2. REHEARSING THE SPEECH

Read the speech over as many times as you can. Rehearse it in a couple of candid friends that can give you feedback. You might even want to go as far as videotaping yourself to see how you look, but keep in mind that youre often your harshest critic. Go over your speech enough times that youll have it mostly memorized. Its okay to have notecards when you are up there, but dont be reading word for word. Give yourself at least a week or two to get comfortable with the speech.