Happy New Year 2017 (and a new book!)

I want to wish all readers Happy New Year. I hope that 2017 is a happy, healthy and successful one for you and for those whom you hold dear.

If you are a regular visitor to this blog, you might have noticed that my stream of posts has recently dried to a trickle. In fact, my lack of writing is due to … the huge amount of writing that I have been doing over the last couple of months.

My friend and business partner, Florian Mueck and I have been working steadily—including many 12-hour days—on a book on public speaking for the German publishing house, Redline Verlag. We worked hard to meet an early January deadline from the publisher and we have met that deadline. There will be more work to do with the editor over the next two months, but the heavy lifting is now done.

TED Effekt


The book, entitled The TED Effect (in German, Der TED Effekt), will be published in March 2017. It will come out initially in German and we are hopeful that it will eventually be released in English. It has been a labour of love and one which has involved many long sessions working remotely on Google Drive.

Florian and I are excited to share Der TED Effekt with you. If you speak German, you can learn more about it here. And, you can order the book, in paper or electronically, on Amazon. For some great books on public speaking by other authors, have a look here.

In the meantime, I look forward to posting more regularly here on Manner of Speaking.

Update April 2020: While the book has not yet been published in English, it is now available in Russian. I will let you know as soon as our publisher has decided to release the book in English.

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  1. The book sounds fascinating, and I wish you both great success with it. From the cover description, I see you’ll discuss presenting on video, which is such a huge growth area.

    Recently I watched a series of great Facebook videos by Emma Sutton on storytelling. She didn’t use any visuals, but she’s such an emotional speaker, and the content was so good, that I found them spellbinding.

    A few of my recent posts have also dealt in various ways with video and webcam use. For instance, here’s a tip for speeding up playback when you’re watching videos on Facebook, Vimeo, or many other sites. (Other relevant recent posts were Critique of Toastmasters video: “Managing Fear”, which among other things talks about eye contact on video, and 6 tips for great videos of your presentations or demos.)

    Lastly, I’d be interested to know how challenging it was for you to write a book in German (say, on a 10-point scale) – assuming that’s what you did. And, given that you and Florian are both multi-lingual, will you do the English translation yourselves?

    1. Thanks for the comment, Craig. In fact, we wrote the book in English. My German is good for dinner conversation but not for writing a book. Florian is a native speaker, so he has translated it. The publishing deal is with a German company so it has to come out in German first. But, they are keen to get it out in English too. It will likely come out in English as an ebook first, but I know that meeting are planned with English publishers to get the hard copy out in English too. Thanks for the tips on playback.

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Testimonials

John delivered a keynote address about the importance of public speaking to 80 senior members of Gore’s Medical Device Europe team at an important sales event. He was informative, engaging and inspirational. Everyone was motivated to improve their public speaking skills. Following his keynote, John has led public speaking workshops for Gore in Barcelona and Munich. He is an outstanding speaker who thinks carefully about the needs of his audience well before he steps on stage.

Karsta Goetze

TA Leader, Gore and Associates

I first got in touch with John while preparing to speak at TED Global about my work on ProtonMail. John helped me to sharpen the presentation and get on point faster, making the talk more focused and impactful. My speech was very well received, has since reached almost 1.8 million people and was successful in explaining a complex subject (email encryption) to a general audience.

Andy Yen

CEO, Proton Technologies

John gave the opening keynote on the second day of our unit’s recent offsite in Geneva, addressing an audience of 100+ attendees with a wealth of tips and techniques to deliver powerful, memorable presentations. I applied some of these techniques the very next week in an internal presentation, and I’ve been asked to give that presentation again to senior management, which has NEVER happened before. John is one of the greatest speakers I know and I can recommend his services without reservation.

David Lindelöf

Senior Data Scientist, Expedia Group

After a morning of team building activities using improvisation as the conduit, John came on stage to close the staff event which was organised in Chamonix, France. His energy and presence were immediately felt by all the members of staff. The work put into the preparation of his speech was evident and by sharing some his own stories, he was able to conduct a closing inspirational speech which was relevant, powerful and impactful for all at IRU. The whole team left feeling engaged and motivated to tackle the 2019 objectives ahead. Thank you, John.

Umberto de Pretto

Secretary General, World Road Transport Organization

I was expecting a few speaking tips and tricks and a few fun exercises, but you went above and beyond – and sideways. You taught me to stand tall. You taught me to anchor myself. You taught me to breathe. You taught me to open up. You taught me to look people in the eye. You taught me to tell the truth. You taught me to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes. I got more than I bargained for in the best possible way.

Thuy Khoc-Bilon

World Cancer Day Campaign Manager, Union for International Cancer Control

John gave a brilliant presentation on public speaking during the UN EMERGE programme in Geneva (a two days workshop on leadership development for a group of female staff members working in the UN organizations in Geneva). His talk was inspirational and practical, thanks to the many techniques and tips he shared with the audience. His teaching can dramatically change our public speaking performance and enable us as presenters to have a real and powerful impact. Thank you, John, for your great contribution!

Sara Canna

HR Specialist, World Health Organization

John is a genuine communication innovator. His seminars on gamification of public speaking learning and his interactive Rhetoric game at our conference set the tone for change and improvement in our organisation. The quality of his input, the impact he made with his audience and his effortlessly engaging style made it easy to get on board with his core messages and won over some delegates who were extremely skeptical as to the efficacy of games for learning. I simply cannot recommend him highly enough.

Thomas Scott

National Education Director, Association of Speakers Clubs UK

John joined our Global Sales Meeting in Segovia, Spain and we all participated in his "Improv(e) your Work!" session. I say “all” because it really was all interactive, participatory, learning and enjoyable. The session surprised everybody and was a fresh-air activity that brought a lot of self-reflection and insights to improve trust and confidence in each other inside our team. It´s all about communication and a good manner of speaking!"

Jon Lopez

General Manager Europe, Hayward Industries

Thank you very much for the excellent presentation skills session. The feedback I received was very positive. Everyone enjoyed the good mix of listening to your speech, co-developing a concrete take-away and the personal learning experience. We all feel more devoted to the task ahead, more able to succeed and an elevated team spirit. Delivering this in a short time, both in session and in preparation, is outstanding!

Henning Dehler

CFO European Dairy Supply Chain & Operations, Danone

Thanks to John’s excellent workshop, I have learned many important tips and techniques to become an effective public speaker. John is a fantastic speaker and teacher, with extensive knowledge of the field. His workshop was a great experience and has proven extremely useful for me in my professional and personal life.

Eric Thuillard

Senior Sales Manager, Sunrise Communications

John’s presentation skills training was a terrific investment of my time. I increased my skills in this important area and feel more comfortable when speaking to an audience. John provided the right mix between theory and practice.

Diego Brait

Director of the Jura Region, BKW Energie AG

Be BOLD. Those two words got stuck in my head and in the heads of all those ADP leaders and associates that had the privilege to see John on stage. He was our keynote speaker at our annual convention in Barcelona, and his message still remains! John puts his heart in every word. Few speakers are so credible, humble and yet super strong with large audiences!

Guadalupe Garcia

Senior Director and Talent Partner, ADP International