A lot of people get nervous when they give a speech, and when people get nervous they talk fast. But fast talkers seem untrustworthy. So if you get nervous, space out your words (literally, put five spaces in between each word on the page) to keep your speech measured.
Don’t go overboard with informality. You’re asking to lead your peers, so they need to trust you can do that. Most people can’t lead well, so to convince them you can lead well, your speech should also reflect that you’re more capable than an average person. You need to strike a balance. Speak at a level just above the level of a typical conversation.
Instead of: “We need to address the way we schedule our lunch breaks in a reasonable but fair way, because the way we do it now isn’t fair to anyone. " Try: “We have people eating lunch at 10:30 am. They’re still serving breakfast at Burger King at 10:30! It doesn’t make sense! By the time 2:00 rolls around, the early lunch kids are starving. There is a better way. We all know it. "
For even more focused practice, try speaking in front of a mirror or in front of a camera. [6] X Expert Source Lynn KirkhamPublic Speaking Coach Expert Interview. 20 November 2019.
So, if you’re talking to one classroom, don’t only talk to the classroom about a general problem the school has. Talk to the classroom about how that general problem affects them and how you can change it. For example, don’t say: “The breaks in between homeroom and first period aren’t long enough. ” Say: “Everybody in homeroom has gotten at least one demerit for being late to first period. We can’t get all the way from North Campus to South Campus in time. Elect me as homeroom representative, and I won’t let the administration forget it. ”
The beginning needs to catch people’s attention and raise the questions you’re going to answer. The middle needs to provide the answers, and the end connects the answers back to the questions. In very simple terms: You tell them what you’re going to tell them. Then, you tell them. Then you tell them what you told them.
Don’t say: “My name is Joe Blow, and I’m running for City Council. I’m a member of…” Instead, get right to it. Say: “Not a single person in this city thinks the parking situation on Main St. is adequate. No one. ” There’s a lot of ways to get this done. You can use a story, a challenge, a joke, or just vividly describe a problem. You just need to get the audience’s attention quickly. Earn their attention, don’t expect it to come to you.
You want to have a good mix of facts, feelings, and action. If you only talk facts, your audience will get bored. Only talk feelings, and you’ll wear them out. Only talk action, and it invites disbelief, because you haven’t offered enough factual and emotional support for your argument.
To continue with the parking example, don’t end your speech talking about the width and number of parking spaces on Main St. Make it bigger than that—something that makes them feel weaker for not supporting you and stronger for supporting you. “This isn’t just about parking spaces. The parking situation is just a symptom of everything that’s wrong with the Council in this city. We’ve asked. We’ve begged. We’ve done all we could. Now we have to send a message that they can’t just ignore us. ” With this kind of appeal, you put the listener in a position where they are either a person who votes for you or a person who lets themselves be ignored. Most people will take the first choice.
Your speech needs a clear beginning, middle, and end. The beginning needs to hook the audience, you need to keep them interested through the middle, and the end should leave them nodding their heads in agreement, applauding and on their feet.
Staying on message is about more than repeating yourself. Focus on a problem and then offer a solution. [12] X Research source Say your issue is healthcare. That’s a multifaceted issue, so bring up specific problems, and offer specific solutions. For example, start by offering the problem: “Prescription drug costs are too high!” Give a few details or anecdotes to illustrate the magnitude of the problem, and then offer your solution: “And that’s why we’re going to negotiate directly with the drug companies to lower prices. ”
For example, a politician who emphasizes his military service is appealing to group affiliation based on authority. They are one of us and deserve our allegiance because they protect us. A politician who is brings up the fact that their family “has been here for five generations,” or that they are the “child of a single mother” is appealing to group affiliation on the basis of equality. They are one of us and understand us because they have lived a life like mine.
Emotional appeals can turn audiences against things for a simple reason: anger and fear are easy emotions to stimulate. For example, when a politician says: “The system is rigged! They think they’ve got you fooled, but I know different. ” They are making an emotional appeal based on stoking the anger of the audience. When they imply that “they” think of the audience as fools, the speaker plays to the audience’s sense of ridicule. This infuriates the audience, turning the audience against “them. ”
For example, “Very few of us would argue with the proposition that 99/3=33. That’s because we’ve been logically convinced of its truth. There’s almost nothing a person could do to convince us otherwise, and therein lays the power of a logical appeal. However, it took us far longer to understand division than it did for us to feel anger or fear, or understand that we were part of a group. "
If your biggest appeal is associational, your argument is less about specific points than it is about you. Design your speech to emphasize your biography and why it makes you trustworthy. People elect a person, not a set of ideas. If your biggest appeal is emotional, keep your speech short, so that the audience doesn’t notice the logical flaws. Adjust your energy level to the audience’s. If they’re agitated, start slowly. If they’re bored, then start off at a higher energy level. Always work to an emotional crescendo, however. Never start at the emotional level you want to finish at. If your biggest appeal is logical, break up the facts with feeling. You can’t risk boring your audience to death, so you need to break up your logical propositions into bite-sized chunks. Think of it as the spoonful of sugar principle—a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down.
If you will be speaking at a podium or beside a table, put your notes on a piece of paper or a notepad–not notecards. Very few people can shuffle notecards discretely enough to look professional while doing it. If you won’t have a podium and you must use notes, get your notes onto one notecard.
Brevity is the soul of wit. No one is going to remember sixty word sentences. Since you are striving to be memorable, make sure to pepper your speech with short, punchy lines. You don’t want to sound like a limerick, but you do want to use alliteration, assonance, and rhythm to your advantage. For example, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country,” contains only nine unique words, with seven examples of alliteration.
