Public speaking with no clothes

By: Ellen Egan

Ok, its kind of a funny title.   At the time it was a bit of a public speaking nightmare. But, after a bit of time has passed, its now a funny story. 

The first time I was scheduled for a public speaking event where I had to speak in French, I took a lot of time to be sure all my preparations were in place.  If you have read any of my articles or previous blogs, you know that one of my main tips for public speaking is to be sure you are prepared.  Know your topic, know your audience, know your venue and prepare your materials.  These are all essential techniques to ensure success in any public speaking situation.

I love public speaking, but this time I had a serious fear of public speaking in French.   So, I took extra time with everything.  I even made sure to take my materials in my hand luggage to be sure that they didn’t get lost en route (from Geneva, Switzerland to Lome, Togo).  The thing that did get lost en route was my luggage.  So, I arrived in Africa for a week of presentations, with only black pants and a little blue sweater for clothing.

I discovered several things on this trip.

1.  The women in Togo are, in general, taller than I am.

2.  It is possible for an airline to lose your luggage for 8 weeks.

3.  Presenting in a language other than your mother-tongue is not as scary as it might seem at first.

4.  Most importantly, (and this is true for all public speakingsituations) the people in your audience are generally really nice people who want to see you succeed. And, they will cut you a lot of slack, no matter what the situation – even if your grammar is not perfect and you wear the same outfit 5 days in a row.

No matter what the public speaking situation, your audience usually wants to see you succeed and they will forgive the faults that you may perceive as huge.  Most difficult situations can become funny stories with the passage of time.

To your success,

Ellen

PS.  When travelling, try to remember to bring a little sewing kit in case all your clothes are lost and you need to shorten everything you buy so that you can wear it.

Don’t dwell on past public speaking difficulties

By:  Ellen Egan

We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated. — Maya Angelou
I came across this quote today and, well, I just love Maya Angelou quotes.  But, this one immediately made me think of past public speaking “challenges”.

When I first started training and public speaking, my mentor told me “one of these days you are going to be on stage and think you are in the middle of a sh** storm”.  At the time, I was just falling in love with public speaking and I couldn’t envision what she was talking about.  Well, a couple of months later I was on stage and thinking “oh, so this is what she meant by a sh** storm”.   That day, it felt like a disasterous experience, but I sure learned a lot from it.

I imagine that you may have had “challenging” public speaking experiences – maybe even a sh** storm.  The key is not to dwell on the negative aspects of it , but to learn from it and  use it to improve your public speaking. 

When you look back on the situation, a couple of things may be helpful.

1.  What could you have done to prevent the situation?  Better preparation?

2.  What did you do well in handling the situation that you could use in the future?

3.  What could you improve in the future?

When you begin thinking of how you can learn from difficult situations, you are already overcoming them.  And, remember the next time a “challenging” situation arises in public speaking, that you have survived in the past and you can do better next time.

To your success

Ellen

Flipchart fear?

by:  Ellen Egan

While mentoring some colleagues to help them overcome their fear of public speaking and to  improve their public speaking skills, I noticed a distinct “fear of the flip chart”.  What is it and how does one overcome it?

It can be easy to spot someone with a fear of public speaking because they are glued to the spot where they began their speech and they refuse to move.  The idea of using any kind of props (e.g. flip charts, handouts, etc) is terrifying because they would have to move and it might make the experience go on even longer. 

However, an important public speaking tipis to use flip charts and other props to support your presentation.  The way you use your flip chart is a critical part of public speaking. Here are some important public speaking tips and techiniques for using a flip chart effectively:

1.  Arrive early and be sure that the flip chart is positioned so that you can get to it easily when you need it.

2.  Be sure that it is positioned so that you can stand next to it and write while still facing your audience (ie. Do Not Turn Your Back On Your Audience!)

3.  Make sure you have several markers that work and immediately throw away the ones that don’t work. You don’t want to be scrambling to find a good marker during your presentation.

4.  Only use blue or black markers please.  It is too difficult for those at the back of the room to see other colors.  Red is OK to accentuate things already written in blue or black.

5.  When writing on the flip chart, make your letters at least 2-3 inches tall.

6.  Draw lines in pencil on the flip chart beforehand to help you keep your writing legible.

7.  Plan out your flip chart pages as you are wrting the outline for your presentation.  They will be the support for your public speaking presentation.

8.  Write notes to yourself, in pencil on the flipchart to help remind yourself of all the important points to be included. I promise your audence won’t see the pencilled notes.

9.  If you have something that you want to present and then accentuate during the presentation or discussion, write out the flipchart page beforehand so that you can just flip the page to it.

10.  If you need to refer to something that you wrote on a page at a later point in your presentation, rip  off the page and ask someone to tape it up on the wall – don’t forget to bring big masking tape for this.

Flipcharts are a great way to be interactive with your audience and get their inputs to your presentation.  People feel important when you write their words and ideas on paper in front of the room.

I hope that this sparks some ideas on using flipcharts to strengthen your public speaking and help to overcome any “fear of the flip chart”.

Ellen

What about public speaking in small groups?

By:  Ellen Egan

Does speaking in a small group or meeting count as public speaking? 

Absolutely! 

Whenever you speak to other people in a public setting, you are doing public speaking.  And while the strategies and tips on public speaking are somewhat the same for small and large groups, there are important differences to ensure success. 

I know several people who are very comfortable with public speaking in front of large groups but they have a fear of public speakingwhen they  get into a small group or office meeting situation. And, vice versa, of course.

In a small group situation you can use some of the same strategies to overcome your fear of public speaking that you would use in a large group. 

1.  Stand, if at all possible.  This will immediately set you apart as the expert on your topic.  It also improves your posture and frees up your diaphragm so that you can more easily control and project your voice.  You will also have greater freedom of movement – rather than being trapped behind a desk or table.

2.  In a small group or meeting it is more likely that you know your audience.  Think of their perspective on the topic, their needs in terms of data and information and the outcomes they desire.  With this information you can tailor your presentation to them and their smiles of appreciation will help to alleviate your public speaking fear.

3.  As you can more easily see people’s faces and gauge their reactions from body language, you can make better eye contact, smile and engage your audience.  Engaging your audience is an important public speaking tip to help you feel more comfortable and to ensure your success.

There are advantages to public speaking within a small group.  As with most public speaking situations, your audience wants you to succeed.  Keep that in mind whether you are looking out at a small group or a large sea of smiling faces.

To your success.

Ellen

Public speaking question – handouts Yes or No?

By: Ellen Egan

This morning I had the standard public speaking question of whether or not you should provide handouts before or during a presentation.  But, it came from the somewhat unlikely source of my 5 year old son.

Here’s the situation.  He wanted to do a presentation about frogs to his Montessori class (yes, this certainly qualifies as public speaking). He wanted to make copies of the pictures of the frogs to give to each class member to look at while he spoke.

Now, in my standard tips on public speaking I would always advise against handing out anything to the audience before or during your presentation as this tends to serve as a distraction.  But in this case, he had no audiovisual support to display the somewhat technical information he was describing (pictures of frogs from the rainforest).  Also, his audience had no previous experience with the items he was discussing.

While to those with a fear of public speaking, the prospect of having an audience that is distracted from your talk might seem agreeable.  The distraction does not really help the audience.

If, you have information that 1.  your audience has no previous experience with and 2. you have no other method of familiarizing the audience with the information then, you should first make arrangements for audiovisual equipment to be available.  If that is not possible, then provide handouts and be prepared to have a distracted audience.  I will discuss how to manage a distracted audience in a future blog.

All the best,

Ellen