How to smash your first talk
I don’t consider public speaking and myself to be friends. Like many others, I struggle with imposter syndrome and just the thought of me falling in front of an entire room of people has prevented me from taking the plunge.
As a first step to face my fears, I attended this month’s Triangirls x JAM “Take the Mic” event where the brilliant Mathilde Leo, Liz Hamburger and Rachael Grocott coached us through tackling our first talk and building confidence. Here are some of the highlights and takeaways from the evening.
Choose the right topic
The right topic for you is a topic that lives in the intersection of expertise, passion, and audience interest. When choosing a topic for your talk, ask yourself the following questions:
- How much do I know about the topic?
You should know a bit more about the topic than the average person if you’re going to write and do an entire talk on it. As you’ll most likely need to field questions at the end, the audience will expect you to elaborate beyond the information in your talk. - Will the audience be interested in the topic?
This is all about knowing your audience at the event you’re speaking at. Consider the type of event it is, and what kind of people will make up your audience. - Am I passionate about the topic?
At the end of the day, your audience won’t love it if you don’t love it!
You can also take a look at past speakers to see what kinds of topics land at a particular event or with an audience. For example, with a Triangirls audience, topics such as switching careers, overcoming a fear or a past failure tend to be the most memorable and well-received.
Tell a story
According to cognitive psychologist Jerome Bruner, we are 22 times more likely to remember information that has been delivered in the form of a story. Engage your audience by weaving a narrative in your talk by picking the right story structure.
Here are a few structures to choose from:
- Chronological
Best for taking the audience from the start of your journey to today, with key points along the way. - Problem » Solution » Benefit
Best for knowledge-sharing, such as a talk about how you overcame a problem, as it incorporates how you solved a problem and got a positive outcome. - What » So what » Now what
Best for sharing lessons learned from a significant, altering experience in your life.
Embrace notes
An engaging talk utilises presentation decks that prioritise imagery and pictures. Keeping text minimal ensures audience maintain their focus on you the speaker and not your slides—but this doesn’t mean you need to rely on memory. This is where bringing notes with you on stage comes in handy.
Using notes during your talk is perfectly fine, and it’s absolutely not a sign of weakness! Notes can help you remember talking points or remind you to pause. The most important thing is to make sure your notes work for you.
Managing your fears
Fear of public speaking is a very real thing, and it can be a difficult mental barrier to get past. This is because our minds can perceive speaking in front of an audience as a physical and psychological threat, and we instinctually do everything we can to avoid it.
Luckily, there are some things we can do to help reframe and challenge our anxieties:
- Identify exactly what you’re afraid of
Pick out the exact fears you feel with the 5 whys exercise. Individual fears are much easier to tackle and manage when you can isolate them. - Focus on what you can control
Is it a problem now? Is it actually important? Can you do anything to change the outcome? - Make a plan
If you find yourself in a catastrophic thoughts spiral, make a plan on how to deal with every scenario to get all your thoughts out. You’ll feel more in control when you proactively prepare solutions for worst case scenarios. - Remember the audience is rooting for you
Every single person in that room wants you to succeed. Nobody buys a ticket to go to an event hoping to see the speakers fail!
Be yourself
If you only take one thing from this blog post, let it be this: bring your whole self with you onto the stage. Your unique personality, sense of humour and, yes, even imperfections, are things that make you compelling and relatable. No one wants to see a robot delivering a manufactured speech.
So be you and tell your magnificent story—we’re all ready to listen.
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