EXCERPT FROM THE NEW BOOK LINCOLN SPEAKS TO LEADERS: 20 POWERFUL LESSONS FOR TODAY’S LEADERS FROM AMERICA’S 16TH PRESIDENT by GENE GRIESSMAN, PAT WILLIAMS, and PEGGY MATTHEWS ROSE

THE POWER OF WORDS by GENE GRIESSMAN

(Some years ago I wrote this Lincoln soliloquy for the training film “Lincoln On Communication” and subsequently incorporated it into the one-man play “The Wit and Wisdom of Abraham Lincoln.” It is included in Chapter 19 of our new book.) 

“Words have been used to encourage and praise me. Words have been used to mock, attack, and wound me. But I have never lost faith in their power or their durability.

Words can reveal thoughts, conceal pain, paint dreams, correct errors, and pass along dearly bought lessons to the latest generation.

Words can transport knowledge from the past, interpret the present, and speak to the future. Words can erect walls between people, or build bridges.

Words can inflame passions or cool them, stir up the worst or find the best, pull down or build up, tarnish or cleanse, wound or heal.

The ability to use words can endear you to your fellows, win them to your side, and help you to rise to heights you may now only dream of. That happened to my father's son.

Pursuing the mastery of words is worth the time, the money, and all the energy you can muster. What you invest will be repaid with interest compounded.

Build up your knowledge so that your words will be true. Nurture your spirit so that your words will be true, kind, and wise.

The world may little note nor long remember what you say here. And yet it may.    For words, once released, take on a life of their own, and find lodging in places and hearts you may never know. And after many days, those words may return to haunt you, or to bless you.

Think carefully before you let them go.”

(For autographed copies and quantity discounts of Lincoln Speaks To Leaders, contact us at www.presidentlincoln.com)

LIVING LINCOLN by PAT WILLIAMS
(The following selection is also from Chapter 19 of Lincoln Speaks To Leaders and describes how my co-author has utilized this important leadership principle.)

“In the early 1960s, when I first got into professional sports, I had the opportunity to meet baseball’s Bill Veeck, legendary owner of the Cleveland Indians, St. Louis Browns, and Chicago White Sox. Bill believed the best way to sell your team is to go out and talk to every group within a one hundred mile radius about that team. I bought in to his advice and started doing that in every city to which my career took me—first in baseball and later in basketball. That foundation has allowed me to build a whole second career out on the corporate speaking trail. In a nutshell, here’s what I’ve learned about public speaking—or what Lincoln might call effective oral communication:

You have to have a topic that you have mastered and that is part of your life.

Get your message organized, with points your audience can follow clearly and be able to write good notes.

Practice, practice, practice. Work on your delivery, the tone of your voice, your facial expressions. It’s show business folks—practice! Practice in front of a mirror, have video taken, record your voice and study it. Recruit brave friends who’ll listen now and then and give you confidential, unbiased feedback.

Passion and energy always carry the day. Your enthusiasm for your subject will infect your audience. If it’s not there, it will really infect it—the wrong way!

Be a storyteller—just like Lincoln! We are hard-wired to retain stories, not power points—thank goodness! As author Jack Canfield once told me, “People’s brains Velcro to stories.”

Have your opening and closing nailed. Know exactly how you’re going to launch the speech and how you’re going to land the plane at the end. By the way, the audience judges you in the first twenty seconds of your talk and either buy in or tune out. You must start with a bang.

People ask me if I still get nervous before a talk. Here’s what I tell them: I’ve discovered that if your stomach’s not churning, if you’re not on edge, you’re probably not going to give a good talk. I’ve found that if my blood is not worked up, I’m probably going to struggle.

Some nervousness, some tension, is important to really do a great job. Whenever I am getting ready to speak at a major corporate event, I feel just like an athlete in the locker room before a big game.”

(For autographed copies and quantity discounts of Lincoln Speaks To Leaders, contact us at www.presidentlincoln.com)