Episode 54 Catchy Ways To Keep Your Speech Interesting With Common English Collocations And Phrases

This week we're doing something a little different. We're going to analyse a speech. We're looking at what the speaker does to make the speech more interesting and engaging and to help the listener really understand and take on board his ideas.  The speech we're listening to is Simon Sinek's Why Good Leaders Make You Feel Safe.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmyZMtPVodo&t=523s You can find it on YouTube at the above link with English subtitles or head over to TED.com to find a version with a wide variety of subtitles. I would suggest you listen to this speech before you check out the podcast. The speech is just 12 minutes long.  Today we will be looking at some of the common phrases and collocations that Simon Sinek uses in the speech to make the listener feel more comfortable, less cynical and more likely to emotionally engage with the speech. Simon Sinek is a fantastic speaker, he also has some really good ideas, which you can find out more about in his books. This week we will look at various elements of this speech to understand what he's doing to help you hear his message and remember it. He uses a lot of different vocabulary words in the talk. One of the common methods he uses to help people remember it to use common constructions, these are words, phrases and collocations that we hear a lot. By using common constructions he makes us feel more relaxed, we feel confident that we know what he's talking about, that we're going to understand, and so his message passes more easily into our brains. Let's look at some of these constructions. Many of these are common in the business world, others are common in wider conversations and communication. 'by sheer coincidence' - we often put 'sheer' and 'coincidence' together, 'sheer' means 'absolute' and this phrase means that something was not planned at all. 'concept of service' - 'concept of' is often used to talk about ideas. The wider military and charitable world understands the 'concept of service' as people who are willing to put others before themselves and give back to their communities. 'ups and downs in the economy' - we often use 'ups and downs' to describe how we feel or how something moves 'renders your business model obsolete overnight' - this construction is 'renders something obsolete overnight' we use it to demonstrate extreme situations where something stops working or becomes useless very quickly. 'sets the tone' - this is a very common phrase that we use to describe how someone starts as they mean to go on. From the beginning they are clear about their intentions and what they want and we all understand. 'tangible results' - very common in the business world, 'tangible' means clear or obvious to see. Of course 'tangible results' are something every business leader wants to see. 'seize the opportunities' - 'seize the' is something we use a lot when we talk about wanting or taking something 'seize the day' is another common similar phrase. 'build their self-confidence' - this is a common collocation 'build' and 'self-confidence', and is used in a wide varieties of situations. It means to increase or grow self-confidence and it can be used when referring to yourself or others. 'achieve more than we could ever imagine' - this is a common phrase when we listen to inspirational stories or speakers. By using it here he is tapping into that feeling of increased possibility and hope that this phrase is often used to describe. 'hard times' - used to describe difficult times or situations, this is a collocation we can all understand. 'lay-off' - again, a very common word that describes when people are fired from their jobs due to economic problems or financial problems within the company, rather than because the employee did anything wrong. (More Vocabulary in the YouTube description) #emmaseslenglish #englishpodcast #english #englishtips #publicspeakingskill #publicspeakingtips #publicspeaking #speech