The Power of Rehearsal

"Everyone loves to win - but how many love to train?"
Mark Spitz - 1972 Olympic Gold Medallist Swimmer

When I was little, I wanted to be a singer. I loved the idea of entertaining people with rythum melody and harmony. I listened to records and learned songs and even put on shows performing with the handle of the vacuum cleaner.

The magic fraternity has a number of rules. The most important one is that you must never reveal the secret of a trick (so don’t ask me!) But one of the rules that I learned that has been useful in my real experiences as a singer speaker and trainer  is that you must practice and practice – and then practice some more. And only when you are thoroughly rehearsed do you perform the trick in public.

Practice and rehearsal also make a huge improvement to the delivery of presentations and speeches.

Here’s what happens to an unrehearsed speaker:

They "um" and "ah"They can’t remember what comes next. They get sidetracked and waffle. They go over time or run out of time.They read their presentation and put the audience to sleep.They lack confidence, control and credibility.

This list of problems is bad enough. But the real problem is that your audience doesn’t say to themselves "this speaker hasn’t rehearsed" – no, they say to themselves "this person and their company, product and service are incompetent." They don’t make allowances – and why should they?

Take on board that you have not finished preparing when your notes are written and your PowerPoint is on a drive. You need to practise your talk out loud from beginning to end. And the more often you rehearse it the better.

Learn your opening – know your first line in your sleep so that "starters nerves" won’t stop you from remembering or delivering your opening words with energy and confidenceKnow your closing – for maximum impact you want to be able to deliver it directly to the audience without any notes and without PowerPointPractise with any props and visual aids – especially PowerPoint. Get the timing of your slides right and be thoroughly familiar with their content.

I learned the discipline and the benefits of rehearsal from my childhood poetry contest daye. And it is a discipline because it is time consuming and repetitive and you often don’t feel as if it’s really contributing to your performance. But I can guarantee that it does.

The popular Polish pianist and composer Ignace Paderewski was once asked to explain why, after so many years, he still practiced every day. His response?

"If I miss one day's practice I notice it. If I miss two days, the critics notice it. If I miss three days, the audience notices."