Pacing a Speech

00:00 So, how do you pace a speech or a presentation? The biggest problem most people have is they get a little nervous.

00:08 They start speaking too quickly.

00:10 And when you speak too quickly, it tends to flatten out your voice.

00:14 It essentially destroys the punctuation of speaking.

00:17 If you're reading a book, you have certain cues to your eye.

00:20 A comma means a pause, a period, a longer pause, a paragraph break, a longer pause. An actual chapter in a white sheet of paper in between is an even longer break.

00:33 But when you're speaking, if everything sort of comes out well, here's my next data point.

00:37 Here's my next data point. Here's my next data point.

00:38 It's like reading one big run-on sentence with no punctuation. You could do it, but it's a lot of work.

00:47 So you need to put in pauses.

00:51 You need to catch your breath.

00:54 Sometimes you can do this by walking a few feet, not saying anything. You need to look at audience members and see, Are you getting it? Sometimes toss out a question to the audience, actually have them answer it.

01:09 Sometimes you toss out a question, and it's simply a rhetorical question, and you let people think about what you said you need pausing throughout your speech, and you need variation in speed and tone.

01:23 Sameness is what kills a speech.

01:26 Consistency is what kills a speech.

01:29 People think, Oh, I'm being very professional, everything is even keeled.

01:32 No, you don't want to be even keeled, you want to be conversational.

01:36 That means sometimes faster, sometimes slower, sometimes louder, sometimes softer.

01:41 And sometimes a pause is what's most effective.

01:45 That's how you pace your speech.