Joan Detz Speaker Services

Suzanne Loebl, who has attended my speechwriting workshops over a 20 year span, has received an extraordinary honor from the American Society of Journalists and Authors.  At their 2012 conference in NYC, ASJA presented Suzanne with ASJA’s Career Achievement Award.

Suzanne has written fourteen books.  Her latest title, America’s Medicis: the Rockefellers and Their Astonishing Cultural Legacy (HarperCollins), has earned glowing reviews. Suzanne lectures on this topic throughout the country.

Suzanne spent five years writing the first edition (an enormous undertaking, more than 1,000 pages) of The Nurse’s Drug Handbook.  Designed to teach nurses about drugs, her reference book was a huge success. Seven editions and 350,000 copies later, it’s still selling.   How many writers can claim a success like this?

In the world of freelance writing, Suzanne Loebl’s name commands respect.  Congratulations, Suzanne, for receiving this wonderful honor!

Have you ever added up all the time your organization spends on speechwriting?

Keep a time log for a month, and ask:  “Are we getting a good return on our investment?”

As I’ve seen from 20+ years of teaching speechwriting seminars, good speechwriters can write more than “just speeches”.  My special congratulations go to Laurel Kallen, whose book of poetry (The Forms of Discomfort) will be published in August.

Laurel’s poetry has earned this extraordinary praise:

“Kallen is a contemplative poet whose range is exhilaratingly wide and whose eyes are open to the transience of empirical and spiritual experience, which she captures vividly with both philosophical calm and graceful rapture.  Her poems are simultaneously delicate and robust as she delves deeply and freshly into universal questions about the worlds around her and her place in them.”  — Yerra Sugarman, winner of the 2005 PEN/Joyce Osterweil Poetry Award for Forms of Gone.

To order Laurel Kallen’s book on:  http://www.finishinglinepress.com/product_info.php?cPath=4&products_id=927

Sheila Allee, who attended one of my speechwriting seminars this year, is now the interim executive director of the Writers’ League of Texas, a nonprofit that seeks to elevate the art and enterprise of writing.

Sheila’s main responsibilities are fundraising and gearing up for the organization’s big event of the year — the annual Agents and Editors Conference June 22-24 in Austin.

This week, several entry-level speechwriters asked me to review their resumes.  In each case I asked, “Do you have any foreign language skills?”  In each case, they had some basic skills … in Spanish, German, French, etc.

I urged them to cite those skills on their resumes.  Even “reading-only” foreign language skills have value.  And if you’re fluent in several languages?  Make sure to note that on your resume.  It’s an advantage.

Many thanks to Virginia State Senator Adam Ebbin for sharing this link:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/funniest-commencement-speeches/2012/05/03/gIQAzeYA0T_blog.html?tid=pm_local_pop

An Almanac of Words at Play, by Willard R. Espy (author of The Game of Words).

If you enjoy reading about words (and since you’re visiting a speechwriting blog, I’ll assume you do), you’ll find much to appreciate in this wonderful book.

You might be asked to take a speechwriting test at the client’s office.  Here’s a tip:  If they give you a manuscript speech to line-edit, go the extra step and provide a great title for that speech.

This will distinguish you from other candidates, who might settle for whatever bland/boring title appears at the top of the test page.  Rewrite any title that sounds like “Remarks on the Challenges and Opportunities of Energy Conservation.”

The “Advanced Speechwriting” seminar shows how to write lively titles that attract audiences and generate media buzz.  Next class:  Mon-Tues, June 4-5, Philadelphia.  www.joandetz.com

After I spoke at the ASJA (American Society of Journalists and Authors) conference in NYC on 4/28, I received this question:

“I’m still in J-school but I’m looking at corporate communications opportunities.  What’s the best way for me to break in?”

My advice?  If you want to get corp comm work, go where you’ll find corp comm people.  Make lists of professional organizations that serve corporate communicators:  local, regional, national, international.

I’d put IABC (International Association of Business Communicators) at the top of any list.  Visit www.iabc.com to learn more.

And, don’t forget:  Low student membership rates give you great benefits at very moderate fees.

(I’ll be addressing more questions about corporate freelancing in the weeks ahead.)

My congratulations to Robert Yeager, a highly talented writer who has attended several of my speechwriting workshops.  His new novel, The Romanov Stone, is now up on Amazon.