第8章 Making the Talk to Inform 说明性演讲

PROBABLY YOU OFTEN have heard speakers like one who once made a United States Senate investigating committee squirm with annoyance. He was a high-ranking government official, but he did not know any better than to talk on and on, vaguely, without ever making his meaning clear. He was pointless and obscure, and the committee's confusion mounted by the moment. Finally one of its members, Samuel James Ervin, Jr., speaking as the senior Senator from North Carolina, got a chance to say a few words—and they were telling ones.

He said the official reminded him of a husband he knew back home. The husband notified his lawyer he wanted to divorce his wife, although he conceded she was beautiful, a fine cook, and a model mother.

“They Why do you want to divorce her?” his lawyer asked.

“Because she talks all the time.” the husband replied.

“What does she talk about?”

“That's the trouble,” the husband answered, “she never says !”

This is the trouble, too, with many speakers, both women and men. Their hearers don't know what such speakers are talking about. They never say. They never make their meaning clear.

In Chapter Seven, you received a formula for making short talks to get action from your listeners. Now, I am going to give you methods to help make your meaning clear when you set out to inform, and not motivate, your listeners.

We make informative talks many times every day: giving directions or instructions, making explanations and reports. Of all the types of talks given every week to audiences everywhere, the talk to inform is second only to the talk to persuade or get action. The ability to speak clearly precedes the ability to move others to action. Owen D. Young, one of America's top industrialists, emphasizes the need for clear expression in today's world:

As one enlarges his ability to get others to understand him, he opens up to that extent his opportunity for usefulness. Certainly in our society, where it is necessary for men even in the simplest matters to co-operate with each other, it is necessary for them first of all to understand each other. Language is the principal conveyor of understanding, and so we must learn to use it, not crudely but discriminatingly.

In this chapter are some suggestions to help you see language so clearly and discriminately that your audience will have no difficulty understanding you. “Everything that can be thought at all,” said Ludwig Wittgenstein, “can be thought clearly. Everything that can be said, can be said clearly.”

FIRST/ RESTRICT YOUR SUBJECT TO FIT THE TIME AT YOUR ISPOSAL

In one of his talks to teachers, Professor William James pauses to remark that one can make only one point in a lecture, and the lecture he referred to lasted an hour. Yet I recently heard a speaker, who was limited by a stop watch to three minutes, begin by saying that he wanted to call our attention to eleven points. Sixteen and a half seconds to each phase of his subject! Seems incredible, doesn't it, that an intelligent man should attempt anything so manifestly absurd? True, this is an extreme case but the tendency to err in that fashion, if not to that degree, handicaps almost every novice. He is like a Cook's guide who shows Paris to the tourist in one day. It can be done, just as one can walk through the American Museum of Natural History in thirty minutes. But neither clearness nor enjoyment results. Many a talk fails to be clear because the speaker seems intent upon establishing a world's record for ground covered in the allotted time. He leaps from one point to another with the swiftness and agility of a mountain goat.

If, for example, you are to speak on Labor Unions, do not attempt to tell us in three or six minutes why they came into existence, the methods they employ, the good they have accomplished, the evil they have wrought, and how to solve industrial disputes. No, no; if you strive to do that, no one will have a very clear conception of what you have said. It will be all confused, a blur, too sketchy, too much of a mere outline.

Wouldn't it be the part of wisdom to take one phase, and one phase only, of labor unions, and cover that adequately and illustrate it? It would. That kind of talk leaves a single impression. It is lucid, easy to listen to, easy to remember.

When I went to call one morning on a company president whom I know, I found a strange name on his door. The personnel director, an old friend of mine, told me why.

“His name caught up with him.” my friend said.

“His name?” I repeated. “He was one of the Joneses who control the company, wasn't he?”

“I mean his nickname,” my friend said. “It was ‘ Where-Is-He-Now? ' Everyone called him ‘ Where-Is-He-Now' Jones. He didn't last long. The family put a cousin in his place. He never took the pains to know what this business is all about. He'd put in a good long day, all right, but doing what? Popping in here, popping in there, all over the place, all the time. Just sort of covering ground. He thought it was more important for him to see that a shipping clerk turned out an electric light or that a stenographer picked up a paper clip than it was for him to study a big sales campaign. He wasn't in his office much. That's why we called him ‘Where-Is-He-Now.’”

“Where-Is-He-Now” Jones reminds me of many speakers who could do much better than they do. They don't do better because they won't discipline themselves. They are the ones who, like Mr. Jones, try to cover too much ground. Haven't you heard them? And in the midst of a talk, haven't you wondered. “Where is he now?”

Even some experienced speakers are guilty of this fault. Perhaps the fact that they are capable in many other ways blinds them to the danger in dispersed effort. You need not be like them. Hold fast to your main theme. If you are to make yourself clear, your hearers must always be able to say, “I understand him.I know where he is now!”

SECOND/ ARRANGE YOUR IDEAS IN SEQUENCE

Almost all subjects can be developed by using a logical sequence based on time, space, or special topics. In the time sequence, for instance, you might consider your subject under the three categories of past, present, and future, or you might begin at a certain date and move backward or forward from that date. All process talks, for example, should begin at the raw-material stage and move through the various manufacturing steps that produce the finished product. How much detail you bring in will, of course, be governed by the time you have.

In the space sequence, you arrange your ideas according to some central point and go outward from there or you cover the material directionally, north, south, east, and west. If you were to describe the city of Washington, D. C., you might take your listeners to the top of the capitol building and indicate the points of interest in each direction. If you are describing a jet engine or an automobile, for example, you might best discuss it by breaking it down into its component parts.

Some subjects have a built-in sequence. If you set out to explain the structure of the United States Government, you will do well to follow this inherent organizational pattern and discuss it according to the legislative, executive, and judicial branches.

THIRD/ ENUMERATE YOUR POINTS AS YOU MAKE THEM

One of the simplest ways to keep a talk shipshape in the minds of your listeners is to mention plainly as you go along that you are taking up first one point and then another.

“My first point is this:…”You can be as blunt as that. When you've discussed the point, you can say frankly that you are going to the second one. You can keep on that way to the end.

Dr. Ralph J. Bunche, when assistant secretarygeneral of the United Nations, began an important talk sponsored by the City Club of Rochester, New York, in this straightforward manner:

“I have chosen to speak tonight on the topic, ‘the Challenge of Human Relations, 'for two reasons,” he said. He went on at once to add, “In the first place…”He continued soon, “In the second place…”Throughout the talk, he was careful to make clear to his audience that he was leading it, point by point, to his conclusion:

“We must never lose faith in man's potential power for good.”

The same method was given an effective twist when the economist, Paul H. Douglas, spoke to a congressional joint committee struggling with means to stimulate business when it once was lagging in this country. He spoke both as a tax expert and as Senator from Illinois.

“My theme,” he began, “is this: The quickest and most effective way to act is by means of a tax cut for lower and middle income groups—that is, those groups which tend to spend almost all their income.”

“Specifically…” he went on.

“Further…”he continued.

“In addition…” he continued.

“There are three principal reasons:…First…Second…Third…

“To summation, what we need is an immediate tax cut for low and middle income groups in order to increase demand and purchasing power.”

FOURTH/ COMPARE THE STRANGE WITH THE FAMILIAR

Sometimes you will find yourself floundering in a vain attempt to explain your meaning. It's something quite: clear to you but requiring involved explanation if your hearers are to be clear about it too. What to do? Compare it with something your hearers do understand; say one thing is like the other, the strange like the familiar.

Suppose you are discussing one of chemistry's contributions to industry—a catalyst. It is a substance that causes changes to occur in other substances without changing itself. That's fairly simple. But isn't this better? It is like a little boy in a schoolyard, tripping, punching, upsetting, poking all the other children there, and never being touched by a blow from anyone else.

Some missionaries once had to face this problem of putting strange statements into familiar terms when they translated the Bible into the dialect of a tribe living in equatorial Africa. Should they translate literally? They realized that if they did, the words at times would be meaningless to the natives.

They came, for example, to the lines: “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow.” Should they translate this literally? The natives didn't know snow from jungle moss. But they had often climbed coconut trees and had shaken down nuts for lunch. The missionaries likened the unknown to the known. They changed the lines to read:

“Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as the meat of a coconut.”

Under the circumstances, it would be hard to improve on that, wouldn't it?

TURN A FACT INTO A PICTURE

How far away is the moon? The sun? The nearest other star? Scientists are apt to answer spacetravel questions with a lot of mathematics. But science lecturers and writers know this is no way to make a fact clear to an average audience. They turn the figures into pictures.

The famous scientist Sir James Jeans was particularly interested in mankind's yearnings to explore the universe. As a scientific expert, he knew the mathematics involved, and he also knew that he would be most effective in writing or speaking if he dropped in a figure only here and there.

Our sun (a star) and the planets around us are so near that we do not realize how far away other objects whirling in space are, he pointed out in his book, The Universe Around Us. “Even the nearest star (Proxima Centauri) is 25,000,000,000,000 miles away,” he said. Then, to make this figure more vivid, he explained that if one were to take off from the earth at the speed of light—186,000 miles a second—it would take him four and a quarter years to reach Proxima Centauri.

In this way, he made the vast distances in space seem more real than did another speaker whom I once heard describe such a simple thing as distances in Alaska. He said Alaska's area was 590,804 square miles, and dropped the attempt to show its size right there.

Does this give you any kind of picture of the size of the 49th State? It didn't give me one. To visualize its bigness, I had to wait until I learned from another source that its area more than equals the combined areas of Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, and Mississippi.Now the 590,804 square miles take on a new meaning, don't they? You realize that in Alaska there's plenty of room to move around.

Some years ago a member of one of our classes described the fearful toll of fatal accidents on our highways by this appalling picture: “You are driving across the country from New York to Los Angeles. Instead of highway markers, imagine coffins standing upright in the earth, each containing a victim of last year's slaughter on the roads. As you speed along your car passes one of these gruesome markers every five seconds, for they are spaced twelve to a mile from one end of the country to the other!”

I never take a ride in a car very far before that picture comes back to me with startling realism.

Why is that so? Because ear impressions are hard to retain. They roll away like sleet striking the smooth bark of a beech tree. But eye impressions? I saw, a few years ago, a cannon ball imbedded in an old house standing on the banks of the Danube—a cannon ball that Napoleon's artillery had fired at the battle of Ulm. Visual impressions are like that cannon ball; they come with a terrific impact. They imbed themselves. They stick. They tend to drive out all opposing suggestions as Bonaparte drove away the Austrians.

AVOID TECHNICAL TERMS

If you belong to a profession the work of which is technical—if you are a lawyer, a physician, an engineer, or are in a highly specialized line of business—be doubly careful, when you talk to outsiders, to express yourself in plain terms and to give necessary details. Be doubly careful, for, as a part of my professional duties, I have listened to hundreds of speeches that failed right at this point, and failed woefully. The speakers appeared totally unconscious of the general public's widespread and profound ignorance regarding their particular specialties. So what happened? They rambled on and on, uttering thoughts, using phrases that fitted into their experience and were instantly and continuously meaningful to them; but to the uninitiated, they were about as clear as the Missouri River after the June rains have fallen on the newly plowed cornfields of Iowa and Kansas.

What should such a speaker do? He ought to read and heed the following advice from the facile pen of former Senator Beveridge of Indiana:

It is a good practice to pick out the least intelligent-looking person in the audience and strive to make that person interested in your argument. This can be done only by lucid statements of fact and clear reasoning. An even better method is to center your talk on some small boy or girl present with parents.

Say to yourself—say out loud to your audience, if you like—that you will try to be so plain that the child will understand and remember your explanation of the question discussed, and after the meeting be able to tell what you have said.

A physician in one of our classes remarked in a talk that “diaphragmatic breathing is a distinct aid to the peristaltic action of the intestines and a boon to health.” He was about to dismiss that phase of his talk with that one sentence and to rush on to something else. The instructor stopped him, and asked for a show of hands of those who had a clear conception of how diaphragmatic breathing differs from other kinds of breathing, why it is especially beneficial to physical well-being, and what peristaltic action is. The result of the vote surprised the doctor; so he went back, explained, enlarged in this fashion:

The diaphragm is a thin muscle forming the floor of the chest at the base of the lungs and the roof of the abdominal cavity. When inactive and during chest breathing, it is arched like an inverted washbowl.

In abdominal breathing every breath forces this muscular arch down until it becomes nearly flat and you can feel your stomach muscles pressing against your belt. This downward pressure of the diaphragm massages and stimulates the organs of the upper part of the abdominal cavity—the stomach, the liver, the pancreas, the spleen, the solar plexus.

When you breathe out again, your stomach and your intestines will be forced up against the diaphragm and will be given another massage. This massaging helps the process of elimination.

A vast amount of ill health originates in the intestines. Most indigestion, constipation, and autointoxication would disappear if our stomachs and intestines were properly exercised through deep diaphragmatic breathing.

It is always best to go from the simple to the complex in giving explanations of any kind. For example, suppose you were trying to explain to a group of housewives why refrigerators must be defrosted. This would be the wrong way to go about it:

The principle of refrigeration is based on the fact that the evaporator pulls heat from the inner portion of the refrigerator. As the heat is pulled out, the accompanying humidity clings to the evaporator, piling up into a thickness which insulates the evaporator and necessitates more frequent turning on of the motor to compensate for the thickening frost.

Notice how much easier it is to understand if the speaker starts with what the housewives are familiar with:

You know where you freeze meat in your refrigerator. Well, you know, too, how the frost gathers on that freezer. Every day the frost gets thicker and thicker until the freezer must be defrosted to keep the refrigerator in good working order. You see, frost around the freezer is really like a blanket covering you in bed or like rock wool between the walls insulating your house. Now the thicker the frost gets, the harder it is for the freezer to pull the warm air out of the rest of the refrigerator and keep the refrigerator cold. The refrigerator motor then must work more often and longer to keep the box cold. But with an automatic defroster on your refrigerator, the frost never gets a chance to build up thickly. Consequently, the motor works less often and for shorter periods.

Aristotle gave some good advice on the subject: “Think as wise men do, but speak as the common people do.” If you must use a technical term, don't use it until you have explained it so everybody in the audience knows what it means. This is especially true of your keystone words, the ones you use over and over.

I once heard a stock broker speak to a group of women who wanted to learn fundamentals of banking and investment. He used simple language and he put them at ease in a conversational way. He made everything clear except his foundation words, which were strange to them. He spoke of the “clearing house,” “puts and calls,” “refunding mortgages,”and “short sales and long sales,” what could have been a fascinating discussion became a puzzle because he did not realize his hearers were unfamiliar with the words that were part and parcel of his trade.

There is no reason to avoid a keystone word which you know will not be understood. Just explain it as soon as you use it. Never fail to do this, the dictionary is all yours.

Do you want to say something about singing commercials? Or about impulse buying? About liberal arts courses, or cost accounting? About government subsidies, or automobiles that pass on the wrong side? Would you like to advocate a permissive attitude toward children, or the LIFO system of valuing inventories? Merely make sure that your hearers accept your keystone words in these specialized fields in the same sense in which you accept them.

FIFTH/ USE VISUAL AIDS

The nerves that lead from the eye to the brain are many times larger than those leading from the ear; and science tells us that we give twenty-five times as much attention to eye suggestions as we do to ear suggestions.

“One seeing,” says an old Japanese proverb, “is better than a hundred times telling about.”

So, if you wish to be clear, picture your points, visualize your ideas. That was the plan of John H. Patterson, founder of the National Cash Register Company. He wrote an article for System Magazine, outlining the methods he used in speaking to his workmen and his sales forces:

I hold that one cannot rely on speech alone to make himself understood or to gain and hold attention. A dramatic supplement is needed. It is better to supplement whenever possible with pictures which show the right and the wrong way: diagrams are more convincing than mere words, and pictures are more convincing than diagrams. The ideal presentation of a subject is one in which every subdivision is pictured and in which the words are used only to connect them. I early found that in dealing with men, a picture was worth more than anything I could say.

If you use a chart or diagram, be sure it is large enough to see, and don't overdo a good thing. A long succession of charts is usually boring. If you make the diagram as you go along, be careful to sketch roughly and swiftly on the blackboard or flip chart. Listeners are not interested in great art work. Use abbreviations; write largely and legibly; keep talking as you draw or write; and keep turning back to your audience.

When you use exhibits, follow these suggestions and you will be assured of the rapt attention of your audience.

1. Keep the exhibit out of sight until you are ready to use it.

2. Use exhi bits large enough to be seen from the very last row. Certainly your audience can't learn from any exhibit unless they see it.

3. Never pass an exhibit around among your listeners while you are speaking. Why invite competition?

4. When you show an exhibit, hold it up where your listeners can see it.

5. Remember, one exhibit that moves is worth ten that don't. Demonstrate if practicable.

6. Don't stare at the exhibit as you talk—you are trying to communicate with the audience, not with the exhibit.

7. When you have finished with the exhibit, get it out of sight if practicable.

8. If the exhibit you are going to use lends itself to “mystery treatment,” have it placed on a table which will be at your side as you speak. Have it covered. As you talk, make references to it that will arouse curiosity—but don't tell what it is. Then, when you are ready to unveil it, you have aroused curiosity, suspense, and real interest.

Visual materials are becoming more and more prominent as devices to promote clarity. There is no better way to insure that your audience will understand what you have to say than to go before them prepared to show as well as to tell them what you have in mind.

Two American presidents, both masters of the spoken word, have indicated that the ability to be clear is the result of training and discipline. As Lincoln said, we must have a passion for clarity. He told Dr. Gulliver, the President of Knox College, how he developed this “passion” in early life:

Among my earliest recollections I remember how, when a mere child, I used to get irritated when anybody talked to me in a way I could not understand. I don't think I ever got angry at anything else in my life. But that always disturbed my temper, and has ever since. I can remember going to my little bedroom, after hearing the neighbors talk of an evening with my father, and spending no small part of the night walking up and down and trying to make out the exact meaning of some of their, to me, dark sayings. I could not sleep, though I often tried to, when I got on such a hunt after an idea, until I had repeated it over and over, until I had put it in language plain enough as I thought for any boy I knew to comprehend. This was a kind of passion with me, and it has since stuck by me.

The other distinguished president, Woodrow Wilson, wrote some words of advice that strike the right note to end this chapter on making your meaning clear:

My father was a man of great intellectual energy. My best training came from him. He was intolerant of vagueness, and from the time I began to write until his death in 1903,when he was eighty-one years old, I carried everything I wrote to him.

He would make me read it aloud, which was always painful to me. Every now and then, he would stop me. “What do you mean by that?” I would tell him, and, of course, in doing so would express myself more simply than I had on paper. “Why didn't you say so?”he would go on. “Don't shoot at your meaning with birdshot and hit the whole countryside;shoot with a rifle at the thing you have to say.”

有一次，一位政府高级官员把美国参议院调查委员会搞得坐立不安，如坠雾里，也许就像你经常看到的某些演讲者那样。此人不停地说着，却含混不清，毫无重点，根本没有把他自己的意思讲清楚。整个委员会的困惑也逐渐增加。最后，一位来自北卡罗莱纳州的参议员小撒姆尔·詹姆斯·艾尔文终于抓住机会，说了几句精彩的比喻。

他说，这位官员让他想起家乡一个男人来。这个男人通知律师，说要和他老婆离婚，不过他却承认她很漂亮，是个好厨子，而且还是个模范母亲。

“那你为何还要和她离婚？”律师问他。

“因为她总是说个不停。”这个男人说。

“她都说些什么呢？”

“就是这个让我讨厌呀，”男人说，“因为她从来没说清楚过。”

这正是许多演讲者（无论男女）的问题所在。大家根本不知道他们在说些什么，他们也从来没有说清楚过，也从来没把自己的意思讲明白过。

在第七章中，介绍了一套做简短演讲并从听众那里获得行动的公式。现在，我还要教给你一些方法，帮助你在告知他人某一信息时，把自己的意思表达清楚。

我们每天都要做许多说明性的谈话，比如提出说明或指示，提出解释和报告。每星期在各地举行的各种类型的演讲中，说明性演讲仅次于说服性演讲或获得行动的演讲。清楚说话的能力，其实也是打动听众采取行动的能力。欧文·杨是美国工业巨子之一，他也强调了清晰的表达能力在当今社会的重要性：

当一个人扩大了使他人了解自己的能力时，他也拓展了自己的作用。在我们的社会，即使是最简单的事情，也需要人们的彼此合作，所以他们首先必须相互了解。语言是沟通的主要传递媒介，所以我们必须学会使用它，不是粗略地学会，而是精确地学会。

本章的各项建议，将让你清晰、精确地使用语言，让听众毫无困难地了解你。罗德威·威根斯坦说：“凡是可以想到的事情，都是可以清楚地思考的。而凡是可以说出来的事，也是可以清楚地表述出来的。”

一、限制演讲题材，以适合特定的时间

威廉·詹姆斯教授曾向一些教师指出，一个人在一次演讲中只能针对一个要点。他所说的演讲，是指那种时间限定为一个小时的演讲。而我最近却听过一位演讲者所做的3分钟的演讲，他一开始就说，他想谈11个要点。平均用16.5秒钟来说明一个要点！怎么会有这样“聪明”的人，居然想做如此荒谬的事情，有些不可思议吧？当然，这也只是个别极端的例子，但是即使情况没有这么严重，对于任何新手来说，论点太大也注定会出差错。这就像一个导游，带着一群游客一天之内看完巴黎所有的风光，这当然不是办不到。但就像一个人也可以在30分钟之内看完美国国家历史博物馆一样，根本不记得看到了什么。许多演讲之所以讲不清楚，就是因为演讲者企图在指定的时间内创下世界纪录。因此，他就像只敏捷的山羊，飞快地从这一点跳到那一点。

假设你现在就以劳工联盟作为演讲的题目，你根本不可能在3分钟或6分钟内告诉我们这个组织成立的原因，它们所采用的方法，它们的建树和缺失，以及它们怎样解决工业争端等。如果你坚持这样做，没有人会对你所说的留下清晰印象。它将只是一片混乱和含糊，而且只是一些太过简单的大纲。

如果你只谈它的一个方面，并且仅此一个，对它进行详细讲述，这样做是不是更明智呢？当然是的。这样将给听众留下一个单一的印象，但透彻易懂，也容易记住。

有一天早晨，我去拜访一家公司的总经理，却发现他的门上挂着一个陌生的名字。这家公司的人事部长是我的老朋友，他告诉我为何换了人。

“他的名字害苦了他。”我这位朋友说。

“他的名字？”我不太明白，“他不是控制这家公司的董事之一吗？”

“我说的是他的绰号，”这位朋友说，“他的绰号叫‘他现在在哪里？’人们都叫他‘他现在在哪里’·琼斯。因为我们总找不到他，不知道他在哪里。他从来不肯花心思去了解公司的整个业务概况。他每天待在公司的时间很长，但是在忙什么呢？他只是这里蹿一下，那里蹿一下，这样打发漫漫长日。他认为看到船运部门的职员关掉一盏灯，或见到速记员拾起一张纸，比他研究一桩大买卖更重要。他很少坐在办公室，因此我们叫他‘他现在在哪里’。”

“他现在在哪里”·琼斯让我想起很多演讲者，他们本来可以表现得更好些的。他们之所以不能表现得更优秀，就因为他们没有抓住原则。他们像琼斯先生一样，想包揽更大的范围。你听过他们的演讲吗？在他们演讲的时候，你有没有想过“他现在在哪里”?

即使是那些经验丰富的演讲者有时也会犯这样的错误。也许他们具备多方面的才华，所以看不到精力分散的危险。但你可不要向他们学习，而是要紧扣主题。如果你让自己清楚明了，听众就会说：“我懂他所说的，我知道他现在在说什么！”

二、遵循一定的顺序

几乎所有的演讲题材都可以利用一定的时间顺序、空间顺序或者事物的逻辑顺序来展开。比如时间顺序，可以按照过去、现在、将来“三段式”的顺序来处理材料，也可以从某一天开始进行倒叙或向前叙述。演讲的过程，都是从最粗糙的原材料开始，然后经过各种各样的制造阶段，最后完成真正的产品。至于其中加入多少细节，就取决于演讲的时间了。

在空间顺序上，可以立足于某个点，然后由此向外拓展；或者按照方位来处理，例如北方、南方、东方和西方。假设你要描述华盛顿城，你可以领着听众，从国会山庄的顶端，按照各个方向来叙述有趣的地方。如果你要说明一架喷气引擎或一辆汽车，最好是把它分解成各部分的组成零件，再来逐一谈论。

而有些演讲题材本身就具有自己的内在顺序。例如，如果你要介绍美国政府的结构，不妨按照立法、行政、司法三部门的内在结构来介绍，效果必然很好。

三、逐一列举你的要点

要想让演讲给听众一种井然有序、条理分明的印象，最简单的方法之一，就是在演讲过程中明白地表示：现在你先讲哪一点，接下来再讲哪一点。

“我要讲的第一点是……”你完全可以这样开门见山地说。讨论完这一点，你可以明确地说将要谈第二点，就这样一直说到结尾。

拉尔夫·布切博士担任联合国助理秘书长的时候，在纽约罗切斯特城市俱乐部主办的一次重要演讲上，这样直截了当地说：

“今晚我选择的演讲题目是‘人际关系的挑战’，是因为以下两个原因，”然后他又说，“首先……其二……”从头到尾，他都小心翼翼地让听众明白他的每一个重点。他引领听众，最后得出结论：

“我们不能对人类向善的天性失去信心。”

在美国国会联合委员会想方设法试图刺激一度停滞不前的商业会议上，经济学家道格拉斯以税务专家和伊利诺伊州参议员的身份演讲，巧妙而有效地使用了相同的办法。

他是这样开始的：“我的演讲主题是：最迅速、最有效的行动方式，是对中低收入阶层减税，因为这些群体几乎会花光他们所有的收入。”

然后他继续说：“具体说……进一步说……此外……有三个主要的理由：第一……第二……第三……”

他最后说：“总之，我们需要的，是立即对中低收入阶层实行减税措施，以增加需求与购买力。”

四、将陌生题材与听众熟悉的相比较

有时候你会有这种感觉：你辛辛苦苦地忙了半天，仍然没有把自己的意思解释清楚。你本来是很清楚这件事的，可是要让听众也明白它，就需要深入的解说。这该怎么办呢？不妨把它和听众熟悉的事情相比较，告诉他们这件事和另一件事一样，和他们所熟悉的事一样。

假设你要介绍催化剂在化学中对工业的贡献。你如果告诉人们这是一种物质，它能让别的物质改变而不会改变其本身，这说起来很简单；但是如果你说它正像个小男孩，在校园里又跳又打又闹，还推别的孩子，而他自己却安然无恙，从没有被人打过、碰过，这不是更好吗？

还有一个令人惊奇而有趣的例子：一些传教士在把《圣经》翻译成赤道非洲土著部落的土话时，面临着将陌生语言翻译成他们熟悉语言的难题。是逐字逐句照翻过来吗？他们意识到如果那样做，这些句子对土著人将毫无意义。

例如，他们遇到了一句话：“虽然你的罪恶一片鲜红，但它们终将白如雪花。”这一句怎样翻译呢？这些土著人从来分不清雪和丛林苔藓的区别，但他们经常爬椰子树，摇下椰子当午餐。因此，传教士就把陌生的词语和他们熟悉的东西联系起来，把那句话改译成：

“虽然你的罪恶一片鲜红，但它们终将白如椰肉。”

在这种情况下，再也找不到比这更好的翻译了，不是吗？

1.将事实变成图画

月亮有多远？太阳呢？最近的星星呢？科学家们一般都会用一大堆数字来回答这些问题。可是科普作家都知道，这种方法很难让普通听众了解，因此他们经常会将数字转化成图画。

著名科学家詹姆·吉恩斯爵士对人们探测宇宙的渴望特别感兴趣。身为科学家，他自然懂得高深的数学，但是他也明白，自己在写作或演讲中若只偶尔用上几个数字，效果将会最好。

虽然太阳和我们周围的行星如此靠近，但我们并不了解在太空中旋转的其他物体离我们究竟有多远，因此他在《我们周围的宇宙》一书中这样写道：“即使是最近的星（普洛西玛·森多里星)，也在25万亿英里以外。”为了使这数字更鲜明些，他解释说：“假如一个人从地球上起飞，以光速飞行——每秒18.6万英里——他也需要4年零3个月才能到普洛西玛·森多里星。”

他以这种方式来说明太空的广阔浩瀚，比我曾听另一个人解说阿拉斯加的面积这一类似问题时要真实多了。他说阿拉斯加的面积是590804平方英里，然后就丢下不管了，不再去解释它究竟大到什么程度。

这能给你美国第49个州的规模任何图像概念吗？显然不会。我是后来通过其他资料才知道这个地区有多大的。它比佛蒙特、新罕布什尔、缅因、马萨诸塞、罗德岛、康乃狄克、纽约、新泽西、宾夕法尼亚、德拉维尔、马里兰、西弗吉尼亚、北卡罗莱纳、南卡罗莱纳、佐治亚、佛罗里达、田纳西及密西西比等州加起来还要稍微大一点。现在这590804平方英里才有了新的意义，对不对？你会发现，在阿拉斯加还有许多土地可开发的。

几年前，我们训练班的一位学员曾惊心动魄地描述了高速公路上因车祸而死亡的人数多得可怕：“你现在驾车横穿全国，从纽约前往洛杉矶。假设路边上立着的不是路标，而是一些棺材的话，每一具棺材里面就装有一个在去年公路大屠杀中的受害者。那么当你驱车疾驶时，每隔5秒钟就会经过这样一个阴森恐怖的标志，自这头至那头，每1英里立12个！”

因此，以后我每次开车都不敢离家太远，因为这一景象总会清晰地浮现在我的脑海里。

为什么会产生这样的效果呢？因为耳朵听来的印象不容易持久，它们就像雹子打在榉树光滑的树皮上，会随即掉落。但是用眼睛看到的印象呢？很多年前，我曾亲眼看到了一颗嵌入一幢位于多瑙河岸边老屋的炮弹，这颗炮弹是拿破仑的炮兵部队在乌尔姆战役中所发射的。视觉印象就像那颗炮弹，它们以排山倒海之势扑面而来，深深地嵌入了我的大脑，牢牢地附着在上面，驱走了一切反面的提示，就像拿破仑赶走奥地利人一样。

2.避免使用专业术语

如果你是从事某项技术性的专业工作——例如律师、医生、工程师，或是高度专业化的行业——那么当你向外行人演讲时，必须加倍小心地使用浅显易懂的语言来解释，同时还注意加上必要的细节。

之所以要加倍小心，是因为我的专业责任的关系。我已经听过几百场演讲，它们正是因此而失败，而且败得那么惨痛。这些演讲者显然完全不知道，一般听众对他们的特殊行业普遍缺乏了解。这样的结果会如何呢？虽然他们滔滔不绝地高谈阔论，用他们工作中常用的那些只对他们有意义的词句，但对于外行来说，却是云山雾罩，不知所云。

这时演讲者应该怎样做呢？他应该去读一读并留意印第安纳州前参议员贝佛里奇下面的建议：

一个好办法，就是从听众中选一个看上去最不聪明的人，然后努力让那个人对你的演讲感兴趣。你只能用清晰易懂的话语来叙述，并清楚地说明你的观点，才能做到这一点。另一个更好的办法，就是把你的演讲目标放在那些由父母陪着的小男孩或小女孩身上。

你要在心里对自己说——当然，你也可以大声对你的听众说出来，如果你喜欢的话——你会尽量讲得简单明白一些，让小孩子也能够了解并记住你的解释，而且会后还能够把你所讲的告诉别人。

我训练班上的一个医生在一场演讲中这样说道：“用膈膜呼吸对肠子的蠕动将产生显著的帮助，这是对健康的一种恩赐。”他本想用这句话概括这部分内容，然后再讲述别的东西。但指导老师打断了他，并请那些听懂了膈膜式呼吸与其他呼吸方式有何不同、为什么它会对健康特别有益，以及蠕动作用是什么这三个问题有明确概念的听众举手。结果让这位医生大吃一惊。于是他回头重新讲解：

膈膜是一层薄薄的肌肉，它位于肺的底部和腹腔的顶部，形成了胸腔的底层。当胸腔呼吸时，它会收缩，像只上下倒置的洗涮盆。

在做腹腔式呼吸时，每一次呼吸都会迫使膈膜往下推，使它几乎成平面状，此时便会感觉胃肠受到了腰带的挤压。膈膜这种向下的压力会按摩并刺激腹腔的上部器官——胃、肝、胰、脾等。

当把气呼出时，胃和肠又往上挤迫膈膜，相当于再做一次按摩，这种按摩有助于排泄过程。

绝大多数疾病都来自肠胃不适。假如我们的肠胃因为膈膜的深呼吸而有适当的运动，那么大部分的消化不良、便秘以及体内积毒现象都会消失。

不论你如何解说，总是由简入繁最佳不过。比如，你想对一群家庭主妇解释为什么冰箱必须除霜，如果这样开始你可就糟了：

冷冻的原理，是蒸发器从冰箱内部吸收热气。当热量被吸出来的时候，伴随它的湿气就会附着在蒸发器上，形成厚厚的一层，造成蒸发器绝热，并使马达频频开动工作，以补偿逐渐增厚的霜层形成的绝热。

请注意，如果演讲者从家庭主妇们所熟悉的事物开始，就更容易让她们明白了：

各位都知道肉类应该放在冰箱的哪一层。那么，各位也一定知道霜是如何聚结在冰冻器上的。这些霜一天天越结越厚，最后冰冻器就得除霜，以保持冰箱运转良好。冰冻器四周的霜，就像你躺在床上时盖的毯子，或者像墙里用于隔热的石棉。这些霜结得越厚，冰冻器越难从冰箱中吸出热气，以保持冰箱的冷度。于是冰箱的马达就必须频繁开动，这样才能保持冰箱内的冷度。如果在冰箱里装一个自动除霜器，霜就不会结厚，马达运转的次数和时间也可以减少了。

关于这个方法，亚里士多德曾有一句名言：“思维如智者，说话如常人。”如果你必须使用专业术语，那只有在给听众解释过后使用，这样才能让他们都听懂。所以，你需要一再使用的关键词更应该这样。

我曾听过一位证券经纪商对一群妇女演讲。这些妇女想了解一些银行与投资的基本原则。他使用了简单的语言和轻松的谈话方式让她们放松下来。本来他每件事情都说得清清楚楚的，但对于一些基本词却没说清楚，而这些词对她们而言却很陌生。比如他提到了“票据交换所”、“课税与偿付”、“退款抵押”以及“短期买卖和长期买卖”。结果，本来是一场精彩动人的讨论却变成了一团雾水，因为他不明白听众对他的专业术语不熟悉。

不过，有时候即使你知道某个关键词听众不会了解，也没必要避免它，只需在使用时尽快解释就可以。不要害怕这样做，你完全可以去查词典。

你对歌唱广告有意见要发表吗？或者对冲动式购物、文学艺术课程或者成本会计、政府津贴或逆向行驶汽车有什么意见？你愿倡导一种对待孩子的宽容态度，或评估价值的体系吗？不论上述什么题材，你都一定要让听众对这些专业术语或关键词的了解与你一样。

五、使用视觉辅助工具

通过眼睛通往脑部的神经，比从耳朵通往脑部的神经要多好几倍；而且科学实验发现，人们对眼睛暗示的注意力是对耳朵暗示的25倍。

日本有一句俗语：“百闻不如一见。”

因此，如果你想清楚表达自己，应该用图像来描绘你的要点，把你的观点视觉化。这正是美国现金注册公司创始人帕特森采用的方法。他为《系统杂志》写了一篇论文，简要说明了他向工人和销售人员演讲时使用的方法：

我认为，一个人不能仅仅通过言语就希望别人了解他的想法，或是抓住别人的注意力。我们需要一些具有戏剧性的辅助工具，最好的方法是使用图片，用图片来表现对和错的两面。图表比仅用语言文字更具有说服力，而图片又比图表更具有说服力。表现某一主题最理想的方法，就是给每一部分配上图片，而语言文字只是与图片配合的手段。我很早就发现，和人们交谈时，一张图片往往要胜过我的任何话。

如果你使用一张图表，一定要让它足够大，让人们可以看清楚。不过，还要注意千万别做过了头。一长串的图表有时也会令人感觉无聊。如果是边讲边画，那就一定要在黑板上简单而快速地画，听众可对伟大的艺术作品并不都感兴趣。使用缩略语时，要写得大而容易辨认；在画图或写字的时候，不要停止你的讲话，要随时转身面对听众。

利用展示物时，要注意以下建议，这可以保证你能抓住听众的注意力。

1.展示物应先藏好，直到使用时再拿出来。

2.使用的展示物应该足够大，使最后一排的人都能看清楚。听众如果看不见展示物，展示物就不能起到应有的作用。

3.演讲的时候，不要将展示物在听众中间传阅。你大概不想给自己找个对手进行竞争吧？

4.展示物品时，把它举到听众看得见的高度。

5.记住，一件能打动听众的展示物要胜过10件不能打动人的东西。所以如果可以，不妨先示范一下。

6.演讲时不要紧盯着展示物——你应该与听众沟通，而不是和展示物沟通。

7.展示完后，尽快收起展示物，不再让听众看见。

8.如果展示物非常适合做“隐蔽处理”，就把它放在桌子边上，演讲时把它盖住。演讲时，不妨多提它几次，这会引发听众的好奇心——不过不要告诉听众它是什么。当你展示它的时候，你早就引发了听众的好奇心、猜想和真正的兴趣。

视觉材料在增强演讲效果方面，已越来越显得重要。除非你早就胸有成竹，否则与其用言词表达你的意思，还不如展示给听众看，除此之外没有更好的方法能保证听众会听明白。

有两位美国总统——林肯和威尔逊——同为语言大师。他们指出，清晰的表达能力是训练与自我控制的结果。林肯说：“我们必须狂热地追求明晰。”他对诺克斯学院院长嘉利佛博士说了他在早年是如何培养这种“狂热”的：

我记得，当我还是个孩子的时候，遇到有人用我听不懂的方式跟我说话时，我就会非常不舒服。在我一生当中，还没有对别的事情生过气。可是，听不懂别人的讲话总会让我发脾气，现在仍然是这样。记得有一次，我在听邻居和我父亲欢谈了一个晚上之后，我走回自己的小卧室，大半夜里都在不停地走来走去，企图思考一些语言的确切意义。在我刚开始这样做的时候，常常是到了该睡觉的时间，可就是睡不着，直到我能把它用浅显易懂的语言说出来，自认为可以让我所认识的每个男孩都能了解才肯罢休。这是我的一种狂热，它一直紧紧地跟着我。

另一位杰出的总统伍德罗·威尔逊，有一些忠告正好为本章画上一个注脚：

我父亲是一位具有大智慧的人，我所受过的最好的训练都来自于他。他不能容忍含混隐晦。从我开始提笔写字到他903年81岁高龄时去世，我总是随身携带自己写给他的所有东西。

他会让我大声读出来。这对我来说真是一件苦差事。他会时不时打断我：“你这是什么意思？”我就会告诉他为什么这样说。为此我就得用比写在纸上更简洁明了的方式来表达。“那你为何不这样说？”他会继续训下去，“别用鸟枪来瞄射自己的意思，那样只会击得一片凌乱；要用来福枪瞄射自己想说的话，让人一听就明白。”