Are you looking for a Key Note Speaker for your next Conference, Seminar, All Hands Meeting, Executive Summit, Annual Strategy Meeting or any Big Ticket Event…? How do you select a Guest Speaker?
How often you invited a speaker and ended up thinking of not listening to him or her once more…? How often you find your participants loose interest within in first few minutes of a speech…? How often you find people slowly sneaking out of the room during the session…? How often you were thinking. that “we could have invited a better speaker”…?
The process of identifying a right speaker could be really difficult and any mistake in that could completely ruin the spirit of your event. Hence cost of such mistakes are pretty high.
(Why am I worried about you and your event…? There is a reason. I myself a Professional Keynote Speaker, have spoken on more than 220 stages in last 2 years (2104 – 2015). I’ve been to many of conferences and events where I see someone delivering a great rhetoric without even bringing any direct relevance and bothering to connect with their participants. Of course they are Public Speakers)
Let’s clearly understand that “Public Speaking is NOT Professional Speaking.
Anyone who can stand-up and speak in front of a group of people can claim to be a Public Speaker. When people learn to speak something with melodramatic hand gestures, bit of enunciation and acting on stage, they become Public Speakers.
Whereas Professional Speaker is an expert or have built expertise on the topic he or she is speaking. They are thought leaders, authority and subject matter experts.
Professional Speakers bring great relevance and clarity to the context, they create enthusiasm and energy in the audience, they bring trust and credibility as a speaker. They do it not once or twice, not on one or two topics, but every time they speak by conscious design and practice.
When you invite such a Professional Speaker, you’ll be greatly respected and appreciated for inviting such a speaker for the event. However, most of the time conference organisers and decision makers end up making grave mistake in selecting a right speaker.
4 typical mistakes made by conference organisers
1. Calling someone just for the sake of his or her popularity, position, power and personal relationship, instead of hiring a well trained Professional Keynote Speaker.
2. Fixing up a speaker purely based on the fee. Would not mind spending more on the venue, food and drinks than on hiring a good Professional Speaker.
3. Inviting someone just because of a person’s availability, without finding a right match for the event’s theme and the requirements of it’s participants or the ability of the person to come prepared on the theme.
4. Hiring someone for the way they speak and not worried about what they speak. Content is still the king when it comes to keynote speeches, than just few jokes and laughter.
Next time when you are thinking about a speaker, consider hiring a well trained Professional Speaker who could bring great relevance to the very purpose of your event. It’s truly worth the investment.
– Sivakumar Palaniappan
Sivakumar Palaniappan is an Author, Professional Speaker, Corporate Trainer, Life and Career Coach.
