Time doesn’t matter when it comes to public speaking. Five minutes or fifty, the act of creating and polishing a presentation is remarkably similar, both in time and energy.
There is false security in the statement “It’s just a five minute speech.” A five minute speech can be as difficult to craft as an hour long presentation. In many ways, the stakes are higher; you must make as big an impact in a fraction of the time. When you only have eight minutes to deliver a complex report to your Board of Directors or stakeholders, you need to pay minute attention to both clarity and concision. Because your time is constrained, you don’t have the luxury of wandering off topic or losing track of what you need to say. With speeches and short presentations, timing becomes key; I like to say that the shorter the presentation the longer you are going to have to work on getting the timing down.
Short is not synonymous with easy. Give those short presentations and speeches the same care and attention as you would to something five times its’ length.
Shameless Plug:
If you have a short speech or presentation coming up, and want to craft, hone, and practice is in the space of one weekend blitz, I strongly recommend registering for my workshop Shock and Awe Speech and Short Presentation Intensive. This workshop is taking place November 28 – 30, with a presentation night on December 4th, in room 6-10 of the Stanley A. Milner Library building in downtown Edmonton. This workshop will teach you critical speech and presentation creation and preparation techniques that you will be able to apply to future talks. Space is limited, with a maximum of 10 participants. For more information and to register, please visit https://laurensergy.com/workwithme/workshops. I hope to see you there!
