(rough draft for 60-90 minute keynote speech)

(Note from TJ: does anyone have any thoughts on how to make a speech like this more palatable? This is essentially a motivational speech about success that debunks all other motivational gurus. This is a success/motivation speech that is anti success/motivational speech)

In my attempt to show the emperor is wearing no clothes, I am concerned that it can come across as too negative, harsh and nasty. Thoughts?)

(Notes for Speech on Success)

Increasingly, I am getting asked to speak at events that have a personal development/personal empowerment/success theme. This is a very different from my normal corporate audience. I am in the process of figuring out how to adapt my message to this audience.

I have to confess that I have certain ambivalence about these events. On the one hand, I fundamentally do believe in personal improvement and personal growth. On the other hand, I find that most speakers at such events are selling snake oil and often are selling either phony messages or are just dressing up old tired ideas/clichés/bromides with new labels.

Call me a cynic, but I find flaws and holes in everyone else’s arguments for what it takes to be successful. We all see the world according to our viewpoint and I obviously see the world from my own perspective, through the prism of speaking skills. When I look at how people succeed in life, I only see one consistent variable, the ability to speak well in many or at least some speaking venues. With every single path to success espoused by others, I can think of numerous counter examples that disprove that theory.
Here are some examples I am thinking of…

(Honesty – Trudeau)

Some success gurus say the most important aspect of being successful having lots of integrity. Well, I don’t want to sound like I’m against integrity, but it’s clear you can be wildly successful and have no integrity.
For example, Kevin Trudeau is an extraordinarily successful bestselling author and infomercial guru. He’s written (fill in number here) New York Times bestselling books. His infomercials are seen non-stop around the globe. But guess what. He’s also a convicted felon. He’s convicted of fraud, which is telling lies in a manner to fraudulently get money out of people. Now this isn’t something I dug up because I am a crack investigative journalist. NO, Kevin mentions these facts right on the flap of his book. (Show blowup of the page in his book where he mentions his fraud conviction.)

So what is the key to Kevin’s success? (Cut to video of Trudeau on one of his infomercials talking in a persuasive manner)

(Now I analyze what Kevin does well as a speaker)

***

(Ethical – Trump)

Some success gurus will tell you the secret to success stems form always being ethical. I wish that were the case. But entire books have been written about how Donald Trump has systematically lied about his network, his business holding and his accomplishments. He has looted his own companies. Investors have been destroyed in their dealings with Trump. By his own admission, when he was lobbying Forbes to include him on their list of the wealthiest Americans, he had a net worth of negative one billion dollars. And yet he is loved and admired by millions and given his own TV shows. I don’t recommend lying because it is morally wrong. But Trump shows that you can be successful and lie a lot.

(Pull quotes from TrumpNation book about Trump’s lies)

(Good karma – Strom Thurmond)

Some say the secret is spreading good karma. Just do good things and wish good things on as many people as possible. Don’t keep score. In the end, it will all come back to you. I wish this were true. However, there is the case of former Senator Thurmond. Thurmond devoted his life to three main things. 1. Keeping black people segregated from white people. 2. Doing nothing in elective office other than bringing back pork barrel projects. And 3. Seducing as many beauty queens as possible. Yes, he married a 21 yr old beauty queen when he was 65 yrs old. Oh, and when he was denouncing civil rights for blacks, he secretly had a child with his black maid. If there were such a thing as karma, Thurmond would have died young, broke, poor and alone. Instead, he died at 100 with a smile on his face surrounded by fans, power and admirers.
But he was a great speaker in his prime. Thurmond once spoke for 24 hours straight on the floor of the US Senate.

(Show footage of Thurmond speaking here.)

(Analysis of Thurmond speech)

(Being thin – Oprah)

The beauty magazines preach that people, especially women, have to be thin to be happy and successful. Not so. Look at Oprah. She often balloons up to over 200 pounds. But she is one of the richest and most influential people on the planet. Look at how she speaks

(Show clip of Oprah speaking on her show and showing empathy)

(Analyses why Oprah is a great communicator)

(Also thin- Rush Limbaugh)

(Show photos of a really fat rush Limbaugh)

Folks, rush Limbaugh makes $50 million a year by being an effective communicator. He has such a loyal following that I bet he could make money selling a Rush Limbaugh diet pill and his fans would still buy it.
What makes Rush such an effective communicator?

(Show footage of Rush)

(Analysis of rush’s speaking strengths)

(Accent – Arnold Schwarzenegger)

Certain accent coaches tell us that if we just learn to talk with a standard America accent like a network news anchor, then we can be successful.

But what about Arnold?

(Footage of The California Governor)

(Analysis of speaking strengths of Arnold)

(Good hair- Dr Phil… Trump)

There are personal image experts who will tell you image and style are everything. And you’d better have great hair if you want to be successful. Well, what about Donald Trump?

(Show photo of Trump on a bad hair day)

Or Dr. Phil

(Photo of Dr. Phil)

Yet both are successful.

(Video clip of Trump)

(Analysis of trump’s speaking skills)

(Video of Dr. Phil)

(Analysis of Dr. Phil’s speaking strengths)

(Goals – Oprah)

All motivational gurus talk about how important it is to have goals and to write them down. Yet Oprah says she doesn’t believe in goals.

(Footage of Oprah)

(Analysis of Oprah’s speaking skills)

(Strong religious values and belief in God – Ted Turner)

Many success gurus’ give all the credit for their success to their firm belief in God and their particular religious values. This may, in fact have helped them. But Ted Turner, the founder of CNN and one of the greatest philanthropists is an avowed atheist.

(Footage of Ted Turner)

(Analysis of Turner speaking)

Former Governor Jesse Ventura rose from obscurity to high elected office. Yet he contends that belief in god and religion is just for the feeble-minded. How did he rise to power? By his speaking skills.

(Footage of Ventura speaking)

(Analysis of Ventura Speaking)

(Traditional moral values Rudy Giuliani, Rush Limbaugh, and Newt Gingrich)

Many success gurus’ stress the importance of traditional family values. Treat your spouse and kids with respect and love. Give that your top priority and everything else will flow from that success in your personal life.

Yet look at these guys (show photos of Giuliani, Limbaugh and Gingrich)

And here are their collective nine wives (show photos of 9 ex or current wives of these three guys)
They might not be great husbands or fathers, but they are all excellent speakers.

(Footage of Giuliani speaking)

(Analysis of Giuliani speaking)

(Footage of Limbaugh speaking)

(Analysis of Limbaugh speaking)

(Footage of Gingrich speaking)

(Analysis of Gingrich speaking)

(Discipline and punctuality – Bill Clinton)

Start on time and finish on time we are told. Yet former president Clinton is known for always being half an hour late to everything. He was that was as a candidate and that was as a President. By the way, George Bush was always on time. Yet few would deny that Clinton was very successful

(Footage of Clinton speaking)

(Analysis of Clinton speaking)

(Being Tall – Dr. Ruth)

If you go to the back of comic books, young boys are taught the secret to success is being tall—so you’d better get lifts in your shoes.

But Dr. Ruth and Mother Teresa? Both under 5 feet tall. But both are good speakers.

(Footage of Dr. Ruth)

(Analysis of Dr. Ruth’s speaking skills)

(Footage of Mother Teresa)

(Analysis of Mother Teresa’s speaking skills)

(Good marriage – Barbara De Angelis)

We are told that a solid marriage is the source of strength for successful people. Marriage guru Barbara Se Angelis preaches the same thing. Only she’s been married five times, at last count.

Why is she successful?

(Footage of De Angelis speaking)

(Analysis of de Angelis speaking)

And Larry King has been married at least 7 times

(Footage of Larry king speaking)

(Analysis of why king is a good speaker)

(Good voice – Barbara Walters)

Voice experts will tell you the key to success is having a great, smooth and soothing voice.

Well what about Barbara Walters?

(Footage of Walters speaking with an irritating voice)

(Analysis of why Walters is a good speaker)

(Not about getting up early. Winston Churchill)

Benjamin Franklin was an 18th century motivational guru. He was fond of telling people early to be and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.

But what about Winston Churchill? He was known to sleep until 10AM!!!

(Avoiding alcohol – Winston Churchill)

Many Success gurus, including Donald Trump, stress the virtues of avoiding all alcohol and drugs. This may be perfectly good advice, but again, let’s look at Winston Churchill. Churchill was known for his love of sherry, wine, and other liquors…on a daily basis…during and after all meals. And yet he defeated Hitler.

(Born into wealth with a good family name and connections – Barack Obama)

Some even claim that the secret to success, especially in America, is being born into the right family, with the right name, the right connections and wealth. Well then how do you account for a guy like Barack
Obama who had none of these things? But he did have one thing going for him.

(Footage of Obama form 2004 Dem convention)

(Analysis of Obama speech)

 (Education Tony Robbins, Peter Jennings, Steve Jobs, John Gray)

We are told by leaders as successful as Barack Obama that education is the key to success. Yet Anthony Robbins has only a high school degree. Peter Jennings was a high school dropout. Steve Jobs, Brian Williams are college dropouts. “Dr. John Gray” the relationship guru has a PhD, a masters degree and a college degree all form unaccredited colleges. His PhD is from a defunct diploma mill, oh well, hasn’t seemed to hurt his career.

(Show photos of all of them)

(Video clip of Anthony Robbins)

(Analysis of Robbins strengths as a speaker)

(Video clip of Steve Jobs)

(Analysis of why Jobs is a great speaker)

(Video of John Gray)

(Analysis of John Gray speaking)

Being young and hip—Art Linkletter, Zig Ziglar, John Wooten

Lately there has even been a cottage industry of success guru’s who claim the secret to achievement in life is being nice. Jay Leno even wrote a book about it.

But wait a minute. What about… (Show photo of Simon Cowell)

Even his biggest fans will admit Cowell is anything but nice.

(Footage of Cowell speaking)

(Analysis of why Cowell is a great speaker)

I am suggesting to you that the real secret to success is learning how to speak effectively. Period! That is the one and only consistent trait among wildly successful people. The good news is that absolutely anyone can learn how to be an effective speaker. The bad news is that you probably aren’t an effective speaker.
My message today is not that I want you to be cynical, though a little skepticism can be a good thing. It’s not that I take pleasure in pointing out people’s flaws or inconsistencies. I also don’t want you to thin that I am suggesting that the people I have discussed are insincere. I believe most of them are very sincere when they talk about their ideas on how to be successful and happy in life.

I hope what you take away is that regardless of your own flaws and inadequacies, you too can be a success. Whatever your own deficiencies are I have shown you people today who have even greater deficiencies and yet they are wildly successful.

Why? They learned how to speak effectively.

Lots of these experts have good advice. I’m not saying you should disregard their advice. But what I am suggesting is that their real secret to success is sitting right out there in front of you and no one ever talks about it. The real secret to success is simply asking for it. But asking in a specific way. Asking persuasively. Asking by speaking. Asking by speaking directly to people in a way that is memorable, persuasive, interesting and engaging.

Chances are I have offended most of you by now. Please realize that I am not trying to encourage you to drink more, sleep late, and divorce your spouse or start lying more. All I want is to help you give greater focus to the one thing I am absolutely certain will help you become more successful in whatever you want to do: become a better speaker.

I’m not trying to put anyone down. All of the people I have put a spotlight on today have some good ideas that we can learn from. But I am suggesting that there is a gigantic elephant in the room that most successful people never talk about. And that is the role of becoming a good public speaker has had in their career success. The good news is that this is a very specific quantifiable skill—and it’s a lot easier to become proficient at it than it is golf.

If you really want to be successful in life, then you need to improve your speaking skills, improve your asking skills, and improve your presenting skills. And you need to do it in a systematic way. You need feedback and a way of measuring progress. Fortunately most of you already have that already and it’s in your pocket. I don’t mean your money. Instead I mean your cell phone if it captures video. You can start video recording your practice presentations today. There is nothing holding you back.

Here’s the real key to success. You’ve got to figure out how to spend less time sitting where you are right now, in the audience and more time where I am –speaking to an audience. Now this could be an audience of one other co-worker. It could be an audience of five colleagues. Or if 15 new business prospects. Speaking to an audience of any size, even if it is just one, beats speaking to no audience.

So what is the solution? The solution is to learn the secrets of people who are more successful than you are. But I mean the real secrets. The secrets of how they speak effectively and raise money effectively and sell effectively.

As you can see from what I’ve been talking about for the last hour. You can break down second by second exactly what works in a speech and what doesn’t. If you watch the video of any speech and stop it every few seconds. It’s easy to see what works and what doesn’t work. You’ve seen me do that here.

Guess what, you can do the same with your own speeches, presentations and job interviews. But you have to have positive role models and you have to watch yourself. That’s why I’ve created my home and office presentation training course. In this course, you will learn everything I’ve learned during the last 25 years of training CEOs, Nobel peace prize winner, Presidents, Prime Ministers and Miss Universes. Even more important, you will be recorded on video and taught how to critique yourself to get better and better.
Does my system work? No, if you don’t use it. If you leave it in the box and put it by our nightstand, it will be of no value. However, if you do use it and you do practice and do record yourself, I guarantee you will become a better speaker. I guarantee you will lose your fears of public speaking. I guarantee you will be more successful in all aspects of your life. So the choice is yours. Are you going to continue leading a life where you sit passively as an audience member and let other people speak to you and sell? You stuff and get you to do things. Or are you going to turn the tables and start speaking yourself. I don’t mean you have to become a professional motivational speaker, but are you going to speak out more forceful at your own job, speak up to your own board of directors, start pitching to 10 prospects at once rather than one at a time? If you are ready to make a real change in your life, not just a feel good change, then it’s time for you to get out of your chair as a permanent audience member and take your first step toward being on the stage….the stage of life that will let you speak out whenever and wherever you want to help you get whatever you want. Get up now and go to the back of the room and purchase your speaking success kit today.

(Note form TJ: need something that is a call to action at the end, but that is less cheesy)