A club that shall remain anonymous!

Regular readers may have noticed that it is rare for me not to name an organisation that I have recently spoken to. When it does happen, it is usually because there was some problem at the meeting and I do not wish to embarrass that club or society.

A few months ago, I delivered my talk Life as a Freelance Comedy Writer following a dinner at a particular club in the South East. I spoke to a male audience numbering around 20 for the requested length of time.

Then came the 'vote of thanks'.

Two years ago, in a popular post, I blogged about what a vote of thanks should and most definitely should not consist of. I mentioned examples of both. You can read that post here.

I am afraid the vote of thanks on this occasion fell into the latter category. The member delivering it began by telling a long, old, shaggy dog story joke against speakers (badly). I knew it was old because I had first heard it on an 'Evening with...' cassette featuring a much-loved, retired British sportsman in the mid-90s (and I very much doubt if it was new even then). But he had told it about speakers in general and didn't direct it at one person whereas this club member rewrote it to be specifically about me. Then there was an inane comment about me not looking like a comedy writer. (So what do they look like then? The number that I have met over the past 20 years must run into three figures but I still couldn't tell you!) The negativity continued and I had to endure it.

Now I am used to occasionally receiving tongue-in-cheek comments after I have spoken. For example, sometimes I get a bit of ribbing because I am not always the world's quickest at returning calls to finalise arrangements for talks. Fair enough. And then there are the votes of thanks which are unfortunately-worded and contain inadvertent double meanings or backhanded compliments. I love those as much as the audience does and they often go into future talks as self-deprecating anecdotes. But this was different; the whole thing just seemed aggressive with very little in the way of the thanks which are surely the main reason for this type of short speech! (Even the fearsome speakers at Friars Club Roasts often have some appreciative comments after all the clever comic insults but this chap was no Don Rickles or Jeffrey Ross).

Now, even if I had bombed, it would still have been bad-mannered but one gentleman at my table said afterwards that my talk was the best they had had in a long time. A decent percentage of the audience bought copies of Nick R's in a Twist! and their Treasurer enclosed a note with the cheque saying that my presentation had been 'excellent'.

So what had I done to deserve this? True, I had been a few minutes late due to some appalling rail disruption but the lost time was soon made up. As I have mentioned, my talk lasted for the length of time they had requested. I had finished on a humorous story about an occasion when I spoke to members of a particular profession which a couple of the club members also belonged to but this had been discussed with the committee member who had given me a lift in and we had agreed that I should tell it; besides, in my stories, a great deal of the humour is directed at myself.

The person who had booked me wasn't present that evening so perhaps the speaker delivering the vote of thanks had not been made aware that I had helped this club out by standing in at short notice. And maybe he had also not been told that I had helped them out still further by allowing some haggling over an already modest fee because they are such a small organisation.

Then again, perhaps it made no difference and he just felt that he had to follow a comedy writer's speech by trying to be an entertainer himself. But non self-effacing humour is often best delivered with a twinkle in the eye.

I would love to have been able to tell you the name of the venue where the three-course dinner was easily one of the best that I have ever had at any speaking engagement since I started in 1996. And it is a pity that I cannot name the committee member who, because of the rail problems, gave me a lift from the nearest major station to the venue and back again afterwards - a round trip of nearly 30 miles. I was truly grateful to him. But this is a blog about public speaking and that graceless vote of thanks made the biggest impression on me that evening and I felt it needed to be written about here so, out of respect for the other members of the club, I will not say who they are or where they meet.

The rail journey home was depressing. The excellent meal, the amusing conversation, the good work the club does, the compliments on my talk, even the selflessness of the member who drove me all that way all seemed to be overshadowed by the rather humiliating experience of standing there while one member directed a lot of negative, attacking 'humour' at me, all under the guise of a vote of thanks and presumably for the 'entertainment' of an audience who apparently had enjoyed my own speech!

I am in no hurry to go back there.

Public Speaking Tip #355: Votes of thanks may only be very short speeches but they can make a lasting impression. At a function, the vote of thanks may be one of the last speeches the audience - and guest speaker - gets to hear before leaving.  Any humour you include should be good-natured and tempered with some sincere thanks at the end.