Public speaking anxiety, or glossophobia, affects up to 75% of the population. Overcome your fears and captivate any audience with these 5 tips for leaders to become better public speakers.
If public speaking is one of your greatest fears as a leader, don’t worry: you’re not alone. In fact, in a survey from the Wall Street Journal, public speaking ranked as the #1 fear among people, even more than being hit by a car or flying.
As a leader, you may find yourself in a cold sweat when it comes time to deliver a speech. But take a deep breath! Regardless of your audience and any preexisting fears, there are actionable steps you can take to shrug off the shame and master your own public speaking abilities. The good and bad news is the more you practice, the better you will become. Here are five tips to perfect your public speaking abilities.
Perfect Your Public Speaking: 5 Tips
1. Leverage the power of storytelling. Stories are remembered 22 times more than facts and data. Influential leaders look for innovative ways to inspire, make a point, or grab people’s attention by replacing humdrum data or bullet points with captivating stories. Your story doesn’t have to be long or melodramatic, either. To do this effectively, you can use metaphors, similes, and analogies, or even share a customer story. Like you will observe from most TED talks, storytelling is key to giving a compelling speech and truly connecting with your listeners.
2. Be action-oriented in your speeches. Keeping in mind that your audience’s capacity to remember your message is limited, providing a short list of actionable takeaways is key for any presentation. Experts suggest organizing your speech into no more than three main ideas that you can deliver clearly and impactfully, making your few talking points as memorable as possible.
3. Study great public speakers. It goes without saying that one way to become an expert is to study the experts who came before you. Some things to take note of when watching other public speaking experts are their body language—how they use their arms and hands to emphasize key points, how they deliver their words by practicing voice and breath control, and how they strategically pause during their speech to keep the audience engaged and to avoid seeming rushed. There is a practiced intentionality that separates the great speakers from the rest of the pack.
4. Know your audience. Knowing your audience and their expectations means you will be able to tailor your speech to make it more interesting and relevant to them. This begins with understanding why this topic matters to them, considering what they might expect from the presentation, and gauging the level of existing knowledge they have about the topic. Knowing demographics—age, gender, background—can also help you fine-tune your speech so it lands well.
5. Harness the power of mindset. When adrenaline spikes, you may feel the unpleasant sensations of a racing heartbeat, clammy hands, and buckling knees; all things that primitively make you want to crawl into a hole and never come out. The reality, though, is this is your body preparing you for a critical moment, much like running from a saber-toothed tiger in the jungle.
While giving a speech is arguably less dangerous than avoiding a tiger attack, recognizing this energy as the powerful catalyst it is can make all the difference when readying yourself to give a speech.
Instead of thinking public speaking is akin to running for your life, consider that you are now prepared to run with the tigers! You were not just built to survive, but to thrive!
Master the Art of Public Speaking
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