Ryan Trinter

Leadership Log
A Leader and His Skill with Words
There is a leader in all of us, but all of those leaders have their
strengths and weaknesses. Some leaders lead by a quiet example. They are
respected for their silent influence rather than their ability to capture a crowd
with speech. Others lead with their mastery of rhetoric. However, the
abilities of these kinds of leaders are greatly displayed through debate, both
in its preparation and execution.
The skill of a leader in persuasive speaking is often dependent on
personality. A quiet yet intelligent person is a valuable spearhead to the
debate planning process. While this process is slightly easier than debate
execution, excellent planning and research leads easily to a successful
argument. In my own experience, terrible planning lead to disaster in the
debate over Creon and Oedipus. My first speech was extremely unorganized
and poorly planned which lead to an ineffective argument on my part.
However, my speaking in the debate over animal experimentation was
seamless. Ideal preparation was made, and I created a sound argument with
which to speak.
However, debate execution was immensely harder to perform than its
preparation. While preparing can take hours, performing speech in a debate
only has three minutes to make a difference. It isnt something that can be
erased and done again, but rather it is something that takes precision and
accuracy that can only be perceived through preparation. This preparation is
what gives many people the qualities of a leader that leads through their

Ryan Trinter
Leadership Log
mastery of public speaking. I found that the easiest way for someone to
effectively speak in front of a crowd is to remain confident, and the easiest
way to remain confident was to know your material well. It is well
established that preparation, from beginning your research to practicing the
final seconds of your speaking, was instrumental in delivering an effective
argument.
These debate skills are abilities that can transfer into daily life. A
persons aptitude to craft arguments out of simple facts can prove invaluable
as people often have to defend their choices in all workplaces, such as an
attorney in a courtroom or coach defending a play call. While some
situations may not have intensive preparation beforehand, the constant
practice of organizing an argument will help you to create a valid defense.
Whether someone simply leads by example or leads by their eloquence with
words, the ability to reason a point is imperative to the position of a leader.