At some point in your life, you’ll probably have the opportunity to formally reward someone for a job well done. When you do this in front of others it increases the perceived value of the honor.
When presenting an honor or award, you need to accomplish two things:
1. Highlight the award
Make sure that the recipient, as well as the audience, understands the importance of the award. What does it stand for? How does someone earn it? What are the traditions associated with this honor?
2. Highlight how the person earned the award
Now that you’ve built up the award, you need to build up the person receiving it. What did this person do to deserve the award? How did they meet the criteria better than anyone else who was up for the award?
There are ways to make this sort of presentation more effective.
Tips for effectively presenting an award
Tell a story
People are more engaged with stories. So highlight the award and the honoree in the form of a story.
Introductions first
Call on the awardee last … nothing is more awkward than having to stand there and wait while you do your presentation. Tell your story first, then, when you are ready to hand over the award, call the awardee up to the lectern.
Mind your Ps and Qs
Make sure that you know how to pronounce the name of the award and the person receiving it. Also, make sure your facts are correct. Nothing will spoil the honor more than mispronouncing someone’s name or announcing information that is totally wrong.
Be humble
You may have been on the selecting committee, but this presentation is about the person being honored … not you. The presentation should be mostly about how wonderful the honoree is and why they are so deserving of this honor.
Demonstrate the award’s worth
Hold the award as if it were a treasure. Make eye contact with the recipient, smile warmly and hand over the award with reverence.
Resources for effectively presenting an award
- Toastmasters International: Presenting an Award
- Flat World Knowledge: Presenting or Accepting an Award
- Buzzle: Presenting an Award Speech
- eHow: How to Present an Award
- Certificate Street: How to Present an Award Certificate with Style
Did you miss these?
Here are the previous posts in this “Type of Speeches” series:
- The Keynote Address
- The Training Session
- The Motivational Speech
- The Entertaining Speech
- The Demonstration
- The Information Dump
- The Inspirational Speech
- The Q & A
- The Persuasive Speech
- The Impromptu Speech
- The Acceptance Speech
- The Commencement Speech
- The Eulogy
- The Toast
- The Roast
- The Interpretive Reading
The next post in this series is Accepting an Award.