To my fellow Asian-Americans: Here's Our Free Workshop to Help You Sharpen Your Public Speaking Voice

If you identify as AAPI (Asian-American Pacific Islander), I would like to invite you to sign-up for a free workshop designed to help you become a public speaker and communicator.

• This will be a two-hour tactical workshop where we take you through how to craft memorable experiences by building engaging content, meaningful design, and powerful delivery. 
• We will dive into figuring out your audience’s desires and biases to craft a compelling story and call to action. Using our mind-mapping exercise, we’ll give you the framework for crafting your argument in 15 minutes or less.
• We will work to improve your overall presentation delivery through body language, gestures, cues, and more. The saying is - “you’ll always remember the presenter more than the presentation,” and in this workshop, we make sure what you're saying is matching what you're feeling. 
• Post-session, you will receive our rubric on presentation measurement along with some e-books on how you can keep sharpening your craft.

Click here to sign up.

So why am I doing this?

For the last 10 years, I’ve been told that my gift has been public speaking. 

I tell others that it’s not a gift but a craft I constantly practice because I wanted to prove the world wrong. [story here]

This gift led me in 2011 to be a co-founder in my first company, Big Fish Presentations. We sought to rid the world of boring presentations. That company has led me to train some of the world's most fascinating speakers and brands.

With the rise of attacks on Asian-Americans that go unnoticed as hate crimes and the increasing short-term and long-term impact of AAPI communities due to COVID-19, I know the gift of public speaking can help others join the fight against AAPI injustice.

Our time to speak up is now.

Our Asian-American brothers and sisters are either:

Fighting for a job. Asian-American job rates have unemployment rates have risen heavily during COVID-19. According to the pew research center, in the fourth quarter of 2020, nearly half of unemployed Asian workers (46%) had been out of work for more than six months, compared with 21% in the fourth quarter of 2019. 

Fearing for their safety. Asian-Americans have never been more unsafe in America. Organization Stop AAPI Hate received reports of 3,292 hate incidents that occurred in 2020. This includes 68.1% percent of verbal harassment, 20.5% of shunning, 11.1% of physical assault, 8.5% of civil rights violations, and 6.8% of online harassment.

Fighting to have a seat at the table. According to Bloomberg, Asian-Americans represent 27% of professionals in the US., but only half among executives. 

For those that can't relate to those statistics, you may have stories like me:

• Professionally, I played the game to assimilate into corporate America. As far as I have gone on in my professional career, I still have folks that are surprised the racism impacts me as they’ve felt I’ve broken what’s called the bamboo ceiling. It hurts when they’re surprised I’m hurt. 
• Our organization ThreeSixtyEight has trained some of the world’s best speakers through our service line, Big Fish Presentations. As far as I have gone on in my professional career, I still get told, “You speak so well for an Asian person.” The hard facts are that having a public speaking gift isn’t perceived as possible for some if you’re Asian-American.
• I know I conditionally belong only when people know my achievements. There’s still a moment where after being with my team at a corporate event, a guest coming to congratulate us on some recent recognition thought I was the waiter. Fortunately, my team stood up for me. 

All those things above may shake us, but we cannot let them break us.

If you or a friend are still searching for improving your public speaking skills, sign-up here! 

Please feel free to tag a friend via comments, send the sign-up link privately, or message me for more info. You can also reach me via email at kenny@nguyen.ventures.

Let's keep fighting. Hope to see you at the first session.