Overcoming the FEAR of Public Speaking and Presentations

Overcoming the FEAR of Public Speaking and Presentations


Picture this: you walk into this room where 15 people wait in anticipation of your presentation, and they include some of the top management who are your potential clients, You are there to present a pitch.

Or imagine this, you are waiting outside a room for an interview, and if you nailed it, you are hired!

Now, the little voice in your head starts asking these questions:

"What should I say?"

"What will they ask me?"

"Am I truly prepared?"

And your body starts to shiver and your hands are sweating. Without realising it, you are breathing heavily, and guess what, you have butterflies in your stomach...

Sounds familiar?

It is safe to say that everyone has his fair share of this scary experience. This is FEAR - Fear of presenting and speaking in front of a group of people. Although some naturally do not possess this fear, most people do, including me.

Lucky you, it is good that you have this FEAR! If you can turn this into something positive, eventually you will be able to overcome it. Do you want to know more? Read on...
The solution is the word FEAR itself, discover how the word can help each of us, to conquer our very own fear.

Find

First of all, find out what causes you to be afraid. Yes, facing reality is the point. One must be able to learn to overcome fear by admitting one's weakness. By understanding your fear, you can overcome it. Start by asking yourself some questions, "What am I afraid of?", "How can I then overcome it?", "What can I do to make this presentation better?", "If this does not work, what will happen?"By doing this, you actually realise that you will be able to find answers to it and this process can help you to identify both problems and solutions. Just be positive.

Evaluate

At this phase, you weigh the pros and cons of the solutions and come out with the best answer to overcome the problems. At the same time, you will be able to realise how you can actually improve your presentation or how you can present yourself at the interview. Take for example, realising that your fear is that your presentation is too long or boring. Try making it short and brief, fill it up with some visuals that can help your audience to understand it better. Practise KISS (keep it short and simple). You may also be afraid that you may make some blunders during the presentation (who does not anyway?). Address it immediately, "I am sorry for the mistake, it was unintentional", and move on with the presentation.

Act

When you are aware of your fear and have solutions to it, ACT on it immediately, do not wait. If you have a trembling voice or merely afraid that you may forget some key points during presentation, the best solution is to practise, even with the slightest time given. If you have more time, practise in front of a mirror. As you are talking, look at yourself in the mirror, and when you are comfortable, move on by presenting it to your friends or family members. Have more interactions with them. In this way, you will be able to learn how to control your audience and, at the same time, control your trembling voice.

Response

In order to be able to help yourself to improve your presentation skills and interactions with your audience, do not be afraid of getting feedback and response from your audience. Your audience knows best, as they are the ones who are listening to you and will be able to give feedback on your presentation. Take note of all the feedback, regardless of whether they are negative or positive. Fine tune and improve on your weaknesses with a positive mindset, and keep those good points of yours.


The next tip is to understand your audience. This is crucial, so as to make sure that all the key messages are clearly understood. One must know whom they are speaking to. By knowing who they are, you will be able to be more prepared, be it contents of your presentation, or presentation style, intonation and even your length of presentation.

If you are speaking to a large crowd of children, make sure there is a lot of informal interactions and interesting visuals as they lose interest very quickly. If you are speaking to your superior, avoid using strong words, like "in order to improve our performance in the next fiscal year, let's do this...", instead, use words that are polite, formal and less dictating, such as "we may explore a few ways to improve our performance in the next fiscal year", "please feel free to suggest in this discussion" and "we may start with the first suggestion which is..."

There are many ways to improve and enhance one's presentation and public speaking skills, but there is no express way to do it. Lame as it is, practice makes perfect, and I could not agree more with Micki Holiday in his book, Secrets of Power Presentations, "know your stuff, know whom you are stuffing, and know when they are stuffed." With this in mind, the next time you are preparing for a presentation, what better way to remind yourself than to use this tip: Be prepared, know your audience and stop when necessary, without overdosing them with too much of information. As they always say, "just nice will do!"

Nothing is more important than to practise and be prepared. Nothing beats that. Everyone has his or her first time. I had mine. Enjoy and happy presenting!