How to Deliver Effective Speeches

Write Your Speech

• Writing a good speech is something that people write entire books on. But here are some quick cheat-notes to consider:

  Vary your word choice. Your speech will get very boring very quickly if you repeatedly use the same words. So use interesting and different words and phrases and keep things new.

  Get a thesaurus. It's not cheating, it's expanding your vocabulary, and all great writers use one. A word of warning: Only use words that people know.

  Keep the writing conversational, no matter how technical or unexciting the subject content might be. No one likes being lectured to, so there are a couple of tricks you can use to make it feel like a normal dinner-table conversation:

  1. Throw out rhetorical questions as if you really expect answers; you might even get nods of agreement.

  2. Incorporate words that you usually use while speaking, but not in writing, such as "okay" (as in "OK, so we're all caught up…) or "see" (as in "See, the reason is…).

  3. Refer to the event. If you're speaking at a graduation, refer to the graduation. It makes your speech sound more personalized.

  Whenever possible, describe a feeling or situation in detail. The audience will follow you with more facility if you paint a picture instead of continually throwing out dry, emotionless words. One way to do this is to use action verbs. Instead of saying "learn," try "elucidate." Also, imagery can be very effective. Instead of simply informing the audience that female praying mantises instinctively bite off the heads of males after they've finished mating, you could try a more graphic and dramatic approach:

  "Imagine you are a male praying mantis, in the prime of your life. You want--more than anything else--to fornicate. But you've seen other males do it and then get their heads ripped off and be promptly consumed by the females. What do you do?… What do you do?"

  Humor almost always helps. It's even appropriate at eulogies. The essence is in the timing, though. It's a good idea to test out humor on friends prior to the actual presentation. And leave out any humor that is even remotely offensive. Often, self-deprecating humor (that doesn't completely destroy your credibility as a speaker) works well.

  Rewrite your speech--many, many times. Even the most brilliant writer never gets it perfect on the first try, so you have to continually rewrite and tighten your speech. Get rid of superfluous information (no matter how funny it is), and make sure each line has a point.

  After you've written your speech, it can be helpful to put it on 3-by-5-inch index cards. They are easier to carry around and shuffle through, and because you don't want to spend your entire presentation reading (and not speaking), index cards will make you feel more inclined to glance up when you flip through them. Just be sure to put huge numbers on the front of each card, in case they accidentally get shuffled around. But don't use the index cards as a crutch. Then, people will think that you're talking to your hand.