On the day: your checklist
What to have in hand, who to tell and what to check before you speak. Items that do not apply to your occasion are marked from your setup.
Essential on a first pass: three items, the first line on the top card, your lost-your-place plan and the microphone answer. The other items can wait until the day before; tick the ones that apply. A reader who skips the checklist tends to find out on the day that the notes are in the wrong order or that nobody holds a spare copy. Voice, microphone and the room and Nerves and the unexpected explain the items.
Day-of checklist
Tick each item as you do it. Add a note beside any item that does not apply. The first line, the lost-your-place plan and the microphone answer are the Start here items.
How to use this sheet
- Tick what you have done, not what you intend to do. The Notes column holds the detail: where the second copy is, who holds it, what the plan is.
- Items that do not apply to your occasion get a note, not a delete. Slides, the screen adapter, the microphone and the toast drink are the usual ones; the note keeps the list whole if your setup changes.
- Lost-your-place plan. Write the plan in the Notes column in your own words: pause, look down, find the next keyword on the card.
- A second copy belongs to a named person (a backup reader or the host), not to a bag.
- Time signal. If a timekeeper will signal, write the signal you agreed on.
The checklist follows Lena Park's case, a toast at a family dinner with no microphone and no slides. The slides and adapter lines carry the note "does not apply to my setup," and so does the microphone line, with her own plan added beside it: she stands at one end of the table and waits for quiet. The drink line applies, because it is a toast, and she writes "any drink" beside it. Her lost-your-place plan reads pause, sip water, look at Daniel, then find the next keyword.
A ticked line means you did the thing. It does not mean the thing will work: a microphone that was fine at the sound check can fail, and a room can change. This checklist cannot tell you what the venue, the officiant or the organizer requires on the day; ask them, and write the answer beside the line.