Politicians and Public Speaking: Why They’re Making A Peppa Pig’s Ear Of It

Rambling. Bumbling. Unrelatable. Not reading the room. Why do so many politicians get it wrong when speaking to an audience? Speaker trainer and coach, Taz Thornton, shares her take after Boris Johnson’s Peppa Pig speech.

THIS morning, I took a call from the BBC. As both a business coach and speaker trainer, they wanted me to go live on air to provide some public speaking tips for Boris Johnson.

Of course, I was delighted to do so.

The thing is, having listened to the much-reported CBI speech in full, I reckon Peppa Pig World was one of the best parts.

Why? Because, when he started speaking about something that actually meant something to him, his delivery changed.

Boris went from rapidly throwing out stats, with little to no emotion, to slowing his pace, leaning towards his audience, and adopting a more conversational style.

The topic might have been the cause of much hilarity, but the delivery was better.

It was a similar story when he spoke about his hedonistic glory days as a motoring correspondent for GQ magazine. We saw a different side to Boris. A more human side.

If you haven’t yet seen the full speech, I’m sharing it here, courtesy of the Confederation Of Business Industry. If you’re interested, I’d encourage you to watch the entire 24-minute dialogue, for context, rather than the beautiful blooper reel our friends in the media have blasted across the world wide web.

Are the topics that clearly light him up desirable in a PM? That’s not for me to decide. Perhaps it doesn’t matter. Or, at least, it might not if he was equally as engaged with the core topics of the event.

For me, what’s more concerning than car engine impressions or theme park segues is the…