Why Great Speaking is Essential to Great Leading
“The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.” – Michelangelo
Is great speaking essential to great leading? Think about it. Can you think of any great leader who is or was not a great speaker? Great leaders use their great speaking ability to influence their followers. Because of this, great speaking is indeed essential to great leading.
Below you will see how your great speaking significantly enhances your leadership in the following qualities: integrity, resolution, and having the strength of your convictions.
Great Speaking is Integral to Developing Unquestioned Integrity
Earl Nightingale in his audio album, Lead the Field, talks of an American Army General captured in the Korean War. He was subjected to all types of physical torture, solitary confinement, and sleep deprivation. The general was ordered several times to sign a confession admitting he was a spy for the United States. He refused every time.
One day, his captors told him if he did not sign the confession by day break, he would be executed. Thinking he was going to be executed the next day, he wrote a letter to his wife that night. In the letter, he wrote, “Tell Johnny, the word is integrity.”
The general was later repatriated to the United States in a prisoner exchange. But thinking he would be executed the next morning, he asked his wife to tell their son, Johnny, the word is “integrity.” Integrity in all you say and do.
What would be your last words on this earth to your son or daughter. These would be the words you want them to remember through their lives. Would your last word be “integrity?”
Dictionary.com defines “integrity” as “adherence to moral and ethical principles; soundness of moral character; honesty.” I was pondering this the other day and thought how your public speaking greatly supports your integrity.
You are your most convincing to your audience when you adhere to high moral and ethical principles and are honest in all your interactions with others. How can you exemplify the highest integrity as a speaker? Prepare your own presentation and when you use someone else’s words, attribute them. It is entirely appropriate to support your presentation with quotes from other speakers if, and only if, you attribute the words to the rightful speaker.
Integrity is the bedrock of your speaking life. Modern audiences are incredibly perceptive and can catch when a speaker is being less than honest with them. Your integrity or lack of it will be obvious to your audience.
Adherence to high integrity will bring you much appreciation from your audiences. In addition to integrity, audiences are looking for leaders that are resolute.
Great Speaking Significantly Enhances a Leaders Resolution
George Washington is a perfect example of the quintessential resolute leader. He agreed to lead a ragtag group of farmers, merchants, and part-time militiamen in a struggle for independence against the most powerful military on the face of the earth at the time – Great Britain.
George Washington was a man of few words. He never wrote a book and wrote few letters. However, during the Revolutionary War and after when he led the Constitutional Convention in 1787 which established the Constitution of the United States which we still live under today, no one ever faulted him for being not resolute in his decisions.
In his capacity as the President of the Constitutional Convention, George Washington had many opportunities to speak to his fellow delegates about the eventual shape of the United States. You could even go as far as saying George Washington had the greatest role in determining the shape and form of our present United States. He was that trusted by his fellow Constitutional Convention delegates.
Why do you as a speaker need to strive to be as resolute as George Washington? Dictionary.com defines resolute as firmly resolved or determined; set in purpose or opinion; characterized by firmness and determination, as the temper, spirit, actions.
Do you as a speaker have to firmly resolve what you are going to say in your presentations? Do you as a speaker have to have determination to prepare and deliver your speech? Do you as a speaker have to have a strong opinion on what the audience should do with what you are presenting them? I hope you answered a resounding “Yes” to all of these questions. Resolution enhances your leadership.
Final question. Are you yet convinced you a leader when you are speaking? I hope you answered yes, because people in the audience are following you because you are influencing them through your ideas in your presentation. When you speak, you are a leader.
Integrity and resolution are key attributes of speakers, and, therefore, leaders, but people will not follow you if you don’t have the strength of your convictions.
Great Speaking is Essential to Developing the Strength of Your Convictions
Would you follow a person who makes a decision and then vacillates on that decision? Of course you wouldn’t. To gain and retain people’s trust in you as a leader, you must follow through on your decisions with the caveat that if further information proves the decision to be a poor one, you are willing to change the decision. Leaders require the strength of their convictions. Great public speaking skills significantly adds to your strength of convictions.
It’s ironic that it takes sometimes many years to build your reputation of which you can be proud. However, it takes much less time to lose that reputation if you show yourself unworthy and even a longer time to regain a great reputation if that is possible.
In his lifetime, General Dwight David Eisenhower was the commander of the D-Day invasion, Army Chief of Staff and President of the United States. In planning and then executing the D-Day invasion of France and destroying the Nazi war machine, he is a prime example of a leader who has the strength of his convictions.
General George C. Marshall, Army Chief of Staff in World War II, (another great example of a leader with the strength of his convictions) chose General Eisenhower over more senior generals to lead the D-Day invasion. Why? General Marshall knew that the person leading the invasion would have to have the strength of his convictions and superior communication skills to bring together a coalition of many nations to defeat Nazi Germany. General Eisenhower was known as a person who was able to get along with anyone. He was the right person for the right job at the right time.
Another great example from the American Civil War was General Ulysses S. Grant. Up until the time General Grant was appointed the commanding general of the Union forces, President Abraham Lincoln went through a number of commanding generals that vacillated and let the Confederate forces escape many times.
General Robert E. Lee, the commanding general of the Confederate forces, knew that his forces would survive until the Union could field a general with the strength of his convictions and continuously pursue the Confederate forces. That general was Ulysses S. Grant.
From the time he took command, General Grant’s Union forces relentlessly pursued the Confederate forces until attrition caused General Lee and the Confederate forces to surrender. General Grant would not have been successful unless he could communicate his convictions through clear and unambiguous orders to his forces that led to the defeat the Confederate forces under General Lee.
Do you think George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower, or Ulysses S. Grant would have become great leaders without the ability to influence the men under their charge (AKA, audiences) and the world through their spoken word? The answer to this question hopefully is a resounding NO!
If you aspire to be a great leader, an essential skill you need to develop is to speak intelligently and convincingly to influence your followers (AKA, your audience) to your way of thinking.
With this skill you will become a master at speaking, leading, and succeeding!
“I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.” – Alexander the Great
Looking for professional services to help you significantly increase your influence with your audiences? Contact DiBartolomeo Consulting International (DCI) at info@speakleadandsucceed.com or (703) 815-1324