Could you just say a few words please?

Thanking family and friends for coming to a birthday celebration, giving a FOTB (father-of-the-bride) speech, entertaining after dinner, introducing an honoured guest … the list of occasions when just saying a few words is not just appropriate but downright essential goes on. Those are just the some of ones I’ve had to do within the last couple of years.

Now the mechanics of human behaviour and psychology make it a most precarious business. Staring someone straight in the eyes with a blank expression and making no sound is received as a threat gesture – if you don’t believe me, try it on someone - preferably someone you know, a stranger may be a martial arts expert and react as if being threatened!

“Come on – gather round”, so now you’ve got a whole group advancing on you, looking you in the eye, without smiling. Underneath the intelligent, thinking, organising brain, there’s a basic animal survival one that takes over when you’re in danger and, let me tell you, if you have three, never mind thirty odd people coming towards you displaying apparent threat behaviour that basic part of the brain decides you’re in serious danger and whips into over-drive, getting you ready to “fight or flee”. Adrenaline is pumped, heart rate goes up, breathing gets deeper, and thinking is pushed aside to make way for instinct. So just at the moment you wanted all your wits about you to deliver a really good little fireside-chat/speech/monologue you’re in the grip of that which was developed to help the frog escape the hungry snake.

How to cope? Be ready for the body’s violent response and prepare the words, the gestures, the tone of voice and everything else in advance. I actually write down every word of a speech before giving it, even the “Hello and good day to you all.” That way I can play with the structure, the words, and the oratorical tricks in rehearsal mode, having them all polished and ready for when adrenalin takes control. After the greeting, trying something witty or funny, no matter whether it’s plagiarised, is a great idea, as many of those faces confronting you may well break into a smile, and that is a “welcome” signal – so you tell the joke to make the audience smile in order to make yourself feel better! Don’t forget to smile back.

Research has shown that people tend to remember what was said during a talk in the first forty and the last thirty seconds; sometimes there’s about twenty seconds in the middle where messages get through too. So, if you must speak for more than a minute and a half, (but please try not to) those are the places to get the key ideas in. Look at Bernard Montgomery’s inspirational “here I am” speech to the Eighth Army for an outstanding example of clarity in a few words if you don’t believe you can get over what you want to say in that tlme, the humour was there too, even if of the “gallows” variety.

“Could you just say a few words please?” The answer’s yes, but make them few and concentrate on saying them well.