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Resource Mentioned in the video
Karmic Ally Coaching’s 25 Best Public Speaking Tips Report
Prefer to read? Here’s the full transcript.
Public Speaking is more than just a talent but an important and perhaps even crucial leadership skill.
Especially in today’s fast-paced world, communication is crucial to your success as a leader or potential leader. Your ability to articulate ideas and inspire others through speech is becoming increasingly essential for leaders across various industries. Done properly, it can position you as a motivating thought leader.
Hi. I’m Vatsala Shukla from Karmic Ally Coaching and in previous posts I’ve covered the leadership skill of storytelling, commanding a room and even the power of silence.
Today, I’ll be discussing public speaking ability and why I recommend that you should develop this skill.
So, why Is Public Speaking Important?
Admittedly, it is a feared skill and can make a lot of people nervous. They would much rather find anything else to do with their time rather than give a big speech to others. But there are actually a lot of benefits to public speaking.
It is actually one of the most important, and most dreaded, skills that someone should have.
So again, why is public speaking so important?
Well, for starters, it helps to win over a crowd.
Whether you are a business leader looking to get funding, an employee trying to get a job, or in public relations and trying to reach a lot of people, public speaking is a good skill to have. When done well, it can be used to help win over any crowd that you would like, big or small.
To win them over though, you need to present the audience with a compelling argument. And you need to bring in the whole package. It is not enough to just say a few words; you have to make it an experience. Good public speaking skills can help with this.
Another reason is to motivate others.
A person who is great at public speaking is able to use some of those skills to motivate their audience to make a change. There has to be something special in the delivery though.
The audience will not change simply because you told them to. You need to have a good presentation behind you and be a confident public speaker along the way. Being knowledgeable and having the ability to arouse passion can be important here.
And to inform
The ability to inform is an important part of public speaking. Many public speaking events are done in order to inform and help people learn things, especially if you are doing the presentation for class.
Learning how to be a good public speaker will help you to get your information across so you can make a big impact. Having good knowledge of the topic and being a charismatic speaker can go a long way to help with this.
While many people do not like public speaking at all and may try to avoid it at all costs, it is an important thing to learn how to do. It can help you to persuade, to convince people to follow your advice, and to inform others as well. With some practice and doing it more often, you’ll find that public speaking is a good skill to know.
3 Celebrities Who Overcame Their Fear of Public Speaking
Now, Public speaking can be nerve wracking for everyone. It is normal to feel nervous when it is time to do a presentation or get up in front of people. I certainly remember getting butterflies in my stomach whenever I had to participate in a school debate or extempore competition.
At the time, I felt I was the only person who got nervous with public speaking, but later I discovered many celebrities also have the same fear.
Is it not hard to imagine?
The people who get up on the screen and give amazing performances that leave us in awe have trouble speaking in front of others too? It’s true! Celebrities can struggle with speaking in front of other people too. Some of the celebrities that I’ve noted who had to overcome their fear of public speaking include:
Rowan Atkinson
Known as playing Mr. Bean, Atkinson finds himself uncomfortable when it is time to speak in public. This can often be seen when he appears on talk shows. To help handle this, many of his characters overcome problems with speaking and he has even stepped forward to discuss the importance of freedom of speech in his country.
Another example is Tiger Woods.
Tiger Woods has had trouble with public speaking as well. He uses one of the best techniques to help with this problem though, practicing. He says that before bed, he practices to his dog, who is always a great audience.
And a third example is Sir Richard Branson.
Though he is known for daring adventures and lots of fun, he does get nervous any time he has to go on stage. To help with this, he starts with a Q&A session to ease into it.
Public speaking is something that everyone can be worried about and can give anxiety to anyone. It doesn’t matter if you are giving a speech in front of your class or to a worldwide audience, everyone will feel nervous and anxious at some point.
Recognizing the fear and learning how to compensate for it to gain more confidence can help put that fear of public speaking on the backburner.
And there is one great tool that can help you out and that is visualization.
Visualization: The Key to a Good Speech
When you visualize how the speech should go and all the right moves that you can do to give the perfect speech, you will find it is easier to put it into fruition.
Visualize Your Speech
To start, we need to visualize the whole speech. Sit down alone for a few minutes and imagine how you would like the speech to go. Imagine yourself getting up in front of the class, keeping calm and collected as you go. Imagine the words that you would like to say, the tone inflections, and all the other parts that need to go into the speech.
Imagine how it will feel when the whole speech is done. Try to add in as many details as possible from start to finish, including how you feel, who is there, and how well it goes. You can use this to help you get through the speech.
Now how about if you mess up?
Visualize How You Can Recover If You Mess Up
It is possible that you will mess up during the speech. Maybe you will forget something important that you would like to discuss, or you stumble over a word. You may even lose your space in the speech at some point. Rather than getting nervous about it and worrying about how bad it looks, take this time to visualize the mistake and figure out how you will recover.
Sit down and close your eyes. Imagine that you are giving the speech and you do make a mistake. What are you going to do?
There are different ways to recover, so spend some time going over them to see how you will respond. This can give you more confidence even if any mistake does happen.
And then, also Visualize How You Will Respond To Q&A Sessions
If you plan to have a Q&A session with your speech, you can visualize this portion as well. Imagine some of the questions that others are going to ask you about the topic and come up with the responses. When you can imagine some of the potential questions ahead of time, you can reduce some of the stress you feel the day of the speech as well.
(And) Visualization is one of the best tools that you can use to help take control over your speech and to reduce the anxiety that you feel along the way. So, try the technique above and see how easy it can be for you.
To give your public speaking efforts a boost, I’ve got a free report with 25 of the best public speaking tips. Be sure to download it and apply those tips. This is Vatsala Shukla from Karmic Ally Coaching signing off. Bye for now.