I need to write a speech. Where do I start?

You’ve been asked to write a speech and you don’t know where to begin.

You’re staring at nothing.

The empty screen.

A flashing cursor.

Or perhaps a blank piece of paper.

And all those really good ideas you had in your head that you want to go out and tell the world have disappeared like the money you *knew* you had in your bank account.

You’re not alone with this.

In fact when I first started writing speeches, I was exactly the same way.

I went more with “intuition” rather than actually having a strategy.

I jot ideas down and cross my fingers, heart, and legs that it would magically end up being okay.

The problem for many speakers isn’t the lack of ideas. In fact it’s totally the opposite. It’s just not having a container to put them in.

Without some kind of clear starting point you’re either going to be paralysed in the moment by the blank page or trying to go in about 37.35 directions all at once.

If you’ve got a little bit of neurodivergence in your life, your brain will want to explore everything at the same time.

Because variety.

And this weird bloke from Birmingham ain’t going to tell me what to do.

For me this is where having a framework is really fucking useful.

It gives you somewhere to begin.

I believe that creativity doesn’t come from total freedom. It comes from having some form of constraint. Something that you get to push against a little bit.

And that’s why I teach my clients a framework for speech writing.

I call it a framework for one very particular reason. If I call it a structure it’s rigid and a lot of the people I work with, me included, just want to break it.

To me that distinction is really important.

Because if I want someone to see how useful this is, then people need to understand that there is flexibility in it.

It is a spine on which to build all other things and if you think about your spine in your body, it’s a strong and stable structure but it’s not rigid.

You can bend.

Twist (and shout).

Stay upright.

The framework I teach is flexible enough to work with a 60-second pitch, a 10-minute networking slot, and a 45-minute keynote…

…the same basic bones with different anatomy on top.

When you start with the framework that empty screen stops being a problem.

You know where to start, you know where to finish, and you know the steps to follow in the middle.

And because it’s a framework it is flexible.

To you.

To your content.

To your audience.

In many ways I’m creating the box for you to put your speech in but I’m also showing you how you can change the dimensions, the shape, and the capacity of the box to suit you.

Over the last few years I’ve been looking at the way I work and coach and speak and that’s meant that I’ve tried different things.

For me the idea of having something totally rigid just isn’t going to work and even putting a framework together, I’ve felt myself battling against it.

That’s a pattern I have and it’s a pattern that many others have around me.

But when I’ve applied it to my own speaking, it has made things so much easier.

And then when I have shown it to my clients, it’s made their lives easier too.

If you are in the process of writing a speech or putting together a pitch and you’re staring at that blank screen, or getting dicked off at the flashing cursor, or wondering what the hell you’re going to write down on that piece of paper, then we need to have a chat.