Five Tips for Overcoming Public Speaking Nerves

By Bronwyn Ritchie

Your mouth is dry, heart palpitating, and knees knocking. You go into panic, facing a dreaded public speaking assignment.

It doesn’t have to be so.

These five tips will give you some strategies to overcome those symptoms and have the butterflies flying in formation.

1. Deep breathing will pull in oxygen. Adrenalin, secreted to help you deal with the fear brought on by little doubts, causes breaths to become shallow, or causes you to hold your breath. Deep breathing will help your brain work to capacity, and forcing the slower pace will quell the panic.

2. Bluff. Stand tall, with shoulders back and chest out. Smile. Even though you don’t feel happy or confident, do it anyway. You will look confident and your body will fool your brain into thinking it is confident. This really works!!

Bluff – body and smile

3. Keep you mouth and throat hydrated. Plan to keep a drink on hand while you are speaking., though this sounds impossible. Visualizing how you will use it if you need it, and calling up the audacity to do such a thing will carry across to your attitude as you take your place to speak, placing your glass just where you need it to be.

4. Adrenalin sends the blood rushing to the fight/flight centers of your brain at the base of the skull. Place your hand on your forehead and press gently on the bony points. This will bring the blood to the parts of the brain that need it to present your speech best.

5. Know you are prepared. Obviously this depends on actually being prepared, so take every opportunity in the days leading up to the speech to prepare your material. Be familiar with the structure of the presentation, and the ideas to use. Memorize the most important parts, and the parts you are frightened of forgetting. I would memorize the opening of the speech and in the moments before presenting it, would reassure myself that I knew that part, and that would lead on to the rest. It worked!!

If you want to develop your speaking confidence, visit an ITC club. You will have the chance to find the strategies that work for you and perfect them. ITC offers a supportive environment and constructive evaluation for you to develop your communication skills.

Bronwyn Ritchie is a speaker, writer, librarian and trainer and she manages Pivotal Points – resources for the times in your life when you pivot – change direction – towards a better you, a better life.

For tips, articles and courses on public speaking and presentations, visit http://www.consultpivotal.com/public_speaking.htm

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Does your forehead perspire at the mere thought of speaking in public? Public speaking anxiety is one of the most common fears afflicting people.

It stems in large part out of concern we may have of how other people think about us. Will we screw up? What if we forget what we were going to say? Or lose our place in our script. What if our voice breaks, or we freeze in our tracks.

Well the truth of the matter is that any of these things could happen. And if you’re lucky a meteor will fall though the roof and relieve you of your agony. The “what if” game can be paralyzing. If you have a serious problem you may need to seek professional assistance just as you would if you were actually paralyzed. But for most people, the “what if’s” are manageable. The key is to focus less on the “what if’s” and more on your message.

In most circumstances, you need not memorize every word of your speech. Instead focus on the content of your material. Know what you want the audience to get from your presentation, and memorize your outline rather than the words.

Practice explaining each of the points in your outline over and over, out loud or just in your head. Each time you do this it may be different. But you will discover a variety of ways of saying the same thing. Then when actually in front of the audience, you can cover each point in succession talking not from memory, but from a reservoir of memories which will remove the fear of loosing your place in a script or forgetting a line.

Perhaps the best tip about dealing with public speaking anxiety is to point out that the most important participant in a speech is not the speaker, but the audience. They are the empty bucket that must be filled with the ideas you are presenting.

If you will know people in the audience, imagine giving your presentation to them individually. Then think of them in a group of other friends, and then in a section of your audience. See them with a smile on their face and an encouraging attitude. Imagine yourself giving the perfect presentation. This is one time when positive expectations will do wonders. Your own positive thoughts can go a long way is quieting public speaking anxiety.

And while you may imagine yourself giving a perfect presentation, the odds are you won’t. And that’s okay. Accept the fact that even professional speakers stub their toes on occasion. Don’t sweat the small stuff. If you lose your place in a prepared text, just pause, take a deep breath and take a moment to find it. The audience isn’t going anywhere. They will wait. Then carry on.

Public speaking is like any other skill. The more often you give presentations the easier it will be to overcome you public speaking anxiety.

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The fear of public speaking is a common trait, and can become a personal roadblock affecting your career and social life unless confronted head on.

The ability to effectively communicate ideas and concepts to multiple people is a critical leadership skill, one which when mastered can help you advance in whatever career you seek to pursue, whether public speaking is a large or small part of the day to day tasks.

A group leader within any organization must be able to communicate that organizations immediate and long term objectives to the assembled team. This communication may be as simple as the days assignments, or more complex outlining corporate strategy and seeking employee input on critical functions.

In any of these communications, there are always at least two major components, the message and the delivery. The source of many people’s fear of public speaking springs from their inexperience with one or the other of these two elements.

The better you understand the material, the easier it is to communicate it. The more confidently you present the material, the more likely the message will get through to your audience.

If you are in an entry or mid level to level job, your ability to communicate with your fellow workers and help them understand and perform their tasks is a characteristic your employer will appreciate.

Recognizing this, it’s imperative that you work to build your personal skills. The first step is to focus on your audience. The odds are that you know some of your fellow workers better than your manager or boss does. If nothing else, you probably get to hear some of their franker feedback.

Much that is said in the workplace and in every day life is misspoken and/or misheard. When you notice such circumstances think to yourself how it could have been better said to communicate the message. If the speaker is speaking over someone’s head or using jargon, imagine how you might have said it better.

The goal of public speaking it to communicate, and if you pay attention to how your co-workers or friends react to someone else’s presentation, you will begin to pick up useful tips on how to be more effective yourself in a similar situation.

So the speaking task requires not only knowing the material, but also the audience. Your goal is to connect the dots between the two.

The second source of fear is that of appearing foolish. If you have a handle on your main message and focus on your audience, the odds are that you won’t actually have any problem with this. And if you do, take solace in the fact that people’s memories are really quite short. At the worst, you may get some ribbing from your friends. But no worse than if you were to fall off the proverbial horse. The secret is to get back on, and seek out another chance to speak again.

You will be surprised at how forgiving your audience will be. After all, many of them share your fear of public speaking and will sympathize with you. And the experienced speakers in your audience will smile inwardly as they recall how they too, at one time shared the same fear of public speaking. The only difference being that they, like you had the gumption to actually get up and speak, despite their fear of public speaking. These are the people who will recognize you for your efforts and keep you in mind when advancement opportunities present themselves.

Effective communications is important in all organizations. Your willingness to overcome your fear of public speaking is one of the surest ways to advance within any organization.

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