So what should the actual structure of your retirement speech be? I don't think you want to write it all out. If you absolutely insist you can. But I want to tempt you against reading it reading. It makes it seem impersonal. It makes it seem like a quarterly conference call with analysts and there's an SEC attorney behind you.

This is a personal moment. So I would recommend not reading your speech and your structure is fairly simple. You thank the people who meant something to you and you thank them specifically, and you mentioned specific acts, you tell stories, recounting specific things you and your team did, that were meaningful to you and perhaps, to others. And you make people feel good about themselves. And you realize that you make them realize that you feel good about them. And you wish everyone continued success.

That's it. Now, you could spend a half an hour doing that. But it's not a typical business speech where you have to get the wording just right, because let's face it, no one is recording every minute of this and going to be picking it apart and criticizing in the newspaper tomorrow because of your retirement speech, most likely. So it's not a typical business speech where you've got to get every word right. And there's the teleprompter. It's not like that.

It's really an opportunity for you to thank people to make them feel good about themselves, your time, they're a moment of reflection for yourself, what this career meant to you what this place meant to you what these people meant to you, and a chance to make everyone feel good about your tenure there. So what I asked you to do in the previous lecture was to come up with three specific examples and what I want you to do now is to tell A story about it. And a story is simply you recounting a real problem. I mean, all of us have problems with clients, customers, colleagues, particular challenges, just state what the problem was. What the client said to you, or what one of your colleagues said to you, where you were where you were in the warehouse. Were you on the penthouse of the building?

Were you on the client's location at their office are there where where were you when this problem happened? What are the clients say to you? What did your colleagues say to you? How did you feel about it where you're feeling depressed or bummed out or worried? How was it resolved? How did everything work its way through how did you work together as a team?

That's it That's all a story is it's you talking about a problem recounting a real conversation you had with real customers, clients, colleagues, other employees how you think about it, how you solve the problem, how it was resolved. That's all you really need and a story and describing the setting, people will be able to re experience it with you, the more your stories relate to things that everyone in the room can understand, the better. And then what's going to make it so meaningful is when you thank Sally and accounting or James and it when you thank the people in very, very specific meaningful terms of what they did. getting you out of a jam helping you with a crisis. That's so much more meaningful than sounding like a B level actors won an award. I'd like to thank the following director, my accountant, my CPA, you don't want to sound like you're just giving some sort of generic thanks.

You want it to seem heartfelt. You won't be looking directly at people. When you're talking about it. When you're reliving that situation that was horrible at the time, but we can now laugh at it. You need to be smiling and laughing about it and looking at the person who got caught with mud all over them or something embarrassing happened. And if you're going to talk about something embarrassing, make yourself the butt of the jokes.

And you don't have to worry about your corporate reputation here or your organizational reputation that much because you're retiring so you can be a little looser. I'm not suggesting you get risque and say wildly off color politically incorrect things but you can be a little looser in this situation. It's simply not as formal a presentation. So do you want to make fun of yourself? now is the perfect time to do it. So here's what I want you to do with your speech.

Rather than write it all up. I'd really like you to have a simple one page outline. And I'd like you to have the names of the people you really want to thank. I'd like to have three bullet points that remind you of particular stories, things that happen, where once you see those three words, you know exactly what you want to say for the next three, four minutes. You're recounting that story. You're thanking the people who involved you're talking about, you know, really what you learn from it, why it was so meaningful to you.

And that is the bulk of your speech outline right there. And then the And beyond that, if you want to give people some indication of what you might be doing, I mean, if you've been a lifelong fan of birdwatching, and now you and your spouse are going to travel the world on international birdwatching, Safari and no one else knows about it. They would love to hear that about you. They'd love to know that you're going to continue with an active life and you're not just sitting home and watching television. You're doing something meaningful with your life. So now's the time to share with people what You're doing if they don't all know.

And just and on a positive note, it's a night for positive emotions. I realize you may have mixed emotions and it may be bittersweet, but it is time to accentuate the positive. So your assignment right now is I want you to come up with a simple one page outline. This the names of the people you want to thank, in particular, three stories that really dramatize for you the key moments of your career here, the events that really meant something to you where there was a problem and you can tell a real story. Please do that. Now.

Come up with the outline