What Is an Elevator Speech?
An elevator speech is a focused speech that you can deliver in a short time—basically during the ride in an elevator—to explain what you do, have done or want to do. It is normally about three minutes long, sometimes even four or five minutes, and provides a way to identify yourself and differentiate yourself from other people. It provides a chance to make contact with a listener—supposedly someone stuck in the elevator with you—or someone who wants to know what you are about.

A good elevator speech sparks an interest in you and leads to other conversations. A poor elevator speech is one full of nouns and tells the person some basic information, but does not trigger any interest or provide anecdotes and details that lead to further conversation.

An elevator speech should be learned so well that you can give it easily and without stumbling over the information. It should flow easily and provide you with a way of providing information about yourself without bragging on the one hand or feeling embarrassed on the other.

Why Is an Elevator Speech Important?
Because an elevator speech is a chance to make an impression on a potential friend, business connection, future employer, faculty member or other professional, it is a way to explain yourself. It is also a way to build interest in what you are doing or want to do and an opportunity to leave a lasting impression. Many people use elevator speeches to encourage others to support a common cause, participate in a planned activity or join an organization. It is a great way to engage other individuals in a cause or organization that you believe in, whether it is a study group, a project, local student club, a fund raising activity, involvement in voting or politics, a study group or the American Culinary Federation.

Therefore, think about what you want to say about yourself or the organization you want to help grow, and how you can make the message vivid. A good elevator speech should be a crafted—clear, relevant, accurate, focused, tailored, energetic and detailed. Clarity means that you know what you want to say and you get right to the point; it should be relevant to the person you are speaking with and not a standard elevator speech that you use everywhere and for every situation. Therefore, plan to write several of them for the various situations in which you find yourself. Accuracy counts because the vividness of your stories and statistics will help capture your listener.

Focus your elevator speech; make it brief and to the point. No one wants to hear a long-winded and confusing speech. Tailor your speech to the situation you are in; if you are telling a potential employer about yourself, you will want to focus on your interests and professional experience. If you are trying to raise money for the Chef & Child Foundation or a food pantry, use details about the pantry and your involvement. Other information is less relevant.

If you do not have any energy or enthusiasm for yourself or the topic you are talking about, your elevator speech will not make a good impression, so bring your own passion to the elevator speech. Details count, so find vivid examples of what you or your organization has done and share them in your elevator speech. People will remember the details, so consider carefully what you want to include and make sure the details are accurate.

How Can I Deliver an Effective Elevator Speech?
Delivering good elevator speeches is an art, but you can do it. There are four steps: Write them, edit and revise them, memorize them, and practice delivering them. Writing them out in great detail often feels like the hardest step, but it is critical to make sure you have the content you want and in the appropriate order and with enough details to capture your potential listener’s interest. Remember to write out several elevator speeches for various situations.

Then read the speech out loud so that you can hear it; this process will prompt you to edit and revise the speech. Consider using the last points as initial points, rearrange the key points, and consider a different order of comments. Since good elevator speeches take time to develop, play with each one until it feels correct. You can even try it out on friends to see what they think; their idea might inspire a different structure.

Then memorize and practice with gestures and a variety of inflections and pauses. Memorizing it helps you learn it really well and will enable you to deliver it without pausing. Do not worry if you do not actually deliver it in the way you organized it. If you know it well, you can deliver it in any order. In fact, you will unconsciously reorganize it for the situation without even being aware of it because you will know really well the points you want to make. Practice leads to comfort in making the speech, so find opportunities to deliver it to friends, family, faculty members, people you meet at random and any time you are at a conference, meeting or new situation where people want to get to know each other. Practicing all of your various elevator speeches until they become second nature will help prevent your stumbling over any parts of them.

Summary
Thank you for reading this column on elevator speeches; I hope it reminds you of various aspects of elevator speeches and gives you something to distribute to your students. Next month we will discuss other ways of helping students to connect with their interests, each other and industry professionals.

If you have comments about this topic or suggestions for others, send them to me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., and I will include them in future “Mayo’s Clinics.”

Dr. Fred Mayo, CHE, CHT, is a clinical professor at New York University and a frequent presenter at CAFÉ events nationwide.