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Most special occasions are carefully planned affairs. Recall a wedding, christening, or retirement dinner you’ve recently attended. The occasion likely had a program, featuring certain events occurring at specific times. The program for a retirement dinner, for example, might look something like: “Cocktails at 4:00. Award ceremony at 5:00. Dinner at 6:00.” The occasion may also have featured several speeches. Whenever refreshments, meal service, and multiple speakers are involved, skillful management of the overall program schedule becomes that much more important. If a specific event listed in the program gets off to a late start, or if one of the speakers uses up more time than the program has allotted, then the entire event can quickly go off the rails. For this reason, if you’re giving a speech at such an occasion, make sure you know beforehand when you’re scheduled to speak and what your time allotment is. Then be certain to stick to these logistics while delivering your presentation. As a courtesy, be willing to modify the time for your own presentation if a previous speaker has gone overtime.