- We're going to talk about two common types
of speech delivery,
extemporaneous versus impromptu delivery.
People confuse these a lot.
And we'll also answer the question,
which approach is best for your typical speaking situation?
And be sure to look at my free download
in the description below the video
with the seven instant tips
for more confident and composed public speaking.
Let's compare these two types of delivery styles.
And when I say delivery, that word,
that means the way an individual speaker
stands up and shares a message.
For example, some people will look directly at a manuscript
and read word-for-word, everything that's on the page,
(papers rustling)
just like they're reading a paper at the end of a semester.
That delivery style is called manuscript speaking.
But today, we're talking about impromptu
and extemporaneous delivery styles,
which are two of the most common styles.
Impromptu delivery is where you deliver a message
with little or no immediate preparation.
You might only have several seconds
to maybe a few minutes to get ready.
Some people call this speaking off-the-cuff.
And even in the thought of this gives
a lot of people anxiety.
But you can get good at impromptu speaking.
It's a fantastic skill that will enhance
all your other public speaking and presenting.
You'll often see this happen in business settings.
The boss might open a meeting up, and without any notice,
say, "I'd like a two-minute status update
"from everybody on how things are going.
"Let's go around the table.
"Johnson, you go first."
Now, it would've been nice to get a heads-up about this,
but like it or not, Johnson, it's showtime.
At the beginning of lots of meetings, or trainings,
or classroom settings like in college,
the leader will often want everybody
to introduce themselves.
And there are endless situations where you'll be asked
to speak where you don't have any time to get ready.
And you probably already see the pattern here.
In most cases, people use the impromptu approach
when they have no other choice.
They are put on the spot in one way or another.
We speak impromptu when we essentially can't prepare
in advance, but believe it or not,
some people look for opportunities to speak impromptu
and practice this skill as much as they can.
They do it because it's one of the quickest ways
to get comfortable and build your confidence
when you're speaking under pressure.
And you can get a lot of repetitions in,
because it literally takes no time to prepare in advance.
And usually, these messages are short.
You'll almost never be expected to speak impromptu
for more than a few minutes at a time.
My YouTube friend, Brenden, from the channel MasterTalk,
uses a random word exercise
with his clients to help them practice.
He gives them a random word, and then,
asks them to speak impromptu about that word for 30 seconds.
I was sitting in on one of his workshops not long ago,
and he assigned one of his clients the word "intuition,"
I believe it was.
And she thought about a it for just a moment.
And then, Brendan said, "Go."
And she spoke for about 30 seconds on the word intuition
in front of about 40 people on a Zoom call.
And she did great.
And I will put a link, by the way,
to Brenden's workshop page in the description
below this video if you wanna try this yourself.
This is a learnable skill.
And the first time you do it,
it may not be that smooth, but it only takes 30 seconds.
And by the 10th or 20th time
doing this random word exercise,
you get in the flow of speaking comfortably off-the-cuff.
Some people take this even further.
When I was in graduate school,
I had the benefit of being an assistant coach
for our speech and debate team.
And one of the categories
of competitive speaking is impromptu.
And at these competitions,
each speaker was given a little slip of paper
that had a short quotation on it,
or a line from a song, or some other short prompt.
And they were given only two minutes to prepare.
And then, they were expected to speak
for five to seven minutes in front of an audience
on that topic, whatever was on that slip of paper.
I was really blown away by some of the competitors.
Some of them will deliver a five-minute speech
on a random topic they were just assigned,
and it would be amazing.
And they were able to do it
because this is a learnable skill, you can practice.
And they also used strategies
that they could apply to any impromptu topic.
For example, they almost all use
the classic introduction body
with three points and conclusion.
And since they already know in advance
the structure that they're going to use,
they can plug in various ideas, stories,
and examples into that framework really quickly.
The bottom line is that impromptu speaking is
probably the quickest way to get better
at your overall public speaking
because you get a lot of repetitions,
and you really push yourself and put yourself out there.
So the key question here is
when is impromptu speaking style the best option for you?
And the short answer is when you have no other choice.
When you are given little or no time to prepare,
that's when you would use an impromptu approach.
But the key is if you practice doing this type
of speaking ahead of time, you'll get better at it.
And you'll handle those impromptu moments
with much more confidence and composure.
Impromptu speaking is often confused
with extemporaneous speaking.
In everyday conversation,
people use these two words interchangeably,
but that's not correct.
They are different as you'll see.
With extemporaneous speaking,
you have plenty of time to research,
prepare, and practice in advance.
You know that you're going to be talking
long before the day.
You have time to create an outline,
think of an interesting way to open and close.
But what really makes extemporaneous speaking what it is,
ultimately is that the speaker uses
limited notes or just a basic outline
when they're standing up and speaking.
Remember I said earlier that one type of speaking
is called manuscript speaking,
where you essentially read every word on the page.
But since that often sounds like you're a robot,
most people prefer to take their research and preparation,
put it on an outline and turn it into just bullet points.
And then, they practice behind the scenes numerous times.
The advantage of this is that they can
simply glance at their notes just to remember
what they were going to be talking about next.
And then, they look up and away from their notes,
and connect with their audience.
This is how most professional speakers do it.
This is a very comfortable and conversational approach,
and allows you to break away from your notes
most of the time to connect with your listeners.
You can adapt your message as you go
because you're not tied to your pages.
Extemporaneous speaking allows you a bit of spontaneity.
So if you lose track of where you were headed,
you can always look back at your outline
and pick it up from there.
So your extemporaneous notes,
what we call your speaking notes,
are really just a safety net.
Usually, most of the outline will just be
brief bullet points, keywords,
just enough to jog your memory
about what you plan to say next.
And again, the next question is
when is extemporaneous speaking the best approach?
In my opinion,
extemporaneous delivery should be far and away,
your number one go-to choice.
If you ever have any time at all to prepare,
speak extemporaneously.
I highly recommend against reading your presentations.
If you do that, you're going to sound like a stiff.
Prepare in advance and speak from limited notes.
That's almost always the way to go.
Be sure to take a look at the free PDF download
on these seven instant tips
to make you a more confident speaker.
And check out Brenden's free workshops on his page,
where you can practice that random word exercise
with him in a live workshop.
Links to both of those resources are below.
And tell me your thoughts.
What do you think about impromptu
or extemporaneous speaking?
I would love to hear all of your thoughts on that.
God bless, and I will see you soon.