Can You Summarize Your Speech ike Steve Jobs?

In 2005, Steve Jobs delivered the commencement speech at Stanford University. A link is provided below.  At the 1:22 minute mark of the 20-minute address he clearly summarizes his talk, making it easy for the audience to envision a “table of contents,” and consume his messages as he progressed.  

When you can summarize your speech concisely it demonstrates clarity of message. If you can’t summarize concisely, you have opportunity to clarify your speech purpose for your benefit and for the benefit of your audience

Photo by Product School on Unsplash

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Assembling Speech Content

I’ve seen inexperienced speakers panic when invited to deliver a talk.  Sometimes a speaker will frantically accumulate research and data. Research and data can be used to support a message, but too often I’ve seen reams of data be recited in a dry and dispassionate manner. 

Purpose Drives Content

Your speech purpose should drive your selected content and a speaker needs to make clear the context of any data and research.  This is the value that a speaker adds.  Many people can collect quantities of data and research.  A great speaker can assert a point of view and add content to the data that he or she chooses to illustrate a point of view.

One Question

When I prepare a speech, I will usually explore current data and research to consider new ideas and approaches.  Once I have assembled a sufficient amount of possible talking points I ask myself this question;

“What do I want this specific audience to understand when my presentation is complete?”

Once that purpose is defined, anything that doesn’t fit is discarded, or maybe saved for another presentation. I prefer to explore more deeply with an audience the relevant content, rather than recite data and research I believe, often alone, is interesting. It’s not up to the audience to listen and then assemble the material into a coherent whole – it’s our job as speakers.

Define Your Speech Purpose

Defining your speech purpose, and committing to this, will focus your planning and direct any research you need to perform. In most cases, little research is required because you should be speaking on topics where you have expertise, and personal experience to share.

When you draw from personal experience, a quality speech can be constructed based on your knowledge, your experience, and impacts you’ve observed.

 

Steve Jobs at Stanford

I expect that as he prepared his talk Steve Jobs had much more material and personal stories he might have spoken about. He selected three stories and lessons and delivered them exceptionally well.   The speech is available at this link

https://youtu.be/jiHZqamCD8c?si=LparN8XAIjXO_RPB

 

Conclusion

Work to describe your speech concisely – within 30 seconds.  This will demonstrate clarity of message.