Power of Oratory / Speech

Barack Obama has it but Mr. Brown doesn’t.

Tony Blair does, George Dubya doesn’t.

It’s inspirational charisma and it’s perhaps best seen in speech making. From so many of our politicians, ex-lawyers or school-teachers etc…, why only few of them make an impact, while others, a laughing stock?

It’s about the power of Oratory

Everyone remarks on Obama’s “soaring” speeches.

Trained in the Evangelic tradition, he clearly knows about the P-words

Pitch, Poetry, Pause and Pace. He understands metaphor and repetition.

A speech is a talking show. Speech-writing is an art, but so is speech delivery.

Ronald Reagan spoke his lines well. He knew about the C words

Confidence, Cadence, Conviction and Colour. It’s performance, and the performer needs to be inebriated with zeal and exuberance.

Speech making is pure theatre.

The Orator has to be at once proud and humble, powerful and powerless. It needs to be both visceral and intellectual. Most of all it needs to be personal and emotional, exclamatory and climactic.

Television has changed oratory. By and large it has been made more difficult!!

Close-ups mean every small eye-movement, every drop of sweat; every wrinkle is seen and commented upon. The orator is up-close, intimate. This is not Nuremburg Rally stuff of great spectacle. Sound-bites dictate the ultra importance of catch-phrases. Speeches are rehearsed and timed. Speech writers revise up to the last moment.

The crowds have plants that clap, yelp and holler at the right time. Euphoric, orchestrated hand-clapping. The cameras know when the speaker moves; gestures have been synchronised with speech. Cuts to the crowd are pre-planned.

But as we can see with Bush and Brown, training and tricks still don’t work that well. They don’t seem able to do that audience connection thing and the same is true of some business leaders. The paradox, of course, is that authentically and naturalness cannot easily be taught. Speeches have to be clear, simple and genuine– but that’s the problem. It takes a lot of effort to be natural.

What are speeches for?

To inspire action, often just to vote. But also to feel good about the leader, the cause and yes, oneself. Speeches are about articulating dreams. They are, as Bush Senior memorably said, “the vision thing”. They are not full of numbers but of passionate conviction.

Leaders need to be “one of us” to all their listeners.