Speakers, how do you reflect on your presentation year and plan for the new year? Last year, many readers responded positively to my “Weekly Win” jar, where at the end of each week, I write down my weekly wins on a Post-it note and add them to the jar. By the end of the year, […]
Communication Skills
Speakers – Overcome the Fear of Rejection
Speakers get comfortable with your audience. With Halloween just around the corner, I am reminded of things that scare us. Generally cited at the top of the list of things we fear is public speaking. After years of working as a communication coach and working with speakers who fear getting in front of an audience […]
How a Successful Speaker Remembers their Content
6 Speaker Strategies for Speech Memorization In previous posts, I’ve written about content creation. Now we are switching gears to the next part of the speaking preparation process. After you have developed the content of what you want to deliver to your audience, the rehearsal protocol begins. In my experience, it is the most challenging […]
How Do You Create Content for Your Speech?
A Road Map to Developing Your Speech One of the areas where many emerging speakers struggle is how to start creating content for a speech, or presentation. There are many steps in the process of developing content for an audience, then verbally delivering it. Let’s start by breaking down the content development process into smaller, […]
Speakers – Stop using Pesky Filler Words
Discover how to Eliminate Filler Words from your Presentations Those verbal sounds (ahs, ers, ums, you know, like, etc…) we make during our conversations – actually make up about 5% – 8% of the words we use every day, according to Michael Erard, linguist and author of Um…Slips, Stumbles, and Verbal Blunders. Erard also notes that […]
How Successful Speakers use Visuals to Communicate a Complex Concept
A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words – How Successful Speakers use Images in their Presentations Over the past six months, I have worked with several speakers who have asked to be able to communicate a complex idea or concept to their audiences. My response is – DRAW IT. Instead of trying to craft the […]