Speeches

You can learn helpful techniques from people who make speeches regularly. Politicians are best-known for the speeches they make, but there are a number of people that parlay successful careers as authors and business people as speaking careers in the future. The art of rhetoric is useful whether you're making a simple presentation to a small group of co-workers, simply interviewing for a job or telling a story to friends and family.

Actually writing a speech and delivering it are completely different things. Writing a good one is a challenge, but speaking in a natural way is in many ways more challenging. The best speakers will feed off of an audience's response and alter their tone, inflection and content of what they are saying to fit the crowd and their emotional state. Less experienced speakers tend to stick strictly to their written material, whether they have memorized it or not, and only take questions during specially designated periods.

Sometimes that's a necessary part of speaking, but few people need to get up to talk to thousands of people at the same time. Most gatherings are under 50 people, and taking questions in the middle of a speech is a good way to build a rapport with the audience and to keep things moving. You want to make them feel like a part of the process. If you're getting paid to speak, they are paying for the sense of personal connection that they get with you, not your words. If they simply wanted to hear a canned speech, they could read your material instead. Stay relaxed, and if you don't know something, don't attempt to make up an answer on the spot - simply admit your ignorance on the subject and move on.