Posted 9:05 AM by Blah blah

How to Be a Better Speaker and Writer (Speaking, Writing)

From a letter I just wrote to an engineer:

About your speaking and writing skills, why not take a writing or public speaking class? You may join groups like Toastmasters, which have people who help each other improve their public speaking.

The best ways to improve your communications skills:

1) Read excellent writers in different fields, not just technology. Expand your range of expression by reading poetry, drama, essays, etc. Some of the best writers in the English language write for the New Yorker magazine. I used to read it from cover to cover each week. It's my favorite magazine and really influenced my writing style.

In fact, AVOID bureaucratic and office writing like the plague. Avoid engineers' writing. Most of the office memos you see will teach you how NOT to write.

2) Listen to excellent speakers. Listening to talk radio helps. I used to listen to KGO talk radio every day as a teenager, trying to absorb how the excellent hosts dealt with various guests and callers. Excellent interview shows like "Charlie Rose" help. You may listen to his interviews with the world's movers and shakers in all fields, all on his website.

If you like politics and current events, all of these sites I link have excellent speakers.

Excellent TV news interview shows are also good, like "The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer." Their guests are all well-educated, articulate, and persuasive speakers.

3) Write on a regular basis, but challenge yourself. Try to copy a magazine writer's style or your favorite author's style. That's what Benjamin Franklin did when he first started publishing. There's no shame in copying style. That's how you learn from others. It's like learning to program. You first copy other programmers' styles.

4) Constantly meet and talk to people, but try to find ARTICULATE people. Find people from whom you can improve your speaking. AVOID talking to only engineers. Make friends with marketing and salespeople. Creative people. Artists. Teachers. Lawyers. Managers. They are the best communicators.

5) MOST IMPORTANTLY, fine-tune all of your senses. Become an excellent observer of life. When you meet a person, REALLY listen to him. Become an expert at interpreting non-verbal communication. Shut off all of those side conversations in your head and focus 100% on how his eyes shift, how his hands fidget, and how he keeps nodding off like he's bored (hehe). Don't take everything he says literally, but ask yourself WHY he says it. Why he acts that way. Study people and the world obsessively.

Smell the world. See it from unusual angles. Take pictures of the world upside down. Feel and taste it. Never ever stop being curious.

How observant and creative you are ultimately determines how interesting you are as a writer and speaker. You could take all the technical communication and speaking classes you wish, but if you miss half of the things that go on around you, can't read non-verbal signals from people, and find most people and places boring, that means one thing.

YOU are boring.

Good writers and speakers can make everything sound interesting. They find everything interesting. They can turn every puff of dust they touch into a raging sandstorm.

Everyone can and should improve his writing and speaking. It helps you in business. It helps you in relationships. Hell, it helps you in your sex life.

Go forth and multiply, my friends! We sorely need better speakers and writers in the world. I'm tired of being one of the few people in my circle of friends who cares about the English language. Go forth and spread the gospel of sucking in the marrow of life.