Milford-on-Sea Probus

On Tuesday, I made a return visit to Milford-on-Sea Probus, this time to deliver my talk about Patrick Campbell. I was greeted at the South Lawns Hotel by the club's very friendly Programme Secretary Stan Kirtley and, after coffee and their short business meeting, I spoke to 35 appreciative members and guests for 50 minutes and then took questions. Then Mr Richard Mallory, who had been making notes throughout my presentation, proposed the vote of thanks.

And it was a good one.

It turned out that Mr Mallory is himself a fan of Patrick Campbell's writing and he had even brought along a copy of a Campbell book, one of several which he has collected over the years.

He mentioned what my talk had meant to him personally.

He added material from the notes he had made to the content he had prepared beforehand.

He provided some extra information about Campbell without in any way trying to 'top' what I had said.

What he said was warm and sincere and long enough to have some substance but without being in any danger of overrunning!

And I really appreciated the effort he had made because not everyone gets it right. Some people say very little (it can be very difficult to follow a humorous speaker anyway) and I don't so much mind that. But there was one 'vote of thanks' that I will always remember...

A few years ago, a Rotary Club in Hampshire invited me to be the guest after dinner speaker at their 20th Anniversary Charter Evening. It was a big 'do': black tie, Toastmaster, Rotary District Governor and an Archdeacon among the 75 attending - and six Rotary speakers on before me including a (rather long) slide show about the club's history.

It was after 10pm by the time it was my turn to speak and I agreed to cut my material short as the event was overrunning. Even so, late into a hot summer's evening, after a large dinner and so many other speakers, the audience response was somewhere between lukewarm and just about OK. There was one last speaker to go, a Committee member proposing a vote of thanks to me.

From the moment he started, he appeared determined to make full use of any time I had cut from own speech. He launched into a series of shaggy dog stories, totally different from the type of connected humorous anecdotes and observations which I deliver. He also read out a number of funny press clippings but whereas the ones I include are examples of amusing misprints and other unintentional humour, he just regaled the audience with newspaper articles about bizarre events which had been reported as such (there's no unintentional humour when the item is preceded by a punning headline with an exclamation mark!)

He seemed to speak for almost as long as I had and yes, he got laughs. But what I most remember about that event is the succession of his fellow Rotarians who came up to me afterwards and profusely apologised for what they saw as the bad manners of one of their own who had tried to upstage the guest speaker.

Public Speaking Tip #120: A vote of thanks should be warm and sincere without being sycophantic.

You should mention what the speaker's material has meant to you.

Make notes while they are speaking so you can combine observations about what they have said with any pre-prepared content. Failing to do this will result in a vote of thanks which appears to lack spontaneity.

By all means add a little extra of your own about the speaker's subject but remember: you are there to propose a vote of thanks to them - not to upstage them!

After my talk to Milford Probus, I enjoyed a very nice lunch at the hotel and was then given a lift back to Christchurch by Robin Haggett, a prospective new member of the club who had been visiting as a guest (they are looking for a few more to join). On the journey, he told me some fascinating tales connected with speaking in public and performance, firstly about his appearances on the TV quizzes Countdown, Eggheads and Family Fortunes (where his family won £3,000!) and secondly about his comedy award-winning son who is a clown with a small but very successful circus!