Becoming a Better Public Speaker
- Prepare
- Prioritize the Audience
- Be Personable
- Notice the Physical
- Make Visuals Count
Most people could benefit from the opportunity to improve their public speaking skills. Public speaking is one of the most common fears that people report, but even for confident, experienced speakers, there is always room for improvement. Below are five tips that can help both beginners and longtime speakers better engage and inform their audiences.
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1. Prepare
Preparation is critical to better public speaking. Even people who are giving a talk they have done dozens of times before should prepare. The speech should be reviewed. If it is one that has been given before, has anything changed that needs to be revised within the talk? If possible, they should find out ahead of time what the venue will be like and what kind of equipment will be available, such as whether there is a microphone or a podium.
2. Prioritize the Audience
One of the most important things for a public speaker to keep in mind is that the talk should be about the audience and not the speaker. Knowing the audience and talking to a few attendees beforehand, if possible, can help a public speaker target the speech more effectively. During the speech, people should try to make eye contact with the audience and note how they are reacting. Forbes suggests getting audience feedback afterwards as well. If someone says the speech was a good one, the speaker should ask for specifics as to what made it good.
3. Be Personable
Becoming a better public speaker means speakers should think about what they can do that sets them apart from everyone else. The best public speakers have a unique presence and method of delivery. People should be unafraid to let their personality through as they speak. Personal anecdotes or funny stories can help an audience relate to the speaker more. If possible, speakers should avoid reading from a script and should simply bring an outline if they must have some sort of prompt to better convey a sense of spontaneity. Finally, they should think about how to grab the audience’s attention from the start.
4. Notice the Physical
Public speaking is not just about the words. There is an important physical element to improving public speaking skills. Posture should be relaxed and gestures should be natural. Beginners might find it useful to record themselves to get a sense of whether they have any distracting physical tics and what expressions they tend to use. Breathing from the diaphragm improves voice quality and helps regulate tone. People should also speak slowly and think about the effects that can be created by varying their volume. Physical symptoms of anxiety before speaking are normal and are not signs that the talk will go badly.
5. Make Visuals Count
If there are visual elements to the presentation, they should be integral to the message and a quantity that is impactful instead of overwhelming. PowerPoint slides or other visuals can become a crutch for nervous speakers, and they can also be boring for the audience. Furthermore, they take attention away from the speaker. Only visuals that are necessary to convey the speaker’s points should be used.
Public speaking can be daunting, but it can also be rewarding for both the audience and the speaker. Furthermore, learning to speak publicly can be an important career skill. These tips for improving public speaking skills can be used to continually refine both new and ongoing presentations.