I FIRST had the opportunity at speechwriting in 2011. The CEO of the company with which I worked was required to give a speech at an International Women’s Day event. Ecstatic, I put my all into this piece and submitted four pages of what I thought was a moving address. When the CEO reviewed the speech, his only remark was “It sounds like a woman speaking.” I was disappointed, to say the least. But they say hindsight is 20/20 for a reason because, upon reflection, I realised that the CEO was right. The speech did sound like a woman speaking because a woman wrote it. But it shouldn’t have because a man was required to deliver it.
And that is one of the most important elements of speechwriting: your speech must sound like the person delivering it. Speechwriting is a type of ghostwriting, so, naturally, speechwriters must have the unique ability of fluidity of voice. That is, they must be able to communicate the personality of the speaker so that what they are saying is considered sincere and trustworthy by the audience. It is the first lesson I learned. Over the years, I have been grateful to be able to practise this technique throughout my subsequent speechwriting endeavours. I’ve received comments about how “cool” some people think speechwriting is and I must admit that I agree, because, not only do you get to contribute to crafting powerful and creative rhetoric, but every time a speechwriter undertakes a speech, their writing skills get massive exercise through the transformation of their style into the style of that speaker.
If you’re interested in becoming a speechwriter, here are some of the elements I have learned that are truly helpful to the craft:

Watch your language
Content that is written to be spoken needs to be written much differently than content that is written to be read. The language used for speeches needs to be clear, simple and direct, written in short, distinct sentences that can be easily understood by any audience.
Know your audience
This is usually the first step in every piece of communication. By assessing criteria such as gender, profession, age, political affiliation, occasion and other similar criteria, you can understand how to lay out your speech and the type of language to be used.

Choose Your Core Message
Rule of thumb is that the average speech runs no longer than 20 minutes. Occasion and length of programme must also be taken into consideration when deciding how long to keep the speech. Once this is understood, choose the core message of what the speaker will present. Focus on the type of audience and the occasion, then centre the message on subject matter relevant to these aspects. Ensure that you have significant knowledge about the topic. Here, research is often necessary to provide context. Speeches aim to inspire, and your audience often wants to hear the opinion of the speaker. So always aim to have strong points by which the audience can be moved or persuaded.

Utilise Devices
One expert has been quoted as saying, “The language of the speech should also be poetic—replete with alliteration, metaphor, and other figures of speech. Such adornments, far from being superfluous, enhance meaning and emphasise relationships among ideas.” Speechwriting, therefore, gives you the perfect opportunity to dress up the English language using those fancy literary devices you learned in school that you thought would never come in handy. Devices such as repetition, sentence variation, parallelism, alliteration, rhetorical questions, and antithesis can add useful flair to your speech.

Develop Structure to Deliver Your Message
Decide on the goal of your speech, then do a brief outline of introduction, body and conclusion. The introduction should be used for salutations and highlighting important themes, the reason for the event and what the speaker aims to address. The body gets to the meat of the matter, utilising those devices for a variety of styles and impact. The conclusion should bring all those points to a head and close with a solid message to the audience, be it a call to action, encouragement or some other positive sentiment aimed at exhilarating the audience.

Avoid common mistakes
Keep in mind that the speaker needs to keep their audience engaged, not drained. Keep your speech less than 20 minutes unless otherwise required. Avoid jargon that may be lost among the audience; avoid redundancy. Don’t make your sentences too long as this may cause the speaker to stumble while reading and never write a speech without first consulting with the speaker, so that you can both be on the same page with regard to the finished product.

Speechwriting can take on a whole class by itself, but these are the first points you need to start thinking about before you go further. Generally, though, once you do your research, understand the audience and occasion, derive a strong message and know your speaker, speechwriting could be one of the most rewarding types of professional writing for those interested in adding it to their portfolios. It brings knowledge about various subjects; it helps writers to diversify their skills while creating poignant content aimed at inspiring people. If you ask me, that sounds like a good deal all around.

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