Photo by: Cayusa

Last week, I happened to witness a double-champion in two different clubs using two different speeches on the same day. That was so unbelievable. I like to look at the behaviour of contestants before and during the contest. I have discovered that most of the contestants still busy referring to their scripts, especially before the contest. That means, preparing for only one speech is a burden to them. It is a burden to me too. I want to make sure that I will speak only what I have planned in order to avoid over time.

I was wondering how this double-champion did that. His name is Benjamin Cheng who is a well-known speaker in Singapore. I happened to talk to him during a Toastmasters Club Meeting. Here are the tips that he shared with me.

Stretch yourself to the limit
This was actually the first time he prepared two contest speeches for one-day two different club contests. He wanted to try out whether he could deliver two QUALITY contest speeches in one day and it was proved that he did it! Congratulations!

Write the full script out
A contest is very strict in timing. Therefore, controlling the timing is very important. To make sure that you won’t go over time, you have to rehearse your speech again, again and again. The best method to ensure that you will not go over time is to plan what you want to say during the contest and that is to write the full script out.

Two speeches in different styles or topics
The first speech he delivered was about “in the end” he got victory. It doesn’t matter what happened in between and what really matter is in the end, you have achieved your goals. This speech was quite a serious speech. Not much humour was injected.
The second speech was quite a relax speech. It’s about happiness.

Use personal stories
This is always the recommendation from experienced Toastmasters. Using personal story is the best way to touch audience’s heart. And it’s true that using personal stories, we tend to remember the speech easily.

Practise
PRACTISE, PRACTISE & PRACTISE…