Confidence in Public Speaking and The Workplace
Introvert, extravert, cocky, socially awkward, happy, outgoing, comfortable spending time alone and those who don’t like the feeling of quite. Stop and think about all the different personality traits that contribute to how an individual presents themselves, how they may act in the work place and, or around others they aren’t on a personal basis or particularly comfortable with. Some people are out of this world in public speaking, presentations and being social whereas others are horrified at the idea of standing in front of audience. They may be the most intelligent person in the room or have an inspirational outlook on a common issue many face, and yet, once their up, front and center, they make a complete ass of themselves. Words come out faster than vomit, anxiety goes through the roof and next thing you know, there’s thirty pairs of eyes starring back observing this colossal sh*t show, staring yourself. If its one person who understands that exact scenario happening every time a presentation or public speaking event is taking place, its me. I’m a Complete ‘screw up’ one hundred precent of the time! Its super embarrassing, but public speaking just not one of my strong suits, and ill own it. “The first step to getting help, is admitting it”. I’m pretty sure thats a quote from Alcohol Anonymous or something, however, if the “shoe," or in this case, quote fits, why not use it?
As wellness coach’s and fitness and health students we are held to a higher standard than those who are just PT certified. All our hard work to get this diploma has to mean more than just the credentials printed on paper. Its essential we can interact on a social basis, having the confidence in ourselves to effectively guide each client with the education and skills they need to reach all their individual goals. For many of us, our placements involve a lot of social interaction in a diverse group of people made up of genders, age, race, etc. Its important we have these tools with everyone we come across in our professional industry, regardless of circumstances.
One of the roles I play in my placement is speaking to parents about their child’s progress in skating lessons, explaining techniques, specific goal orientated tasks and how they will be accomplished. I also assist in running group meetings with all parents and present in almost a Q&A type session with my supervisor and superiors once a week. As I’m sure many of you can imagine, someone who isn’t familiar with the “skate coach life style," already created a lack of confidence laying the foundation for these meetings on my behalf. Now add in the previous statement written about public speaking of any sort, especially with groups of people, not being a strong suit of mine. Together these two aspects have been a difficult transition to be able to feel confident in myself to address all the areas within my placement while speaking to parents but has not been impossible. To my surprise, has become far more easy, even leading to more confidence outside the placement work place. Speaking with clients has a large impact on how effectively we can do our jobs in so many difference aspects, wether it be in front of an audience or to just one individual. If we as coaches have confidence within ourselves, our clients will have the confidence will guide them to the results they desire.
Speaking comes naturally for some and for others it can be a paralyzing situation to be in. However, If steps aren’t taken to improve and create confidence, it will never change and can also become worse overtime becoming more of an issue later on. This can take opportunities away from a career path that are aspired for and other areas in life too. Public speaking and having the confidence to speak in our professional day to day lives can have a psychological hold on us, but does not have to.
Below are some tips to become more confident with public speaking and with general social interaction that helped aid me in getting over my fears are listed below.
1)PRACTICE, PRACTICE AND DON’T FORGET, PRACTICE!
People like to take out the option that public speaking can be learned by the common myth or statement; “People are ether good at public speaking or they're not”. Through personal experience I know this isn’t true. Public and confidence within speaking can be a learned skill or tool, but it doesn’t have to be a preferred one. People do things they don’t like all the time because it needs to be done. No one wakes up thinking they want to clean their house. They clean it because no one wants to live in filth!
Its important to put yourself into these uncomfortable situations of speaking in groups of people, if not, its very likely things will never become more comfortable in this respected manner. Start in small groups of friends and family at first. Once you become more confident speaking out and relaying information in a presentation setting, slowly expand the diversity of people you are speaking to. The confidence will prosper and you’ll be that much closer to feeling comfortable engaging whoever you are directly trying to reach.
2) HAVE AN ICE BREAKER TO GET THE CROWD ATTENTIVE
To get the attention of an individual or group and start the presentation off strong, its always a good idea to draw the crowd in with an ice breaker or a question that relates the to the topic to have them pondering on their own beliefs and how they may go about answering that question. This grasps the focus of the listening party and will assist in guiding the presentational flow, especially in that initial first few minutes.
3)HAVE PREPPED STATEMENTS
It's no surprise that in the first few presentations and possibly continuing into your more experienced ones, there will be moments you forget what you were about to say or get details mixed up. Firstly, IT’S ONLY NORMAL AND TOTALY OK. Secondly, having prepped statements for this exact moment to guide the presentation back to the topic and will prevent paralyzing anxiety to takeover.
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