It’s always puzzled me why people who would never expect to play like Oscar Peterson the first time they sit down at a piano think they can perform like Winston Churchill the first time they speak in front of a group. I’m equally puzzled as to why even seasoned speakers sometimes think they don’t need to rehearse. All speeches should be rehearsed.
I was in superstar Anne Murray’s dressing room in Las Vegas one night between shows. She wasn’t relaxing, she was rehearsing her hit song Snowbird, a song she had sung thousands of times, yet she felt something hadn’t been quite right with her rendition in the first show, so she and her guitar player, Aidan Mason, were rehearsing it before taking the stage again. World-class athletes practice their skills over and over throughout their careers. It’s been said that Al MacInnis (no relation), one of the hardest and most accurate shooters in hockey history, would shoot the puck 10,000 times between seasons. If accomplished superstars like Anne Murray and Al MacInnis recognize the need to practice what they do for a living, why should anyone think they don’t need to practice something they do only occasionally?
Rehearsing a speech is the best way to become familiar with your material, and is the only way to determine how it actually sounds and whether your content and delivery are effective.
Rehearsing allows you to eliminate words you have difficulty pronouncing and phrases that look good on paper but turn into tongue twisters when spoken. Rehearsing lets you determine whether sentences are too long and provides an opportunity to determine pacing, where pauses will be effective, and where added emphasis is required. Also, the only way to accurately time the length of a speech is to rehearse it.
A good way to rehearse is at a lectern in front of a few people. But be careful about heeding advice from members of the audience. Unless the person advising you is a skilled speaker, or the advice is obviously sound, take it with a grain of salt and rely more on your own instincts about how well the rehearsal went. Be sure the rehearsal audience understands you’ll be stopping frequently to make changes in wording and delivery. Do not attempt an uninterrupted run-through until you’re completely happy with your content.
The ideal way to rehearse is in front of a skilled speaking-coach who videos it so both of you can view and critique it together. Although you should take a professional coach’s advice more seriously than that of friends, relatives, neighbours, and colleagues, remember it’s you alone who is responsible for its effectiveness. Keep an open mind, but be sure there are compelling reasons before you accept suggestions that don’t feel right.
You can rehearse by yourself, and should try to do so at least once standing at a lectern. Don’t rehearse in front of a mirror. You’ll spend too much time looking at yourself rather than concentrating on content and delivery, all the time forgetting your image is actually reversed.
There’s effective informal rehearsing you can do. Reading the speech out loud is helpful. And you can evaluate the main points, and experiment with different words and phrases, simply by thinking about them, such as when showering, waiting for elevators, going for a walk, or stuck in traffic. You can also rehearse parts of your speech by slipping them into conversations with colleagues, friends, or family members. Watch their reaction as well as judging for yourself how you sounded.
It’s not possible to over-rehearse. The more you rehearse, either formally or informally, the more comfortable and confident you’ll be when you stand at the lectern and say, “Good evening ladies and gentlemen, it’s a great pleasure to be here,” rather than, “Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking...”