Fear-less public speaking
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Why You Should Be the Only Person Who Can Give Your Presentation

29/4/2024

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I was helping to run a workshop recently for high school student leaders. They were practising inspirational-type speeches that they would be giving at school assemblies to younger students.  Common themes were making the most of opportunities at school, overcoming adversity, and making friends. All students spoke well, but they spoke in generalities. For example, they encouraged younger students to take up extracurricular activities such as sports and music without talking much about their own activities. 
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​Then a young man spoke about how he had almost been expelled in his second year at high school until a teacher had recognised his potential, taken an interest in him and set him on a different path. He was now a student leader. Six months later, his speech is the only one I remember. Why? Because he didn’t talk about the idea of overcoming adversity – he demonstrated how he had done just that. 

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Had a Speech That Bombed? How to Figure Out What Went Wrong and Fix It.

30/3/2024

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​Everyone has experienced failure at work, but the public humiliation of a bombed presentation is particularly hard to handle. And it can stay with you for a long time. Unfortunately, a common reaction is for people to try to avoid public speaking after a failure – which is career-limiting, stressful and often impossible long-term. 
 
You can recover from a poor presentation and become a much better presenter.  But instead of avoiding it, you have to figure out what went wrong and what you can do to fix it. This article explores the most common reasons for a poor presentation and what you can do to stop the same thing from happening again.   Of course often it is not just one thing, but a combination. 

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A Three-pronged Approach to Dealing With Public Speaking Anxiety

31/10/2023

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​If previous attempts to tackle your fear of public speaking have failed, this article is for you. It explains why learning public speaking skills, practice (preferably in a safe environment), and mindset shifts can work together to help you overcome a fear of public speaking. I like to think if it as a three-pronged approach. Like the legs on a stool, you need all three!

I have had clients who keep ‘putting themselves out there’ but find they are still highly anxious and can’t understand why – until I explain that they may need to examine some of their beliefs or mindsets about public speaking. I have had other clients who attend  one of my courses thinking they can just take notes and be cured of their fear! Unfortunately, it does not work this way!

Let’s take a look at each of the prongs.

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How a Lack of Confidence Can Stop a Good Public Speaker From Being Great

13/10/2022

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Skilled speakers exude confidence, right?

Not necessarily. Many reasonably good speakers suffer from intense self-doubt, which ruins the experience of speaking for them and holds them back from becoming great speakers.

​If you are an anxious speaker, you have probably decided you are rubbish at it – but, as this article explains, you may well be underrating your abilities.​

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Six Tips to Help You Get the Most From Your Public Speaking Course

28/7/2022

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​So, you have finally decided to do something about your public speaking anxiety and signed up for a course. Congratulations – you have taken a great first step! 

As a public speaking coach, I see so many people get amazing results – but not everyone gets what they need. Here are some tips that will maximise your chances of success.

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Why a 'Service Mindset' Will make You a Better Public Speaker - And a Less Nervous One!

19/5/2022

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Public speaking is a performance, but it is not the same as acting. There are two main differences. The first is fairly obvious – as an actor, you are being someone else, but as a public speaker, ideally you are being yourself. Many people struggle with being themselves in front of an audience. How often do you hear people go into 'presentation mode'? They take on a professional persona that is an unconscious form of acting.

The second difference is about your relationship with the audience. An actor pretends that the audience is not there. But as a public speaker, you are there to engage directly with the audience – you acknowledge your listeners. To the audience, you are the whole point – and vice versa. Otherwise,  you may as well just hand out notes!

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How I Am Using Yoodli — A New AI Tool — To Support My Public Speaking Coaching

20/4/2022

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Yoodli is an exciting new AI public speaking tool that I am using in my coaching.

A lot of my work is with people who have extreme public speaking anxiety that holds them back from achieving their career and life goals.
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In my experience, there are three things that people need to overcome a crippling fear of public speaking:
  1. A supportive coach who can help build their self-confidence and bring about some mindset shifts
  2. An understanding of the skills involved in public speaking
  3. A safe place to practice their developing and newly acquired skills.

Yoodli won’t replace the coach but it is a great tool to enable safe practice and support skill development.

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Giving a good presentation is one thing – but having impact is another

29/3/2022

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​Recently someone approach me for private coaching. She was nervous about an upcoming presentation. Before she ran through her presentation, she told me that her topic was important to her audience and she really wanted to have impact. Then she practiced her presentation by sharing her screen as she read, or sometimes paraphrased, a series of PowerPoint slides. 

She came across as professional, knowledgeable and confident. Had she not mentioned her desire to have impact, I would have been quite encouraging in my feedback. I would have suggested fewer words on the slides and starting and finishing without slides so that she was more visible to the audience. But I would have reassured her that presentation was as good as many work presentations I see.
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However, I knew that she would not achieve her goal of having impact. I could barely see her on my screen and I had read all the words on the slides before she spoke to them. I gave her positive feedback but I also told her that her presentation was not memorable. I also pointed out that she was adding very little value and she could just as easily have paused and let the audience read her slides for themselves!​

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Why Reading Your Speech is Like Riding a Bike with Training Wheels

31/1/2022

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​Remember learning to ride a bike? You probably started with training wheels. What happened when your parents removed the training wheels? Perhaps you went, wobble, wobble, wobble, splat. The next time the wobble lasted a little longer before the splat, and then maybe by the third or fourth time, you went wobble, wobble and then took off. You were away!

Would you have ever learned to ride a bike if you had kept the training wheels? Unlikely. Training wheels don’t teach you to balance; they just give you a feel for sitting on a bike.

Relying heavily on notes when you are learning to speak publicly is a bit like using training wheels on a bike. You will never be able to deliver a speech without notes if you always read your notes. Unlike training wheels, you may not need to ditch your notes altogether. But you will need to stop reading them!​

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No good at public speaking? Six reasons why improving is just like learning to play a new sport (or any other complex skill)

27/7/2021

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I recently heard someone describe the three phases he goes through when learning a new skill. The first stage is fear. The second stage is grit – the hard work that goes into getting good at anything. Thirdly, there is mastery – the feeling of being highly skilled.

I found this relatable. I started my public speaking journey 17 years ago as an extremely nervous speaker. It took me eight years of consistent effort to feel proficient. Mastery is a strong word – especially when there is always room for improvement – but when things go well, I feel proud of what I have achieved.

I took up yoga around the same time as public speaking and have established a consistent practice that serves me well. I can identify the three phases too. The fear wasn't intense but I had nagging self doubt about whether my body was right for yoga (a baseless concern but very real!)

However, I can think of many things I have started but not achieved mastery or even proficiency. 

Languages, for example! At various times in my life, I have studied Latin, French, Spanish, German, Italian and Māori – but have not become fluent in any of them. I don’t have a gift for languages – but nor do most people. I am not fluent because I never persevered long enough to achieve that level. In fact I have never really progressed beyond the fear stage - fear that I sound terrible! 

Back to public speaking. Like any sport, craft, or even a language, public speaking is a skill-set that anyone can learn. No one would expect to be instantly good at a new activity requiring complex skills, but for some reason, we don’t view public speaking the same way. Many people are quick to judge themselves as just not suited to public speaking. 

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<<Previous

    Catherine Syme

    You will find around 70 articles here, mainly about public speaking nerves. These articles feature many of my clients and their stories about dealing with public speaking anxiety. 

    If you are interested in a course or one-on-one coaching, see 
    what others say for direct testimonials. 

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