Wedding speeches are one of the most memorable speeches that can be delivered. Whether, it is the Bride and groom or the Father of the Bride or the Best Man or Bridesmaid.
Presentation skills and public speaking impacts on many areas, both in business and personal. At The Speakers Practice, we work with professionals but, in essence, we are supporting and training individuals so they can be more confident with personal presentation matters ,as well as, at work with presentation and in marketing efforts. At The Speakers Practice, we do offer Speciality Speech writing and assistance with delivery.
A loving father got in contact and was looking for some support in preparing a speech for his daughter who was getting married. As the Father of the Bride, he wanted to deliver an impactful speech as it was such an important day for his family.
Being a builder, getting up in front of groups and speaking wasn’t something that came naturally to to Jim. His wife was the one that did a whole lot more talking and had that skill. For the wedding, Jim was the father of the bride and this was his duty. Jim had the intention to do the best speech ever, he was willing to prepare and practice to do it as well as he could possibly deliver the speech. Jim called on me , as a presentation skills coach, to help him with his presentation.
The process:
- Brain storming the topic
Jim worked with me for three sessions. The first session, we brainstormed about his family, I asked questions and took notes. From our discussions, we came up with some family stories that were most important and from these discussions, a speech developed. - Preparing the SpeechThe speech was prepared and this was discussed during the second session.For Jim, it was a nice moment to reflect over the years, for me it was delightful to learn about the family. A speech was prepared and discussed with Jim. We worked on fine tuning the content.Jim got input from others and I helped along the way.
- Practice
Jim got to practice and even though it was on line, Jim was able to practice and I was able to give Jim feedback.Jim practiced in front of anyone who would listen. Yes, he got lots of input to support him through the process. This is valuable, as practice, gets in out of your head and into a performance. It helps with getting the language right and with the flow. - The Big Day!
The big day happened and Jim messaged to say how wonderful the day went and he was thrilled with his speech. Everyone congratulated Jim on the fabulous presentation. Think there were a few tears of happiness!
Jim messaged me saying “ I pulled it off! My speech went well. Received so many lovely comments on how well written and presented it was! Thank you so much, I definitely could not have done it without your help. “
His message goes on” The speeches all went very well, mine went well thanks to you. My daughters made some lovely speeches too and the boys spoke. But the groom didn’t want any speeches in the video for some reason. So there are no records of the speeches” Jim thought it was mainly because the groom, his brother and father had nothing prepared and they didn’t come across very well. “
In summary:
The moral to this story is planning and preparation helps prevent presentation predicaments! Plan, prepare, rehearse and practice. Do the work to make the outcome as good as you can do it. Invest in yourself. Do the hard yards. It is worth it. It means you’ll never need to cover up or hide or hide others efforts.
Whether it is a wedding speech, as in this example, or it is a work presentation or a presentation selling your business, doing the preparation and working on each aspect of the presentation will at the end of the day mean you are better off and can present in a much better light than someone who didn’t prepare.
Adrienne McLean is a BookYourselfSolid® Certified Coach, SpeakersTrainingCamp® Internationally Accredited Instructor and the Principle of The Speakers Practice. Offering marketing discovery audits, online training programs, Public Speaking for Professionals, Effective On-Camera Presenting workshop and much more.
Email on adrienne@thespeakerspractice.com.au or ring on 0414 367 960