Rehearsing properly

Most people prepare a talk by writing it and then reading it over, which is preparation of the material and not of the delivery.

Why mental rehearsal is insufficient

The gap.

Reading silently is faster than speaking, so timing is always wrong.

The sentences that are difficult to say are not discovered.

The transitions between sections, which is where speakers actually get lost, are skipped over.

Breath, pace and volume are untested.

And the physical experience of standing and speaking is entirely absent, which is what nerves attach to.

What rehearsal means

Specifically.

Standing up.

Speaking aloud at full volume and full energy.

All the way through without stopping to fix things.

With whatever notes or slides you will actually use.

Timed.

Anything less is a read-through, which is useful and is a different activity.

The sequence

How many times, and what changes.

First run: expect it to be bad, and do not stop. The objective is to discover the shape and the length.

Then revise, based on what went wrong.

Second run: smoother, still with problems.

Third and fourth: this is where it starts to be yours rather than a text you are reciting.

For an important talk, more than four, spread over days rather than compressed into one session.

Spacing the practice

Which matters more than total time.

Distributed practice produces better retention than the same amount massed into one session, consistently, across many kinds of learning.

Which means four runs over four days beats four runs in one evening.

And it means the night before is for one run and sleep, not for the first rehearsal.

What to work on separately

Beyond full run-throughs.

The opening, until it is memorised, since the first thirty seconds are where nerves are highest.

The closing, likewise.

The transitions between sections, practised in isolation, since they are the weakest joints.

Any sentence you keep stumbling on, which should generally be rewritten rather than drilled.

And the answers to the likely questions, spoken aloud.

Recording it

The most informative step and the least popular.

Audio at minimum, video if you can.

Watch it once for content, once for delivery, once with the sound off.

Note: pace, filler frequency, where the energy drops, repeated gestures, whether you look up.

It is uncomfortable and it identifies more in ten minutes than a coach could tell you in an hour.

Rehearsing with someone

What to ask for.

Not "was it good", which produces reassurance.

Ask: what were the three points? — which tests whether the structure survived.

Where did you lose attention?

What did you expect me to say that I did not?

What would you ask me?

And ask someone outside the subject, since a colleague will fill in the gaps unconsciously.

Not over-rehearsing

The opposite failure.

A talk rehearsed to the point of memorised recitation sounds recited, and loses the responsiveness that makes it live.

Which means learning the structure and the key phrases rather than the exact words, except at the opening and the close.

If you find yourself trying to recall the next word rather than the next idea, you have gone too far.

And the recovery is to run it once from bullet points rather than from the script.

Rehearsing in the space

Where possible.

Arrive early and stand where you will stand.

Speak a few lines aloud at volume, which tells you about the acoustics.

Check sightlines, the clicker, the screen, where you will put your notes.

Walk to the position you will start from.

Which converts an unfamiliar room into a familiar one and removes a substantial part of the anxiety.

On the day

The last preparation.

One quiet run of the opening, aloud, somewhere private.

A vocal warm-up.

Not a full run-through, which produces fatigue rather than confidence.

Not new material, which will not be integrated.

And arriving with time to spare, since rushing undoes everything the rehearsal built.