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Giving Ambassadors the Confidence to Speak Up! Speak Out!

SpeakersBank passionately believe that the Third Sector deserves greater recognition for the work that is achieved.

Throughout 2009 we supported a variety of organisations to train their ambassadors in public speaking. What better way for them to get their message across than by recognising the role ambassadors’ play and encouraging them to Speak Up! and Speak Out! for what the organisation does and stands for?

Across the UK, SpeakersBank has trained The Princes’ Trust Ambassador Programme, Diana Awards, YMCA, British Youth Council, Envision and Enterprise Insight with a series of workshops taking place in Liverpool, Wakefield, Birmingham and London.

The training has focused on the power of the ambassadors’ personal stories and their involvement with the organisation, and using these stories to capture the audience’s imagination.

The workshops have also provided a great opportunity for networking amongst ambassadors and resulted in a series of blogs. Following an Enterprise Insight training session in Wakefield in September, one participant blogged:

‘Here in Yorkshire we never seem to have too much trouble talking – in fact it’s shutting us up that is more the problem. However at a special ambassadors’ event yesterday we learnt that it’s less about what you say and more about how you say it.

The problem is that it’s not that easy to talk about yourself – so we set out to help to give hints, tips and top advice on how to get over fears, project your voice and capture the imagination of your audience, whoever they are!

The event was a great success and as a result we had a room full of confident speakers - with a lot to say about themselves!

We would like to thank SpeakersBank for delivering a great session, which had lots of laughs, gaffs and a great response from all who attended.’

In some instances there were opportunities to put the training into practice straight away with new found confidence in public speaking making a great impact:

‘I’m just writing to say a big thank you for the training yesterday. It was an excellent day and I was astounded at the progress made by our volunteers. Their confidence grew immeasurably and their presenting styles have greatly improved. The group attended a speech by the Speaker of the House of Commons last night and one of the volunteers asked a question very clearly and confidently – no doubt, in part, thanks to the day’s training.’ British Youth Council Volunteers Officer

SpeakersBank have been delighted to support the organisations and their ambassadors to give them the confidence to deliver their message. If you would like to find out more about this training please do get in contact with the SpeakersBank office for further information.

For further details click here

Added 06/01/2010 by Sophia Koniarska (Administrator)