The public speaking & presentation training group

Almost every one of us will have an opportunity to be involved in public speaking in some form at some point in our lives. Therefore when the opportunity comes it helps if you are prepared to do a good job.

Why is public speaking important?

• Increases your own self-confidence. Most people fear public speaking so mastering these skills will be a huge confidence boost for your future challenges e.g. speaking at a wedding, at a work presentation, in front of new friends etc…
• Helps fine-tine your everyday verbal and non-verbal communication skills.
• It’s really a one to one communication. Your one to one skills will also improve.
• Career booster – you will also hear this from most business schools. By being able to share information with others you’re better able to increase the impact of your message and ideas that drive business value. e.g. at team meetings, presentations, one to one manager (see point above) etc…
• Persuade people – you are always selling yourself when you speak to anyone. When we are able to appeal to friends or colleagues as human beings that have emotions, desires and thoughts just like we do we can better get our message across.

The Public Speaking & Presentation Training Group (Bay Area)

2 weeks ago I attended my 1^st MethodSpeaking – Public Speaking & Presentation Training Group ran by Peter Khoury from Ovson Communications in San Francisco. I was introduced to this group by Cesar Teague principal consultant from Next Level Up whom I met at the last PowerTeam event. Thanks Cesar!

This group session was Awesome!

The session starts off with playing the “Zip, Zap, Zop”, an Improv game, to warm up, connect and build a group mind. If you want to know more about this technique visit this Wikipedia article.

Peter follows through with a number of interesting topics related to NLP to eliminate public speaking fears and insights into how we all interpret words differently. The latter is great to see how a single word which has a meaning to you can mean something entirely different to another person. I cover this excercise in detail below.

Words are just tools, give them back. ~ Peter Khoury

During the meet up there is an opportunity to speak in front of the whole group on selected topics or just consciously stream your thoughts to the group. Conscious streaming helps in building new connections in the brain and is encouraged if you find difficulty in talking about a specific topic.

As mentioned above public speaking is really a one to one communication. Therefore connecting (eye to eye) with each person in the group as you speak and looking for acknowledgment (head nod or facial expression of acknowledgement) assures that the listener understands what you are saying and you can move focus to the next listener to gain rapport with them.

Using an oral hook at the beginning of your communication will surprise the audience and make them sit up and take notice. A well-placed joke, anecdote or a provocative one-sentence statement that gets listeners intrigued as you open up communication is all that is required to elicit this behaviour.

Now let’s look at some of the great exercises I learnt at this meet up:

Using NLP to eliminate the fear of public speaking

A lot of the fear in our life is associated to the story we keep telling our self, or have told our self for such a long time that it had become encoded into our subconscious mind.

This may have been due to a bad experience when you were younger or just something someone else (who didn’t know any better) made you believe it.

Fear of public speaking is one of those examples. Great speakers are made, not born. In order to break your fear you must face your fear. Facing your fear is harder done then said, but, there is a great technique which can reduce the sinking (cold feet) feeling you get when asked to speak in public.

The technique is called “Anchoring” derived from NLP (neuro-linguistic programming) by which memory recall, state change or other responses become associated with (anchored to) some stimulus, in such a way that perception of the stimulus (the anchor) leads by reflex to the anchored response occurring.

Basically this helps in changing the feeling you get when fear strikes to something which makes you feel powerful and confident!

Here’s how it works:

1. 1. Close your eyes and think of an amazing time you had when you felt great, full of energy, positive, fearless and in high spirit. Remember how you felt and your body posture. Pay attention to the feeling this memory gives you. It may be a warm feeling or tingling in your head.
2. 2. Open your eyes and touch & hold your left hand index finger’s knuckle with your right hand index finger sending the positive feeling to this stimulus. This “anchors” this positive feeling to this stimulus.
3. 3. Let go of those memories and breathe deeply in and out. To test the anchor touch & hold your left hand index finger’s knuckle with your right hand index finger. Did you feel the same feeling you had in step 1? If not, repeat 1 to 3 points above until you do.
4. 4. Now let’s focus on a negative feeling. Say when you were afraid of a public speaking session. Close your eyes and try to remember the event and the feeling/s inc. body posture. It might have felt like a sinking feeling or cold feet.
5. 5. Open your eyes and touch & hold your left hand middle finger’s knuckle with your right hand middle finger sending the feeling to this stimulus.
6. 6. Let go of those memories and breathe deeply in and out. To test the anchor touch & hold your middle hand index finger’s knuckle with your middle hand index finger. Did you feel the same feeling you had in step 4? If not, repeat 4 to 6 points above until you do.
7. 7. Now the fun part. We will mix the 2 feelings together to reduce the severity of the negative feeling. Touch & hold your middle hand index finger’s knuckle with your middle hand index finger and when the negative feeling sets in touch & hold your left hand index finger’s knuckle with your right hand index finger sending positive feelings. The 2 feelings should mix just like hot and cold water mixes to make it room temperature. You may feel a spinning feeling. This is all good!
8. 8. Practise this a few times and you will be on your way to erasing those negative responses. In no time you will be saying “Hello public speaking!”.

How we interpret words differently

The aim here is to understand that what you say may mean something entirely different to the listener then to you. Communication is expressing ideas and if the other party has a different view (image in their head) of the words you use you may not get your message across.

To realise how we interpret words differently, make sure you do this excercise with a partner.

In the middle of a blank page write the word “Dancing”. Now draw rays coming out of this word. At the end of each ray write down what the word “Dancing” means to you. Make sure your partner does this same exercise. When you both are finished compare notes. You will be amazed at the difference.

Practise makes perfect

If you already know about developing new habits then you understand that practise makes perfect. Every new habit requires energy and effort to learn. Perfection comes from practise & preparation. Therefore I strongly encourage you to attend public speaking events in order to grow your public speaking skills while gaining constructive feedback from people other than your friends or family.

If you want to attend the meet up I did (do) register here:
http://www.meetup.com/The-Public-Speaking-Presentation-Skills-Boot-Camp-Group/

There is also Toastmasters International which helps people become more competent and comfortable in front of an audience. Toastmers has 12,500 clubs in 106 countries. Visit their website here and find your nearest group:
http://www.toastmasters.org/

More to come!

I’m going to be attending more public speaking events in the coming months and will blog about the learning’s here – so stay tuned. Plenty to learn and experience.

Ernest

Popularity: 2% [?]

Tagged as: boost your career, persuade people, presentation, public speaking, self-confidence