The University Speaking Center
Monroe’s Motivated Sequence
This 5 step organizational pattern focuses on maintaining the audience’s motivation to listen
throughout the presentation. Steps 2-4 form the main points found in the body of the speech.
Step 1 – Attention
 Arouse the interest of your audience.
 Be sure what you say and/or do is relevant to the audience and topic.
 Your goal in this step is to involve the audience in the topic, generating a rational for them to
listen.
Step 2 – Need
 Make the audience feel a need for change.
 Show them that there is a serious problem with the existing situation.
 It is important to state the need for change clearly and to illustrate it with strong supporting
materials.
 Your goal in this step is to get the audience so concerned about the problem that they are
psychologically primed to hear your solution.
Step 3 – Satisfaction
 Satisfy the sense of need (for change) by providing a solution to the problem.
 Present your plan and show how it will work.
 Your goal in this step is for the audience to clearly understand how your solution satisfies the
need for change (in other words, how it solves the problem).
Step 4 – Visualization
 Intensify the audience’s desire for your plan by visualizing the benefits.
 Use vivid imagery to show your listeners how they will profit from your plan/solution.
 Your goal in this step is for the audience to see how much better conditions will be once your
plan is adopted.
Step 5 – Action
 Say exactly what you want the audience to do – and how to do it.
 Give them the address to write.
 Tell them where they should go to join.
 Show them how to register to vote.
 Conclude with a final stirring appeal that reinforces their commitment to act.
University Speaking Center, 3211 MHRA, 256-1346
For more resources check out our website speakingcenter.uncg.edu
Example
Attention:
Have you ever had cockroaches running through the cupboards in your apartment?
Have you sweltered in the heat because the air conditioning didn’t work? Or
shivered in the cold because the furnace was broken? Or waited months for the
security deposit you never got back even though you left your apartment as clean
when you moved in?
Need:
Throughout the city students and other apartment tenants are being victimized by
unresponsive and unethical landlords. Just last year more than 200 complaints
were filed with the city housing department, but no action has been taken against
the landlord.
Satisfaction:
These problems could be solved by passing a strong tenants’ right bill that defines
the rights of tenants that specifies the obligation of landlords, and imposes strict
penalties for violators.
Visualization:
Such bills have worked in a number of college communities across the nation. If
one were passed here, you would no longer have to worry about substandard
sanitary or safety conditions in your apartment. Your landlord could not violate
the terms of your lease or steal your security deposit.
Actions:
A tenants’ rights bill has been proposed to the city council. You can help get it
passed by signing the petition I will pass around after my speech. I also urge you
to help by circulating petitions among your friends and by turning out to support
the bill when it is debated in the city council next week. If we all work together,
we can get this bill through the council.
This organizational structure can be incorporated into traditional speech outlining practices.
Lucas, S. The Art of Public Speaking 7th edition
University Speaking Center, 3211 MHRA, 256-1346
For more resources check out our website speakingcenter.uncg.edu