Vernon is the author of a truly remarkable book entitled “Natural Teamwork” which contains many wonderful examples of teamwork in nature – supported with beautiful colour pictures to illustrate each example. The book is an ideal corporate gift or handout at his talk or workshop...Read more

BUY NOW

How to evaluate a speech

Whether you are assisting a colleague to evaluate his or her speech for the next presentation at work or evaluating a keynote speaker at a conference; either one or any situation in which you are required to evaluate a speech can be quite challenging. But given the right tools, evaluating a speech can be as easy as pie. There are certain key aspects like constructive criticism, praise and careful listening that are essential when evaluating a speech. Read further for some other helpful guidelines.

• One of the most important aspects when listening to somebody delivering a speech or presentation is that you need to listen very carefully whilst they are talking. Makes notes of the presenter’s gestures, eye contact, speech content, voice inflection and the number of pauses such as “umm”.
• Adapt your evaluation to the presenter’s experience level, objectives, sensitivities and insecurities.
• Put aside your personal style, preferences and prejudice.
• When giving your feedback beware of your “critique langue”. Use phrases like: “My reaction was …”; “I felt that you …” and “I suggest that…” Avoid the words: “should”, “must”, “try to”.
• Thank the speaker for taking the time to come speak to the group of people.
• Make sure that you praise or highlight at least three areas of the speaker’s speech. It can be his or her ability to connect with the audience through the use of humor or that the speaker has made minimum use of his or her notes during the presentation.
• Constructive criticism, as mentioned above, is extremely important when evaluating someone’s speech. With the emphasis on constructive. When giving your criticism limit it to no more than three. The main goal of constructive criticism is to encourage and motivate the speaker to improve certain skills or weaknesses for his next presentation. It is important to positively reinforce your critique by providing a solution on how the speaker can improve his or her area of weakness. For example if the speaker appeared somewhat nervous or stressed encourage him or her to make more use of gestures as it will make him look more confident and relaxed.
• Probably the most important part when evaluating a speech is to share your overall impression of the presentation. Be sure to include at least two praises even if it was clearly evident that the presenter hadn’t had his best presenter’s hat on.
• Once again, thank the presenter for delivering the speech and that you are looking forward to making use of him or her again in the near future.

Testimonials