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A friend of mine has received a pile of community kudos for her work on a special project at the school her children attend.  Recently, our state PTA selected her to receive its annual service award.  The catch: she had to give an acceptance speech that would give the 300 attendees ideas for implementing similar projects on their own.

My friend is also the school’s newsletter editor and, in her spare time, a human resources manager for a sizeable corporation.  She writes well and with a strong business style.

She dropped off a copy of her speech for me to look over, explaining that she had never spoken to a large group and didn’t want to embarrass herself.  There was nothing in the speech to embarrass her.  It had a clear message, touching humor and a clever closing.  The style, though, was right off the printed page.  It read fine.  It just wasn’t a speech.

I telephoned her.

"Well?" she asked.

"It’s very good.  How are you going to present it?"

She hesitated.  "I was going to read it," she said.  She listened to my silence.  "Not a good idea?"

I pointed out that I’ve heard her at meetings and that she’s very good at explaining things right off the top of her head.

"But I’m afraid I’ll forget something," she said, "or get tongue-tied."

As writers, we all work and rework sentences in privacy until they are as smooth and solid as bowling balls.  Often we hold our language to the same standard when we step up to the microphone.  We want to sound literally perfect.  But the language of the podium is different from the language of the page.    The polished prose of a New Yorker editorial sounds stilted in a speech.   The text of a real conversation is too rambling for dialog in a novel or a screenplay.

Of course a lot depends on venue.  Formal language is very effective on the right occasion.  John Kennedy’s inaugural address springs to mind. The same language coming from Tom Brokaw on the evening news would seem contrived.  At a PTA dinner it might be pretentious.

In most situations, what makes a good speech is what makes a good conversation: connecting with the listener.  Establish rapport, get them to accept you, and they’ll listen.  Reading to them is not the way to do that.    Talking to them comfortably is.

"How do I prepare for that?" she asked. Here is what I recommended:

• Sit down with a friend and a tape recorder. Talk about the topic of the speech.  Let your friends’ reactions and questions guide what you say and how you say it.  Make your goal not just to communicate information but to generate the enthusiasm you feel.
  
  
• Listen to the recording. Jot down on index cards the major points you made, the phrases or images you used to explain them, the things that really connected with your friend.
  
  
• Arrange the cards in logical order.  Add a card with an opening and another with a closing, if you wish.
  
  
• Become familiar with the cards.   Practice using them as a guide for your speech, but don’t over-practice.   Memorization kills the casual tone and spontaneity that invite people to pay attention.
  
  
• Bring the cards to the podium with you, and
  
  
• Have fun.

"What about what I wrote?" she said, ruing all that time wasted.

"Make it a handout," I said.    "Put some copies on a table near the podium.  You’ll know what people thought of your speech by how many come up afterward and take one."

My friend accepted her award this past weekend.    She had taken 200 copies of her original speech with her.  She came home with eleven.

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