Paul Krugman shows up as number 3 on Forbes' most influential management gurus list (http://tinyurl.com/ygc6mb4).  He’s a brilliant economist, winner of the Nobel Prize for his work on international trade, prolific writer of books, and blogger for the New York Times.   What kind of speaker is he?

You can see him here:  http://tinyurl.com/yhbz7ak (on the stimulus ) and here:  http://tinyurl.com/5d9g3y (his Nobel Prize acceptance speech) as well as here: http://tinyurl.com/y8pjrjh talking on the Colbert Report, and to Google on the economic crisis. 

Krugman is one of those people who is so brilliant that he can’t finish a sentence.  He constantly interrupts himself with new ideas and half-finished thoughts.  His mind is racing far ahead of his words, and the result is that clarity and syntax are the victims.  He’s often quite hard to follow because of this fractured kind of speaking.

And what about his delivery?  He’s nasal, and his voice tends to go up into his nose and get more so when he gets excited.  That tendency, coupled with body language that lacks authority, and you have someone who in person doesn’t live up to the advance billing.

With work, he could improve both his syntax and his delivery, but my guess is he’s too busy being brilliant to make the effort.