Public Speaking Tips

OVERCOMING FEAR OF SPEAKING

2011-02-17T19:11:00.000-08:00

Stage fright is an awful experience. It's gut-wrenching, nauseating and knee-quivering and most people fear it more than a trip to the dentist.

I spend quite a lot of my time helping people overcome this fear. I also teach and train corporate employees how to vastly improve their communication skills, and sharpen up their presentations. Have you ever sat through a powerpoint presentation while someone drones on and on but after the 237th slide absolutely COVERED with inexplicable data dumps, you finally give up and just turn off. Death by Powerpoint is a real problem and I can help you with that.

I began my speaking career in College where I competed in speech competitions and won a few of them. However, I was unable to get over the freaking about speaking syndrome. Every time I got up, my diaphragm locked up and I couldn't breath properly and ran out of air mid-sentence. My knees shook so much that they sounded like castanets to my ears though I doubt anyone else could tell unless they could see my trouser pants were waving rapidly at knee level.

That all began to change when I joined Toastmasters International in March 2005. Now, nearly six years later I have been on the national executive as an Area Governor with oversight for six toastmasters clubs, spoken to many outside groups, run speechcraft courses for corporates and in the community, entered competitions and won, and on the 4th of January I received Toastmasters highest award - The Distinguished Toastmaster's Award or DTM for short.. (some say that DTM means "Don't Time Me" as many DTM's tend to go overtime on a regular basis and if last night's club meeting was anything to go by, I guess I've proved that - wow.. waaaay over time).

Now, do I still get nervous before getting up to speak.... yeah, sure I do... if I didn't I would know it was time to stop speaking. Now however, I control the nerves... and while the butterflies still flutter inside my stomach.. they now fly in formation.

If you are someone who would rather have a tooth pulled than to get up in front of a group of people and express yourself, then I strongly recommend you go to the Toastmasters website (World HeadQuarters) or in New Zealand and look for the club finder. Find a club near you that is on the right day and time for you and take yourself off to view them. Go as a visitor ... if it isn't to your taste (each club has a different club culture) then try another one. You will get to learn speaking, putting together a speech, learning about gestures and how to breathe and so much more, in comfortable surroundings and a warm, friendly and supportive environment.

If you live in Christchurch check out Civic - a late afternoon club designed for people to drop in on their way home from work in the CBD.

It might be a bit too late for a New Year's resolution but still - you know what the ubiquitous 'they' say - if you want to change some things in your life... then you have to change some things in your life.. or in other words... to continue doing the same things and expect a different result... that is the definition of insanity.

Drop me a line and let me know how you go.
cheers
Nyree

Public Speaking Tips: What Have I Been Doing

2008-09-10T03:45:00.000-07:00

I have been particularly busy this year with my public speaking. My last engagement was for the Tecorians (a public speaking organisation) where I delivered a presentation and demonstration on Humorous Speaking. I have also been developing public speaking courses, helping other people develop there skills. And I have been competing in impromptu speech competitions.

Time has rather slipped away. However, I thought that I might put together a presentation for you to watch in my next post. Perhaps I will touch on how to be a humorous speaker.

cheers

Nyree

SUMMER IN THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE

2008-02-16T01:38:00.000-08:00

Hi

While most of the world has been dealing with floods, freezing conditions, tornadoes and other natural events, I have been down in New Zealand and enjoyed a wonderful summer in Christchurch, New Zealand.

The weather has been warm, the people amazingly friendly and I have had a number of speaking engagements as well.

If you get the chance to visit this wonderful green country, come in their Spring to their Autumn (October - March). New Zealanders don't use the term 'Fall' to describe autumn. The picture to the left, shows Christchurch taken from Sumner Beach and shows the Southern Alps in the background. New Zealand was founded by English settlers and Christchurch, in the South Island of New Zealand, is known as the most English city outside of England. It has to be seen to be believed.

Its coming into Fall now down here and time for me to bring my holiday/working time to a close. Keep an eye on this blog because soon I will be posting regularly again with hints, tips and products to enhance YOUR speaking abilities.

Keep well

Nyree

Public Speaking Tips - Some Great Resources

2007-10-07T02:24:00.000-07:00

During the years it's taken me to reach my current stage of progress in public speaking, I've referred and used a number of resources. There are some really good resources out there and some others that are a total waste of time.

Everyone has his or her own style and some styles of speaking appeals to certain people and others don't. I hope you are enjoying and using the public speaking tips I've used in here and if you have found them useful, please allow me to recommend some tools to help you further.

Paul Evans is a speaker with a great reputation. He is paid quite a lot for making a speech. Imagine being 'paid' to speak! It's the greatest feeling in the world.

Another program I can recommend is this one.

How to Conquer Public Speaking Fears!

Be sure to check out some of the other resources I've used in my previous blogs and drop me a line if you want some one on one help. Zig Ziglar is a bit of a hero of mine. He has been a professional speaker for a lot of years and he has helped so many others. He has learned a great secret and it is:

You can get whatever you want out of life by helping enough other people get what they want. - Zig Ziglar

Be free

Nyree

Public Speaking Tips - What Next?

2007-10-02T04:22:00.000-07:00

There is only so much preparation that you can do before you speak and only so many public speaking tips you can read. Of course you must go through all the preparation, the research, the audience analytics, topic search and subject research but then comes a time when you just have to DO IT!

Yes, that's right. Now comes the time you have to stand up in front of an audience and actually 'say' something. The rehearsals are all over and tonight (or today) is the day of your debut. I just know that you are going to do well.

Begin small. Take on the challenge of speaking for just 5 minutes. When you are comfortable, then speak for 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes and 1 hour.

Haven't you done well!! Congratulations. The moment you stood up, took a deep breath, made eye-contact with some of your audience, opened your mouth and gave the opening for your speech, you became a winner.

Who said you wouldn't feel nervous? Sure wasn't me because I still feel nervous. I've just learned how to get my butterflies to fly in formation. I've learned to breathe from my diaphragm and to breath deeply and relax all my muscles and take control of the platform, but I still feel nervous.

Nerves give you an edge. They give you sparkle. Nerves and confidence do go hand in hand. Whoever said they didn't or couldn't didn't know a thing about it. Bravery isn't about not being scared. Bravery is being scared and STILL doing what needs to be done.

Well done everyone of you who stood up and spoke. I'd love to hear from you about your experiences. Drop me a comment and let me know that my posts on public speaking tips have helped.

Nyree

Secrets of Successful Speakers: How You Can Motivate, Captivate, and Persuade

Public Speaking Tips For Successful Speakers

2007-09-23T01:32:00.000-07:00

Part Two:

Just browse the previous post to read the first five of my Public Speaking Tips for successful speakers. Adding the previous five tips together with the following ones will give you a real advantage when it comes to your next presentation.

6. Relax. Deep breaths and a few yawns are a marvelous way of de-stressing. Don't have an alcoholic beverage for 'courage' before speaking. It does NOT beat the fear, but it will dull
your mind and produce tiredness so that you will bore your audience. It will make you think
you are giving a really scintillating performance when really, you're bombing out.

7. Don't apologize. Apologizing only draws attention to the things you really don't want or need attention to be drawn to and which the majority of your target audience didn't even notice.

8. Turn the anxiety into positive energy. Gather your nervous energy and transform it into positive, motivating enthusiasm and dynamism.

9. Concentrate on the message not the medium. Whatever you focus your attention on will begin to dominate your thoughts and feelings. So focus all that attention towards your message and your audience rather than on your anxiety and concerns and you will find that the butterflies in your stomach will begin to fly in formation.

10. Understand that people WANT you to succeed. Your target audience will want you to be stimulating. They want you to be informative and they want you to be entertaining. Once you realize this then you can RELAX and enjoy your message, enjoy your rapport with the audience and enjoy the whole process.

These points have been some of the most rewarding things I have learned. Learning them, understanding them and practicing them are what gave me the success I have today.

I hope these tips will help you to grow and develop as a public speaker

Nyree

Secrets of Successful Speakers: How You Can Motivate, Captivate, and Persuade

Public Speaking Tips For Successful Speakers

2007-09-16T14:20:00.000-07:00

Part One:

In my years as a public speaker, I have come to know some really good techniques for helping beginning speakers to grow and develop and I want to share some of these Public Speaking Tips with you.

Public speaking can be really horrifying and some people even have a phobia about it. Having some uneasiness when you are about to get up in front of an audience is quite normal. Even the people who do this for a living are a little nervous. If they weren’t it would be time for them to quit what they are doing. Nerves give you an edge, without that edge you will probably bore your audience. However being fearful and irrationally petrified will not do you any good.

Here are a few public speaking tips to help you overcome the nervousness and deliver an entertain, motivating or informative speech.

Know your material. You should be so immersed in your topic that you need hardly refer to your notes. Notes should be brief bulleted points on a small piece of paper, which are only there for you to glance at from time to time.
Be familiar with the venue. You need to visit the place you are going to speak. Arrive early and take a walk around the room. If there is a stage, familiarize yourself with the steps up to the stage and with the equipment on the stage.
Test the audio-visual equipment. If you are giving a PowerPoint presentation, make sure that all your laptop equipment including spare cables is there and working and make sure that the data projector has a spare bulb and that it is working too. Don't forget to test out the microphone and have someone run a sound check. Check, check and double check. Nothing is more character-testing than having audio-visual equipment break down and you can't fix it. I've know people whose data projector bulb was broken and they didn't have a spare and another person who left the cable that connects their laptop to the data projector at home and there was a huge amount of panic as the venue was searched for a replacement. You will NOT present a professional demeanor if your equipment is faulty and you haven't checked it all out.
Visualize yourself giving the speech. Get a clear picture in you mind of you standing up and delivering the speech or presentation. See yourself succeeding at captivating your audience and informing or entertaining them. When you can visualize yourself being successful, you will be successful.
Know your target audience. If at all possible, mingle and greet some of your audience as they arrive and make them instant friends. You will find it much easier giving your presentations to a group of friends than a group of strangers. Know the specific nature of the guests. Do they belong to the same business type or organization and what has brought them together today. Once you have determined this, put some anecdotes or items of interest relating to their common interest, into your presentation. Perhaps you could make a positive statement about the geography of the town or city you are speaking in or something similar. People enjoy it when you compliment their home town and show you like it.

I will have another 5 Public Speaking Tips for you in my next post. For those of you who can't wait, here are a couple of links that might help.

Secrets of Successful Speakers: How You Can Motivate, Captivate, and Persuade

Mastering Public Speaking (6th Edition) (MySpeechLab Series)

Until then... relax and enjoy

Nyree

How Public Speaking Tips Can Help You

2007-09-08T17:34:00.000-07:00

As a speaker, I'm always looking for public speaking tips to help me improve my presentations. I want to give my audiences great value for money. I figure that if they are prepared to pay me what I'm worth, then I should be prepared to give them more than they paid for. This makes for a 'everyone wins' scenario. So I am constantly browsing for little tips to help me refine my presentations.

I wasn't very surprised to find that in a list of the top fears adults have, the leading one is Public Speaking. I found some information about a survey asking 3000 Americans what their top five fears were. Here is the result of this survey:

1. Public speaking

2. Blindness

3. Heights

4. Heart attack or cancer

5. Death

Can you imagine that? People fear speaking in public more than they fear death. In fact I've heard it said that, given the choice, most people would prefer being in the casket to delivering the eulogy at a funeral. Well, I wouldn't go quite that far but I used to be pretty scared to stand up and talk to people too.

My very first tip that I give anyone when they ask for advice is this:

Tip # 1: FACE YOUR FEAR. Actively look for opportunities to give a speech. If you avoid opportunities then you are yielding to your fear and it's got you beaten. Facing any fear will be stepping out of your comfort zone, but growth only comes at the expense of your comfort and if you really want to improve then you've got to be prepared to get really uncomfortable. The same is true in anything you want to do. In fact, I bet as a baby, your cute little butt got more than a few bruises every time you sat down hard on it when you were learning to walk. If you had let the discomfort of your bruises put you off walking, then your mom would most likely still be trying to carry this big old baby around..

But the fear of public speaking CAN be overcome and finding helpful Public Speaking Tips will do that for you.

Nyree

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Public Speaking Tips: The Do's And The Taboos

2007-09-07T03:25:00.000-07:00

Just as there are definite things to 'do', there are also definite things to NOT do so I thought I would share some of the public speaking tips I've learned through my years of experience as a public speaker.

Do: Know your material backwards and forwards. Be so confident with your speech that you only have notes for a quick glance.

Taboo: Don't quote someone else's material without an acknowledgment of who it belongs to and where you found it.

Do: Know the venue where you are speaking. If possible view it prior to the day of your speaking engagement but if that isn't possible arrive extra early and walk onto the stage, become familiar with where everything is.

Taboo: Don't forget to check any equipment you have with you for your presentations well before you need to use it. If you are going to be using your laptop computer with a data projector or other audio/visual aids, make sure that you have all the cables, power cords, spare batteries and light bulbs you will need. There is nothing more frustrating than setting up your laptop and realizing the cable that connects your computer to the data projector isn't in the bag because you never checked it after someone else borrowed it to use.

Do: Visualize yourself giving your presentation in a successful manner. Seeing yourself handling all the hecklers and having the right quip on hand if something goes wrong. Remember, a well rehearsed joke can ease a load of frustration.

Taboo: Do not arrive to give your presentation without having done some research on your target audience. This is one of the biggest mistakes of public speakers. It's very easy to make an error and offend over half your audience because you neglected to learn the culturally correct phrases and the culturally insensitive comments that will upset people of a particular culture.

Do: Concentrate on the message and not the medium

Taboo: Do not have any alcohol before the presentation to 'steady your nerves'. Alcohol blunts your thinking processes and makes you 'THINK' you're are being clever, witty and wonderful when in fact, the opposite is true.

Do: Turn nervous energy into positive energy. Learn to harness your nervous energy and turn it into vitality, enthusiasm and dynamism.

Taboo: Do not apologize. If you apologize for what went wrong before the meeting or if the bulb on the data projector blows out and you have to replace it during your presentation or for your nervousness, then all you are doing is drawing your audiences attention and causing them to focus on the negative. You have to eliminate the negative from your comments and accentuate only the positive because whatever you focus on will occupy your mind and your audience's minds.

Do: Do realize that people WANT you to succeed. An audience wants you to be interesting, entertaining and stimulating. No one wants to come to a seminar or other presentation and be bored out of their minds.

I am not going to include another taboo in here because I want to finish this on a positive note. The tips I have given you are just a few of the points I have learned the hard way mostly. I can say these all work because they work for me and to friends of mine who are also public speakers.

Nyree

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Public Speaking Tips To Untie The Tongue-tied

2007-09-07T03:18:00.000-07:00

Public speaking tips will definitely not be of any help in the medical/physical condition known as tongue-tie also known as Ankyloglossia. But the sense in which I'm using 'tongue-tied is - "Speechless or confused in expression, as from shyness, embarrassment, or astonishment".

This is a condition many hundreds of thousands or ordinary people find themselves in when it comes time to stand up, face an audience and deliver a speech. Let me ask you if you are familiar with any of these symptoms?

Your heart races
Your palms get sweaty
Your diaphragm quivers and you feel nauseous.
Your knees start to knock
You look at your audience and your tongue is 'glued' to the roof of your mouth
Your mind goes totally blank and you think you are going to faint with sheer embarrassment

Do any of these things sound like something you've experienced? Well let me reassure you... YOU AREN'T ALONE! Do you know that the fear of public speaking is the number one fear of most Americans and in fact most people across the face of the whole world. Ahead of death and being audited by the IRS, the fear of public speaking is way in the lead. In fact most people, if given the choice, would prefer to be in the casket rather than giving the eulogy at a funeral.

In my time, I've experienced all of these symptoms and I have to admit that even now when I get up to deliver a presentation, I still have to overcome anxiety, a racing heart, and a tendency for my mind to go blank when just moments before it was filled with my opening statement.

I have some tips that will help you overcome your fear of public speaking. I will post some of them at another time. Let me know how they helped you.

Nyree

Public Speaking Tips To Enhance Your Skills

2007-09-04T17:14:00.000-07:00

As a speaker, I want to share three public speaking tips that you can use to enhance your next presentation whether its a business talk, a wedding speech or a sales presentation.

Did you know that the fear of public speaking is recognized as the greatest fear of average Americans? Greater than the fear of illness, terrorism, natural disasters and even death, it is the fear of public speaking that most Americans cite as the thing that makes their heart race, their hands shake and sweat and their diaphragm tremble in terror.

The three tips I share below are the three that helped me on the way becoming a public speaker and I share them in the hope that they will help you too.

Here they are:

Tip #1 - Attack the fear. Take every opportunity to give a speech, a talk or a presentation. Face your fear, do battle with it.. dare to step out of your comfort zone and DO IT!

Tip #2 - Practice, practice, practice. The better you know your material, the more confident you will appear and the less you will have to refer to notes.

Tip #3 - Find a mentor with the skills you want to have. Make sure it is someone you can respect. Work with them. Listen to their evaluations and feedback and work on those skills.

These are just a small portion of tips I've learned through hard experience and which helped me to become the public speaker I am today. I hope they help you too.

cheers

Nyree

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