13. What’s Behind A Popular Talk, and Why You (Probably) Shouldn't Do One with César Gómez-Mora

Are TED (and TEDx) talks exactly as you see them online? Who should give a talk - and who shouldn't? What would public speaking look like if you could make PowerPoint fun?

Welcome to The StoryPowers Podcast, the show about the power of stories, the people who tell them and why you should be doing it too. I’m your host Francisco Mahfuz.

My guest today is César Gómez-Mora, one of the Godfathers of public speaking in Spain.

César organises both TEDx and Ignite events in Valencia, where he also coaches most of the participating speakers. César runs his own coaching company, saving the world from boring presentations one speech at a time. He was also a National Champion of Public Speaking. Luckily for me, he mostly competed in Spanish, or I’d probably have a few less wins to brag about.

You can find César at fourthwall.es.

If you like the show, please leave us a review, share it and SUBSCRIBE! The support is very much appreciated. And please send me your comments on what you'd like to hear on future episodes.

I'm a keynote speaker on storytelling, author and public speaking coach. You can connect with me on LinkedIn, where I post daily (or as close to that as my children will let me), and on storypowers.com. You can also check out my book "Bare: A Guide to Brutally Honest Public Speaking" on Amazon.

Show Notes

A couple of clarifications:

TED is the main event, which happens typically once or twice a year (usually in Vancouver). Most of the famous talks you think of as TED talks come from those events. TEDx are essentially franchise events organised by volunteers all around the world, which have to follow strict guidelines set up by TED. There are thousands of these a year, but only a very select few are promoted by the main TED website, ted.com. You can only give a TED talk if you're invited to so so, whereas it's a lot easier (but not easy) to do a TEDx talk.

Toastmasters International is the largest organisation of public speaking in the world, with thousands of clubs all over the place. If someone calls themselves a "Champion of Public Speaking" (as I do) what they usually means is that they won't a Toastmaster competition at either national or international level.

TEDxValencia: https://tedxvalencia.com

Ignite Valencia: https://ignitevlc.com

Brené Brown TEDx Talk: https://youtu.be/iCvmsMzlF7o

Brené Brown TED Talk: https://youtu.be/psN1DORYYV0

Derek Sivers TED Talk: https://youtu.be/V74AxCqOTvg

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The Storypowers Podcast By Francisco Mahfuz Jan 31, 2021