President's Tip of the Week

Increasing the Effectiveness of Your Opening and Closing
(9/9/08)

In my evaluations, I often recommend a "circular" structure to speakers. Another term for this type of structure is "bookending." According to John Kinde, a professional humorous speaker, "Relating the opening and closing of the talk is like wrapping your speech in a nice ribbon and tying a bow to make it a total gift for the audience. It looks professional. It's memorable. It helps you to deliver a message that connects and makes a difference."

Here are a couple of Kindle's favorite bookending techniques:

"A quote. You could open and close with the same quote. Or a different quote from the same person. This could be an especially effective way to support the central theme of your talk.

"A Prop. Use a prop at the start of your talk. Come back to the prop at the end. Or maybe at the closing of the talk, give the prop away as a prize to someone in the audience.

"A Challenge. Open with a challenge or problem facing the audience. Close with the solution and call-for-action.
"A story. You could open a speech with a story. You could just tell part of the story, not the whole thing. This is actually a
good speakers technique: "Let's interrupt the story for a moment while we take a side trip." In this case, you could choose to complete the story at the end of your speech."

For even more bookending ideas, click here to read the entire article.