Using Bots for Better Talks

When I was a member of Toastmasters a few years back, I built strong public speaking skills and became a confident presenter. When I give presentations now, I also draw on artificial intelligence (AI).

Before every class I teach and talk I give—typically, to audiences of fellow editors—I use AI to help me write the speaker notes for my slide presentations. Speaker notes—the notes I see on my computer while the audience is looking at the slides and listening to me—help me explain the points I want to make.

I use AI as a tool not because I think AI is a better presenter than I am, but because it is an idea machine that sometimes comes up with explanations and analogies I like better than my own. I put my own stamp on my presentations—I supply the human touch, both in the writing and the telling. However, AI can help, and using it speeds up the writing process—no small benefit when you’re on a deadline.

How to Write Speaker Notes With AI

When I am preparing a presentation, I first develop my slide deck and decide what information to include for my talking points. After that, I draw on AI to help me pull together those points. Where I used to write these notes entirely manually, I now go to an AI computer program—generally known as a chatbot—and attach the PDF of the slide deck, and ask AI to help me write my speaker notes.

I write my speaker notes by using a prompt to elicit ideas from the chatbot. Here is the prompt that I enter (it starts with general information and then works to generate notes for each slide):

Act as a world-class public speaking coach and speechwriter. Prepare speaker notes for a presentation based on the slide deck I’m providing.

My Audience: (e.g., C-suite leaders, prospective customers, middle school students)

Presentation goal: (e.g., secure project funding, inform, motivate)

Speaker tone: (e.g., authoritative, persuasive, inspirational)

Then, ask more specific prompts.

For each slide, generate the following speaker notes in a structured format:

1. Core message: the single most critical idea the audience must remember from the slide (one sentence)
2. Supporting points: the key pieces of information that support this core message (two bullet points)
3. Transition and hook: one engaging hook to introduce this slide’s content. The hook should be one of the following:
   • A powerful, thought-provoking question
   • An analogy to explain a complex point
   • A witty statement

After entering this prompt, the chatbot gives me a full draft of slide-by-slide notes for my whole deck. In my process, I then incorporate the lines I like best into my final notes.

Here is an example of AI-generated notes for one slide. This is a screenshot of the content produced from Google Gemini’s 2.5 Pro model.

Keep in mind that while the process I’ve described works well for professional slide presentations, it may not be ideal for Toastmasters club presentations, where the emphasis is on learning. One way you can experiment is to write out all your speaker notes first and then put them into AI to see what it suggests.

Prompting Tips for AI Speaker Notes

When you experiment with using AI for public speaking, remember these tips:

1. Edit the AI. Add some humanity.

   It’s important to take a discerning red pen to the AI’s draft so you don’t sound like a robot yourself.

   AI has its own catchphrases and sentence structures that wouldn’t sound natural when they are spoken. Use your red pen to strike some notes entirely. Be selective and supplement them with your personal human insights and stories for authenticity.

2. Don’t overfeed AI.

   If you’re like me and you work with lengthy slide decks (think 50-plus slides), you’ll get better results if you have the AI process a half or a third of the slides at a time. (Ask it to analyze slides 1–25, for example.) These smaller bites help the AI stay focused. Throw a monster-sized file at it and the quality of its output may degrade partway through.

   Even with splitting up the process, it only takes about one minute total for it to work through the full deck. That’s one minute to get an hour or more of information. In my experience using this prompt for my lessons, the AI’s initial draft is good enough to get me at least 80% of the way to the finish line. When I tack on time for editing and writing supplemental notes, it takes about half an hour for the entire process.

More Prompt Examples

AI can also be useful in generating ideas when you’re writing a speech. Only you can supply the human voice and perspective, but just as with speaker notes, AI can be a tool that helps with ideas and information.

These are some targeted AI speechwriting prompts you might find helpful if you don’t have source material to give the AI or have restrictions on AI use.

• Audience Connection Maker

  Template: I am speaking to (audience description) about (topic). Suggest a brief, personal question or observation to connect this topic to the audience’s everyday experience.

  Example: I am speaking to university students about the importance of developing people skills. Suggest a brief, personal question or observation to connect this topic to the audience’s everyday experience.

• Relevant Quote Finder

  Template: Find a (quote description) quote about (theme) from a (type of person). Include a verifiable URL for the quote’s source.

  Example: Find a powerful but brief quote about perseverance in the face of failure from a sports icon. Include a verifiable URL for the quote’s source.

• Rhetorical Question Crafter

  Template: Generate three short, thought-provoking rhetorical questions about the challenge of (topic) that I can ask before revealing the solution.

  Example: Generate three short, thought-provoking rhetorical questions about the challenge of maintaining work-life balance in a remote world that I can ask before revealing the solution.

• Data Point Explainer

  Template: Take the following statistic and rephrase it in a more tangible or relatable way for my speaker notes: “(statistic).”

  Example: Take the following statistic and rephrase it in a more tangible or relatable way for my speaker notes: “The human brain has about 86 billion neurons.”

How to Keep Storytelling Human

Perhaps one day there will be robots sitting around a campfire, telling ghost-in-the-machine stories to each other. But humans will always want to hear human stories. We know how to share our experiences in ways that make people connect, feel emotions, and see their humanity reflected in the storyteller. That is something my time in Toastmasters helped me with—how to speak more authentically, to share and incorporate my experiences, to use vocal variety to better express my emotions and accent my tone.

How can you use AI to improve your storytelling without losing your humanity? Leave the machines to do what machines do best and leave humans to do what humans do best. Use AI’s speed and access to knowledge to your advantage while you focus on connecting with your audience through your stage presence and uniqueness. Machines can help us, but it’s our humanity that gives us our power.

AI Use Disclosure: To improve the structure and clarity of this article, the author used AI tools in a supportive role. ChatGPT version 4o analyzed the first draft and generated suggestions for the headline and section headers. Gemini 2.5 Pro generated the prompt templates and examples. The author wrote the article, made all editorial decisions, and is fully accountable for the content and accuracy of this work.

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