"The Quick and Easy Way to Effective Speaking" by Dale Carnegie

• Every activity of our lives is communication of a sort, but it is through speech that we assert our distinctiveness from other forms of life.
• In every art there are few principles and many techniques.
• I have spent almost all of my teaching career proving to people that is it easy to speak in public, provided they follow a few simple, but important, rules.
• Concentrate your attention on what self-confidence and the ability to talk more effectively will mean to you.
• Public speaking training is the royal road to self-confidence. Once you realize that you can stand up and talk intelligently to a group of people, it is logical to assume that you can talk to individuals with greater confidence and assurance.
• Learn to make your thoughts, your ideas, clear to others, individually, in groups, in public.
• By changing our thoughts, we can change our lives.
• So, to succeed in this work, you need the qualities that are essential in any worthwhile endeavor: desire amounting to enthusiasm, persistence to wear away mountains, and the self-assurance to believe you will succeed.
• Because no on can learn to speak in public without speaking in public any more than a person can learn to swim without getting in the water.
• You will never know what progress you can make unless you speak, and speak, and speak again.
• Emerson said, "Fear defeats more people than any other thing in the world."
• I found that learning to speak in public is nature's own method of overcoming self-consciousness and building up courage and self-confidence.
• Fact number one: You are no unique in your fear of speaking in public.
• Fact number two: A certain amount of stage fright is useful.
• Fact number three: Many professional speakers have assured me that they never completely lose all stage fright.
• Fact number four: The chief cause of your fear of public speaking is simply that you are unaccustomed to speak in public.
• To make this fearful situation simple and easy: practice, practice, practice.
• If our ideas are clear, the words come as naturally and unconsciously as the air we breathe.
• If we memorize our talk word for word, we will probably forget it when we face our listeners. Even if we do not forget our memorized talk, we will probably deliver it in a mechanical way.
• When talking with people privately, we always think of something we want to say, and then we go ahead and say it without thinking of words.
• It is especially important to keep your attention off yourself just before your turn to speak. Concentrate on what the other speakers are saying, give them your wholehearted attention and you will not be able to work up excessive stage fright.
• To develop courage when you are facing an audience, act as if you already had it.
• Overcoming fear of public speaking has a tremendous transfer value to everything that we do.
• Speak about something you have earned the right to talk about through experience or study.
• Speakers who talk about what life has taught them never fail to keep the attention of their listeners.
• If something stands out vividly in your memory after many years have gone by, that almost guarantees that it will be of interest to an audience.
• If you have devoted many hours to the study of issues of importance, you have earned the right to talk about them. But when you do, be certain that you give specific instances for your convictions.
• Be sure you are excited about your subject.
• Here is a question that will help you determine the suitability of topics you feel qualified to discuss in public: if someone stood up and directly opposed your point of view, would you be impelled to speak with conviction and earnestness in defense of your position? If you would, you have the right subject for you.
• Be eager to share your talk with your listeners.
• There are three factors in every speaking situation: the speaker, the speech or the message, and the audience.
• The effective speaker earnestly desires his listeners to feel what he feels, to agree with his point of view, to do what he thinks is right for them to do, and to enjoy and relive his experience with him.
• Once you have selected your topic, the first step is to stake out there area you want to cover and stay strictly within those limits.
• It is impossible for the mind to attend to a monotonous series of factual points.
•  In a shot talk, less than five minutes in duration, all you can expect is to get one or two main points across.
• After you have narrowed your subject, then the next step is to ask yourself questions that will deepen your understanding and prepare you to talk with authority on the topic you have chosen.
• Mediocre speaking very often is merely the inevitable and the appropriate reflection of mediocre thinking, and the consequence of imperfect acquaintance with the subject in hand.
• How can we acquire this most important technique of using illustrative material? There are five ways of doing this: humanize, personalize, specify, dramatize, and visualize.
• You might say at this point, "this is all very fine, but how can I be sure of getting enough detail in to my talk?" There is one test. Use the 5-W formula every reporter follows when he writes a news story: answer the questions When? Where? Who? What? and Why? If you follow this formula your examples will have life and color.
• Dialogue gives your speech the authentic ring of everyday conversation.
• One of the best ways to enrich a talk with detail is to incorporate visual demonstration into it.
• The speaker who is easy to listen to is the one who sets images floating before your eyes.
• Pictures. Pictures. Pictures. They are as free as the air you breathe. Sprinkle them through your talks, your conversation, and you will be more entertaining, more influential.
• The surest way to arouse and hold the attention of the reader is be being specific, definite, and concrete.
• It is detail that makes conversation sparkle.
• Vitality, aliveness, enthusiasm--these are the first qualities I have always considered essential in a speaker.
• Unless you are emotionally involved in the subject matter you have chosen to talk about, you cannot expect to make your audience believe in your message.
• If a speaker believes a thing earnestly enough and says it earnestly enough, he will get adherents to his cause.
• Stoke the fires of your enthusiasm for the subject and you will have no difficulty holding the interest of a group of people.
• One areas of topics is sure-fire: talk bout your convictions!
• Don't repress your honest feelings; don't put a damper on your authentic enthusiasm. Show your listeners how eager you are to talk about your subject, ans you will hold their attention.
• No audience can withhold attention from a speaker who talks in its interests.
• There is nothing so interesting to ourselves as ourselves.
• Audiences are composed of individuals, and they react like individuals. Openly criticize an audience and they resent it. Show your appreciation for something they have down that is worthy of praise, and you win a passport into their hearts.
• An insincere statements may occasionally fool an individual, but it never fools an audience.
• As soon as possible, preferable in the first words you utter, indicate some direct relationship with the group you are addressing.
• Another way to open the lines of communication is to use the names of people in the audience.
• One word of caution: If you are going to work strange names into your talk, having learned them through inquires made for the occasion, be sure you have them exactly right; be sure you understand fully the reason for your use of the names; be sure you mention them only in a favorable way; and use them in moderation.
• Another method of keeping the audience at peak attentiveness is to use the pronoun "you" rather than the third person "they".
• The moment you choose some member of the audience to help yo demonstrate a point or dramatize an idea, you will be rewarded by a noticeable rise in attention.
• One of my favorite methods of getting audience participation is simply to ask questions and to get responses.
• Indeed, one of the best ways for a speaker to endear himself to an audience is to play himself down.
• The surest way to antagonize an audience is to indicate that you consider yourself to be above them. Wen you speak, you are in a showcase and every facet of your personality it on display. The slightest hint of braggadocio is fatal. On the other hand, modesty inspires confidence and good will. You can be modest without being apologetic. Your audience will like and respect you for suggesting your limitations as long as you show you are determined to do your best.
• Audiences like humility. They resent the show-off, the egotist.
• Success in the use of either the extemporaneous or the impromptu method is the most assured when the speaker has clearly formulated in his mind the general purpose of a talk.
• Every talk, regardless of whether the speaker realized it or not, has one of four major goals. What are they?
• To persuade or get action.
• To inform.
• To impress and convince.
• To entertain.
• Because so many speakers fail to line up their purpose with the purpose of the meeting at which they are speaking, they often flounder and come to grief.
• Fit the purpose of your talk to the audience and the occasion.
• Choose one of the four purposes only after you have analyzed the audience and the occasion which brings them together.
• What is the Magic Formula? Simply this: Start your talk by giving us the details of your example, an incident that graphically illustrates that main idea you wish to get across. Second, in specific clear-cut terms give your point, tell exactly what you want your audience to do; and third, give your reason, that is, highlight the advantage or benefit to be gained by the listener when he does what you ask him to do.
• Audiences are composed of busy people who want whatever the speaker has to say in straight forward language.
• The Magic Formula can be used also in writing business letters and giving instructions to fellow employees and subordinates.
• A single personal experience that taught you a lesson you will never forget is the first requisite of a persuasive action talk.
• One of the reasons for starting your talk with the example step is to catch attention at once.
• You must stimulate the visual imagination of your listeners by painting word pictures.
• In addition to using picturesque details, the speaker should relive the experience be is describing.
• The more action and excitement you can put into the retelling of your incident, the more it will make an impression on your listeners.
• Your listeners will remember your talk and what you want them to do only if the example sticks in their minds.
• State your point, what you want the audience to do.
• Be precise in telling the audience exactly what you want them to do. People will do only what they clearly understand.
• Speakers who give detailed action points are more apt to be successful in motivating their audiences than those who rest upon generalities.
• The point is the entire theme of your talk. You should give it, therefore, with forcefulness and conviction.
• Give the reason or benefit the audience may expect.
• But again it is bet to chose one outstanding reason or benefit and rest your case on it.
• Of all the types of talks given every week to audiences everywhere, the talk to inform is second only to the talk to persuade or get action. The ability to speak clearly precedes the ability to move others to action.
• Language is the principle conveyor of understanding, and so we must learn to use it, not crudely but discriminatingly.
• "Everything that can be thought at all," said Ludwig Wittgenstein, "can be thought clearly. Everything that can be said, can be said clearly."
• Restrict your subject to fit the time at your disposal.
• Many a talk fails to be clear because the speaker seems intent upon establishing a world's record for ground covered in the allotted time.
• Hold fast to your main theme.
• Arrange your ideas in sequence.
• Almost all subjects can be developed by using a logical sequence based on time, space, or special topics.
• Enumerate your points as you make them.
• One of the simplest ways to keep a talk shipshape in the minds of your listeners is to mention plainly as you go along that you are taking up first one point and then another.
• Compare the strange with the familiar.
• Visual impressions are like that cannon ball; they come with a terrific impact. They embed themselves. They stick.
• If you belong to a profession the work of which is technical--if you are a lawyer, a physician, an engineer, or are in a highly specialized line of business--be doubly careful when you talk to outsiders, to express yourself in plain terms and to give necessary details.
• It is always best to go from the simple to the complex in giving explanations of any kind.
• Aristotle gave some good advice on the subject: "Think as wise men do, but speak as the common people do." If you must use a technical term, don't use it until you have explained it so everybody in the audience knows what it means.
• There is no reason to avoid a keystone word which you know will not be understood. Just explain is as soon as you use it. Never fail to do this; the dictionary is all yours.
• Use visual aids.
• So, if you wish to be clear, picture your points, visualize your ideas.
• If you use a chart or diagram, be sure it it large enough to see, and don't overdo a good thing.
• Use abbreviations; write largely and legibly; keep talking as you draw or write; and keep turning back to your audience.
• Demonstrate if practicable.
• There is no better way to ensure that your audience will understand what you have to say then to go before them prepared to show as well as to tell them what you have in mind.
• Getting a favorable reaction is every speaker's objective any time, anywhere.
• Win confidence by deserving it.
• Pierpont Morgan said that character was the best way to obtain credit; it is also the best way to win the confidence of the audience.
• We must first be convinced before we attempt to convince others.
• Get a "Yes" response.
• The best argument is that which seems merely an explanation.
• Speak with contagious enthusiasm.
• When your aim is to convince, remember it is more productive to stir emotions than to arouse thoughts. Feelings are more powerful than cold ideas.
• Show respect and affection for your audience.
• Begin in a friendly way.
• One of the rules of the art of effective speaking is to support a statement by an illustration.
• The ability to assemble one's thoughts and to speak on the spur of the moment is even more important, in some ways, than the ability to speak only after lengthy and laborious preparation.
• When you are called on to speak without preparation usually you are expected to make some remarks about a subject upon which you can speak with authority.
• Don't apologize because you are unprepared. This is the expected thing.
• Audiences are interested in themselves and what they are doing. There are three sources, therefore, from which you can draw ideas for an impromptu speech.
• First is the audience itself.
• The second is the occasion.
• Lastly, if you have been an attentive listener, you might indicate your pleasure in something specific anther speaker said before you ad amplify that.
• The most successful impromptu talks are those that are really impromptu. They express things that the speaker feels in his heart about the audience and the occasion.
• You must keep your ideas logically grouped around a central though which might well be the point you want to get across.
• We are evaluated and classified by these four contacts: what we do, how we look, what we say, and how we say it.
• There is something beside the mere words in a talk which counts. It is the flavor with which they are delivered. It is not so much just what you say as how you say it.
• Every new life is a new things under the sun; there has never been anything just like it before, and never will be again. A young man ought to get that idea about himself; he should look for the single spark of individuality that makes him different from other folks, and develop that for all his is worth.
• The audience must feel that there is a message being delivered straight from the mind and heart of the speaker to their minds and their hearts.
• When a man is under the influence of his feelings, his real self comes to the surface.
• The speech of introduction serves the same purpose as a social introduction. It brings the speaker and the audience together, established a friendly atmosphere, and created a bond of interest between them.
• In other words, an introduction ought to "sell" the topic to the audience and it ought to "sell" the speaker. And it ought to do these things in the briefest amount of time possible.
• First you must gather your facts. These will center around three items: the subject of the speaker's talk, his qualifications to speak on that subject, and his name. Often a fourth item will become apparent--why the subject chosen by the speaker is of special interest to the audience.
• Be certain that you know the correct title of the talk and something about the speaker's development of the subject matter.
• Above all, be certain of the speaker's name and begin at once to familiarize yourself with its pronunciation.
• The main purpose of your research is to be specific for only by being specific will the introduction achieve its purpose--to heighten the audience's attention and make it receptive to the speaker's talk.
• For most introductions, the T-I-S formula serves as a handy guide in organizing the facts you have collected in your research:
• T stands for topic. Start your introduction by giving the exact title of the speaker's talk.
• I stands for Importance. In this step you bridge over the area between the topic and the particular interest of the group.
• S stands for speaker. Here you list the speaker's outstanding qualifications, particularly those that relate to his topic. Finally, you give his name, distinctly and clearly.
• An introduction should never be memorized.
• The introduction should be spontaneous, seemingly arising out of the occasion, not strait-laced and severe.
• In making an introduction of a speaker, manner is quite as important as matter. You should try to be friendly, and instead of saying how happy you are, be genuinely pleasant making your talk.
• When you do pronounce the speaker's name at the very end of the introduction it is well to remember the words, "pause", "part", and "punch". By pause is meant that a little silence just before the name is given will give an edge to anticipation; by part is meant that the first and last names should be separated by a slight pause so that the audience gets a clear impression of the speaker's name; by punch is meant that the name should be given with vigor and force.
• There is one more caution: please, I beg of you, when you do enunciate the speaker's name, don't turn to him, but look out over the audience until the last syllable has been uttered; then turn to the speaker.
• When we make a speech of presentation, we reassure the recipient that he really is somebody.
• Here is a time-tested formula:
• Tell why the award is made.
• Tell something of the group's interest in the life and activities of the person to be honored.
• Tell how much the award is deserved and how cordially the group feels toward the recipient.
• Congratulate the recipient and convey everyone's good wishes for the future.
• We also should avoid exaggerating the importance of the gift itself. Instead of stressing its intrinsic value, we should emphasize the friendly sentiments of those where are giving it.
• Here is the suggested format [for accepting an award]:
• Give a warmly sincere "thank you" to the group.
• Give credit to others who have helped you, your associates, employees, friends, or family.
• Tell what the gift or award means to you.
• End with another sincere expression of your gratitude.
• A talk is a voyage with a purpose, and it must be charted. The man who starts nowhere, generally gets there.
• Begin your talk with an incident.
• No stalling. No "warm-up" statements. By launching directly into an incident, you can make it easy to capture an audience's attention.
• Creating suspense is a sure-fire method of getting your listeners interested.
• A danger of the startling opener must be avoided, that is, the tendency to be over-dramatic or too sensational.
• If you want to interest your listeners, don't begin with an introduction. Begin by leaping right into the heart of your story.
• A splendid way to get interested attention is to ask the audience to raise their hands in answer to a question.
• When you ask for a show of hands, usually give the audience some warning that you are going to do so.
• The technique of asking for a show of hands gets a priceless reaction known as "audience participation."
• An almost unfailing way to get alert attention is to promise to tell your listeners how they can get what they want by doing what you suggest.
• All too often speakers neglect to tie their topics to the vital interests of their hearers.
• Perhaps the easiest way in the world to gain attention is to hold up something for people to look at. Almost any creature, from the simplest to the most complex, will give heed to that kind of stimulus. It can be sued sometimes with effectiveness before the most dignified audience.
• Recognize that how you open a talk largely determines whether the audience is going to accept you and your message.
• Do no open with an apology.
• Let your opening sentence capture the interest of your audience. Not the second sentence. Not the third sentence. The first!
• If you have the ability to tickle the sensibilities of your audience by some witty reference to a local situation or to something arising out of the occasion or the remarks of a previous speaker, then by all means do so.
• Audiences open their hearts, as well as their minds, to speakers who deliberately deflate themselves by calling attention to some deficiency or failing on their part, in a humorous sense, of course.
• Statistics, of themselves can be boring. They should be judiciously used, and when used they should be clothed in a language that makes them vivid and graphic.
• Mere numbers and amounts, taken by themselves, are never very impressive. They have to be illustrated; they ought, if possible, to be put in terms of our experiences.
• Before using testimony it should be tested by answering these questions:
• Is the quotation I am about to use accurate?
• Is it taken from the are of the man's expert knowledge?
• Is the quotation from a man who is known and respected by the audience?
• Are you sure that the statement is based on first hand knowledge, not personal interest or prejudice?
• By the use of incidents, comparison and demonstrations, you make your main ideas clear and vivid; by the use of statistics and testimony you substantiate the truth and emphasize the importance of your main points.
• The close is really the most strategic point in a talk, what on says last, the final words left ringing in the ears when one ceases--these are likely to be remembered longest.
• Some anonymous Irish politician is reported to have given this recipe for making a speech: "First, tell them what you are going to tel them; then tell them; then tell them what you have told them." It is often highly advisable to "tell them what you have told them".
• In your final words of a talk to secure action the time has come to ask for the order. So ask for it!
• Be sure to obey these caution signs, however:
• Ask them to do something specific.
• Ask the audience for some response that is within their power to give.
• Make it as easy as you can for your audience to act on your appeal.
• Every supervisor is a teacher to a greater or lesser degree.
• The rules of effective speaking before groups are directly applicable to conference participation and conference leadership.
• Use specific detail in everyday conversation.
• Just think for a moment of the really interesting conversationalists of your acquaintance. Aren't they the ones who fill their talk with colorful, dramatic details, who have the ability to use picturesque speech?
• Before you can begin to develop your conversational skills you must have confidence.
• Once you are eager to express your ideas even on a limited scale, you will begin to search your experience for material that can be converted to conversation.
• Once the drive to learn and to apply what has been learned is stimulated, it starts a whole train of action and interaction that vivifies the entire personality.
• You should seek every opportunity to speak in public.
• As soon as possible, develop a twenty to thirty minute talk. Use the suggestion in this book as a guide.
• When we learn any new thing, like French or gold or speaking in public, we ever advance steadily. We do not improve gradually. We do it by waves, by abrupt starts and sudden stops. Then we remain stationary a time, or we may even slip back and lose some of the ground we have previously gained. These periods of stagnation, or retrogression, are well known by all psychologist; they have been named "plateaus in the curve of learning".
• If he keeps faithfully busy each hour of the working day, he may safely leave the final result to itself.
• "I never undertake anything thinking of defeat." That is the proper psychology for anything from speaking to an assault on Mount Everest.
• How well you succeed is largely determined by thoughts you have prior to speaking.
• If you put enthusiasm into learning how to speak more effectively you will find that the obstacles in your path will disappear.
• You will find that competence in self-expression will lead to competence in other ways as well, for training in effective speaking is the royal road to self-confidence in all the areas of working and living.