First, an interesting fact about how the human mind works:

✅ Did you know that we remember the beginnings and ends of speeches best? Psychologists have given these phenomena a name. They are the “halo effect” and the “freshness effect”. What is the conclusion from this?

You should prepare well for the entire speech and think about what impression you want to leave in the memory of your recipients.

It is good to make an interesting, attention-grabbing introduction, where key issues are announced, and at the end, it is worth summarizing and perhaps surprising people with a punch line.

✅ This also means that to keep people’s attention, it is worth dividing your speech, interspersing it with interesting facts, anecdotes, discussions…

✅ For this reason, it is not worth flooding the recipients with long stories about complex data. If you must talk about something difficult – divide the speech into stages, give examples, then embellish.

If you are running a meeting combined with a discussion and different people will be present, it is worth establishing the framework and rules of the discussion at the beginning. Tell the audience that for the good and culture of the discussion you would like to introduce a few rules, propose them. Examples of rules are:

We speak after the leader has designated, we listen to each other and do not interrupt each other, we have a set time to speak, e.g., 2 minutes, we talk on the subject, we maintain the culture of dialogue, we do not insult people and do not mock the ideas of others… etc.

Establishing rules for conducting discussions during the meeting can prevent unnecessary conflicts and support your professional image.

Here are some practical tips:

✅ Always have water with you so that you can drink when your mouth gets dry.

✅ If you are nervous, remember that these nerves are at their highest before the speech and for a few dozen seconds at the beginning, then you are already in action and the brain is mobilized, the stress level decreases, and you enter into a relationship with the audience.

Focus on the topic and your audience, not on yourself. If you focus too much on how you’re doing, there’s a risk that you’ll lose contact with people.

You’re well prepared and can trust yourself.

✅ If you forgot something, or got something wrong, move on, don’t emphasize it, don’t comment on the fact that you failed because you’re drawing the audience’s attention to it, just continue.

✅ Note! People aren’t in your head, nor do they know your plan exactly, only you know how it should look. If something goes wrong, probably only you will notice it… so continue and maintain contact with the room, it’s most important to be in contact with people, not with the ceiling or the window 😉

✅ Plan whether you want people to ask questions at the end? Maybe you want to lead a discussion instead of a question-and-answer session? If so, announce it at the beginning of your speech.

It’s worth preparing a good summary to use the freshness effect.