persuasion, reason and logic

Tell a Wild Story: Not Just any Story will Strengthen a Speech

Christopher Witt — July 24, 2017

Storytelling Public Speaking You can strengthen just about any speech by telling a story. (Highly technical presentations may be an exception.)

I’ve written a lot about storytelling, because I believe stories are so important:

The Importance of Storytelling In Speeches

How to Tell a Story

Two Easy Ways to Introduce a Story

How to Tell Stories of Struggle, Loss, and Failure

The problem is, not just any story will do.

As a matter of fact, a lot of stories are lame or stale or juvenile. They make a speech less effective, not more powerful. And they weaken a speaker’s credibility.

The best stories to tell in a speech are wild.

Here’s what I mean.

In Lead, Speak story, storytelling, unexpected, wild

Confusing an Audience Can Be a Rhetorial Strategy

Christopher Witt — June 23, 2017

Don't confuse your audience One of the cardinal rules of public speaking is Never Confuse Your Audience.

There are a number of reasons why you shouldn’t confuse your audience.

First, if you confuse an audience, you lose them.

People will do their best — for a while, at least — to follow your logic, to ferret out your main point, to understand what you’re getting at.

But when they can’t make sense of what you’re saying, they’ll tune you out. They’ll stop listening. And you’ll have to do something dramatic to win back their attention.

Second, if you confuse an audience, you risk making them mad.

They’ll resent you for making them feel stupid or for wasting their time. And then there’s almost nothing you can do to win back their goodwill.

Third, if you confuse an audience, they’ll oppose you and whatever you’re proposing.

When you lose their attention and their goodwill, you lose their respect as well as their willingness to cooperate with you.

Fourth, if you confuse an audience unintentionally, you’re inept, but if you confuse them intentionally, you’re ethically challenged.

But intentionally confusing an audience can be an effective rhetorical strategy.

In Lead, Sell Ideas, Speak audience, confusion, rhetoric

Build Your Speech Around a Big, Juicy Idea

Christopher Witt — June 12, 2017

Peggy Noonan's book In her excellent book, On Speaking Well, Peggy Noonan states,

“No speech is big without big policy to talk about. Trying to write a great speech without having great policy to work with, to assert and argue for, would be like trying to write a great play about nothing.”

In my book, Real Leaders Don’t Do PowerPoint, I assert, Picture of book

“A speech develops one idea. But it’s got to be a good idea–a policy, a direction, an insight, a prescription. Something that provides clarity and meaning, something that’s both intellectually and emotionally engaging. It’s got to be what I call a Big Idea.”

The speech by Mitch Landrieu, the mayor of New Orleans, explaining why the city was removing statues commemorating its Confederate past is a recent example of a big speech developing a big policy (in Noonan’s words) or a great speech developing a big idea (in my words).

Less recent but even more powerful examples of speeches (from American history) that advanced and advocated big ideas include Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address and his Second Inaugural Address, Kennedy’s Inaugural Address, Johnson’s Voting Rights Act Address, and Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream Speech.

I still agree with everything I wrote about a speech needing a “Big Idea.”

But I now add the word juicy.

Juicy–in surfer jargon–describes a wave that has power and speed and a clean face. It can lift and propel you forward.

(The opposite of juicy is mushy, a description of a wave that passes you by, no matter how large it is, without moving you along.)

A great speech promotes an idea that is both big (broad and deep in its implications) and juicy (capable of moving people to action).

That’s because the goal of a speech is always the same: action, action, action.

Photo used with permission by John Lemieux at Flickr.

In Lead, Speak big idea, speech

Speeches Aren’t Neutral. Evaluating Them Can’t Be Neutral.

Christopher Witt — June 2, 2017

It’s impossible to be neutral while evaluating a speech, especially a political speech.

A speech doesn’t simply report facts or make an objective assessment of things as they are.

A speech expresses the speaker’s values, vision, character.

Any speech worth listening to takes a stand. It develops an idea. It promotes an agenda.

A speech, if it is to have any impact at all, provokes a response from the audience. Consent or dissent. Cooperation or opposition. Support or resistance.

And that’s how it should be.

A speech shouldn’t be neutral.

It’s true for political speeches. And it’s true for corporate speeches.

(One of the reasons why so many corporate speeches are bland, boring, and instantly forgettable is because business speakers try so hard to avoid controversy of any sort.)

And people’s reactions to a speech reveal their values, vision, character.

For example, I think the speech by Mitch Landrieu, the mayor of New Orleans, explaining why the city was removing the city’s Confederate monuments, is one of the best political speeches I’ve heard in months.

I found it thoughtful, courageous, and morally exigent.

Landrieu’s speech was well written. It asserted a thesis and defended it with logic, evidence, and passion. It employed several powerful rhetorical devices. It was clear, without being simplistic.

And it was well delivered.

I like Landrieu’s speech not simply because he articulated my beliefs and values, but also because he expanded my moral vision.

You know from his speech exactly where Landrieu stands on race. And the fact that I consider it such a good speech says a lot about where I stand on race as well.

In a similar vein, I hated President Trump’s speech, announcing his decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris agreement on climate change. And, again, my reaction reveals my values. As it should.

In Lead, Speak evaluate, speech

Executive Presence: The Latest Fad?

Christopher Witt — May 19, 2017

Charisma In public speaking and leadership development circles, the phrase “executive presence” is all the rage. But what is it? And does it matter?

No one quite agrees on what executive presence means.

It’s been called “the wow factor,” which merely substitutes one ill-defined concept for another.

It’s been likened to gravitas, charisma, and dynamism, which are equally fuzzy concepts.

It’s assumed that you’ll recognize it when you see it.

People with executive presence are described as having the ability to

Quickly gain people’s attention and respect
Exude confidence, poise, and calm under fire
Influence and inspire others as much by who they are as by what they say and do

Everyone agrees that executive presence is a desirable quality in a leader.

And every leader or inspiring leaders wants it.

Forbes cites a study that concludes “executive presence counts for 26% of what it takes to get promoted.”

In Lead, Speak charisma, delivery, executive presence, speech

Why the Truth Matters in a Fake-News, Post-Truth World

Christopher Witt — April 12, 2017

The first commitment when giving a speech is to tell the truth. Maybe not the truth in its entirety or a big, world-transforming truth. Maybe just the truth as we know it.

Of course, this rule has been violated throughout history.

In every age, people have mounted podiums and pulpits to spread lies, misinformation, and half-truths. They’ve done so to justify unjust wars, to provoke religious intolerance, to promote discrimination and oppression, to rouse the masses to unthinking violence, to condone unconscionable acts.

Sadly, all too many leaders today — in politics, religion, business — show a less than whole-hearted commitment to the truth.

The disregard of truth in public speaking seems to have gotten worse these days. When confronted with irrefutable facts that contradict their assertions, there are those who simply shrug it off or — worse — double down on what they’ve said as if repeating an error makes it right.

Deceit in public discourse harms both the speaker and the audience and — in the long run — harms public speaking itself.

All the more reason, in my opinion, to speak the truth. To get the facts right. To use reason and logic in piecing together an argument. To choose our words with care, seeking clarity and accuracy. To value being right over winning.

In Lead, Miscellaneous, Speak public speaking, speech, tell the truth

A Great Speech Has Your DNA All Through It

Christopher Witt — March 7, 2017

A great speech isn’t about you.

A great speech is about your audience and how your idea or information can help them.

But who you are–your outlook, beliefs, values, interests, temperament–determines every thought, every image, every word, every tone and nuance of the speech you give.

And that’s how it should be.

A great speech is not and never should be impersonal, detached, objective.

A great speech is highly personal, it takes a stand, and it is as true as you can make it.

If anyone else could say exactly what you have to say about a particular subject, you’re doing something wrong.

Photo courtesy of Caroline Davis at flickr.com.

In Lead, Speak great speech

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Why Use a Quotation in a Speech

Why Not Use a Quotation in a Speech

How to Use a Quotation in a Speech

How Not to Use a Quotation in a Speech

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Using reason and logic to counter Trump’s rhetoric — his tweets, off-the-cuff remarks, speeches — doesn’t work.

For most of us — not just Trump and his supporters — reason and logic aren’t the main drivers that inform our thinking or guide our behavior.

It is easier and faster to react to new people, events, or ideas reflexively, relying on a largely unconscious set of gut instincts, inherited beliefs, and deeply ingrained habits.

It’s fire in the belly that moves people, not the cold light of logic and reason.

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The best stories to tell in a speech are wild.

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There are a number of reasons why you shouldn’t confuse your audience.

But intentionally confusing an audience can be an effective rhetorical strategy.

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