Five Minutes Is Harder Than Fifty.

I’m going to tell you something that might surprise you.

(Or perhaps not. Who knows?)

The shorter the speech, the harder it is to create.

Many people think it’s the opposite.

“Five minutes, mate. I’ve got that. How hard can it be?”

And then they find out.

Back in 1656, Blaise Pascal wrote in Lettres Provinciales: “I have made this letter longer than usual only because I have not had time to make it shorter.”

To be fair, you can probably bring this logic across to speaking.

The discipline of less time to get your message across is hard to master.

I do see it fairly often.

Sixty-second pitches at networking events where somebody tries to tell you their entire life story, what it is they do, and a call to action in sixty seconds, and unsurprisingly they run over.

The ten-minute slot at a speaking event where the speaker arrives with 40 minutes of absolutely essential must-tell-you-everything material and then, in the moment, realises that it won’t all fit in.

The person who delivers the first five minutes of an hour-long keynote and wonders why it doesn’t make sense to the audience.

Having a shorter space to deliver, it can expose some really interesting things.

When you have an hour, you’ve got time to play. There’s flexibility. You can tell the longer version of a story, or you can go off on a bit of a ramble but still have time to find your way back.

In 5 minutes…

Every.

Word.

Counts.

And.

Needs.

To.

Earn.

Its.

Keep.

I’m not saying you have to be precise and word-perfect and all of these things. You just have to work to develop the skill of how you keep yourself more focused.

Which can be hard with a neurodivergent brain.

Especially if you’re in a room with things going on and they might be shiny objects or interesting things that you just want to focus on.

The skill is knowing how much of that you can do with the time you have available.

Shorter deliveries are one of the most challenging but also most useful things when it comes to developing your speaking.

Because if you can put what you need to say into 60 seconds, then it shows that you really understand it.

And if you’re still working out that understanding, it can really offer you a bit more clarity on how you want to say things.

There is something in all of this which might feel a little bit weird - you could take a 60-minute delivery and put it into 60 seconds.

You’re not writing a different speech each time. You’re just deciding what is important in that moment.

You’re making choices about what needs to stay and what needs to go.

A shorter delivery can teach you something about your content that longer deliveries never really can.

It shows you what’s essential.

It also shows you what you might have been including out of habit and comfort.

If you have been asked to do a shorter speech and you’re wondering where to begin, here are a few things which might help:

Know your one thing. Be absolutely clear on what it is that you want people to take away.

Make your content shorter than the time you’ve been given. If you’ve got five minutes, create four minutes’ worth of content because your pausing, pacing, and tone will add extra space to your words.

Practice out loud while timing yourself. Get used to how your voice sounds, what words work for you and what don’t, and also, by timing yourself, you’ll really understand truly how long you’ve spoken for.

If you want to experience a shorter delivery for yourself, I have a Speaking Without Freaking® workshop on Friday 4th August in Bromsgrove.

One of the things we do on the day is a short delivery, and it’s designed to be a little bit uncomfortable because it’s one of the best things that you can do as a speaker.

Give me a shout if you want to know more.