Speech Contest Recovery
March 20th, 2005 by Steve Pavlina
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Last night I competed in my Toastmasters division speech contest. I took third place. While I was certainly aiming for first, I feel good that I did my best and ran up against my limits again. The first place winner was George Gilbert, a professional speaker/comedian who’s been speaking and performing about as long as I’ve been alive. All of the speeches were excellent, and before the winners were announced, I honestly didn’t know who’d place first, second, and third. George’s speech was wonderfully humorous, mine was more emotional, and the second place winner Brandi Harrington gave a very direct and straightforward speech with a good dose of humor.
I accomplished my goal for this speech, which was to connect emotionally with the audience; I knew I’d done that when I saw tears in the audience. In terms of developing a speech to win the contest though, I may have missed the mark. I didn’t aim for a speech with much humor, but in retrospect I think I would have needed to do a lighter more humorous speech in order to win. The judging is structured with a rating sheet and multiple judges, but it’s still very subjective. How do you compare a speech that makes you laugh vs. a speech that makes you cry vs. a speech that makes you think? Even some of the judges were noting the difficulty of that. The contest/dinner was very long, and the banquet room chairs weren’t so comfortable for such a long event. I was there about 5 hours total and didn’t give my speech until 9pm. I think under those conditions a humorous speech is likely to get a better audience reaction, so I may try a different type of speech if I do this again next year.
Dinner included fortune cookies. My fortune said, “You will take a chance in something in near future.” What does that mean when you live in Vegas? 
In a few days I’ll postmortem this contest cycle to figure out what I’ve learned and how I can improve. But for now I’ll be taking a day off with my family. In a few hours I’ll be picking up my wife from the airport. She’s returning from the Natural Products Expo in Anaheim, CA. So as I’m recovering from contest hangover, she’ll be recovering from convention hangover.
March 20th, 2005 at 2:22 pm
Steve–
Although I do public speaking regularly as part of my job, your enthusiastic endorsement of Toastmasters International has inspired me to join a local club here in NC. Although I feel very competent in my speaking skills, my goal is to improve, which is something everyone can do. I’ll keep you updated as tomorrow is my first meeting.
March 20th, 2005 at 4:28 pm
Congrats on becoming a member! I wished I’d joined a decade ago, just for the opportunity to improve my general communication skills and to make more local friends.
This week my club is doing a joint meeting with another local club. It should be a lot of fun, especially for me since I’ll be Table Topics Master.
March 21st, 2005 at 9:00 am
My experience is that the speeches that usually win are the tear-jerkers. I’m always disappointed that the contestants don’t get the judging forms. That would make for some nice feedback.
April 14th, 2005 at 7:17 am
I have been a Toastmaster three and a half years and a contest speaker for almost as long and if I have learned anything about speaking in a contest, it’s this: don’t go out there to win, go out there to communicate. I wouldn’t waste too much time on the post mortem.
The judging is subjective. The best you can do is precisly as you describe: connect with the audience. More than that, have something of value to say - I hate it when an incredibly polished speaker attempts to impress me with his technique for seven minutes, but has no real content.
Congratulations Steve on getting to division. Be proud, on behalf of yourself, your club and your area.
July 31st, 2005 at 11:18 am
It’s noteworthy, I think, that the subjects on things that I’ve seen that have won nationally, seem more to veer away from the humorous, to the more impactful. Have you tried out any of the CDs or DVDs from the contests?