Articles


PRESENTING REMINDERS IN THE WORLD OF MANY VOICES

The potential to connect your voice to the world is now there for the talking.  The world really is an effective presenter’s oyster.  Still, many people are working with the fundamental challenges of finding their voice and packaging their messages for more local presentations to clients, conferences, meetings, and social occasions.  These challenges remain in spite of the potential for a global audience because ‘public speaking’ is still perceived as ‘scary’ by many– and when the human system perceives something is scary it stands to reason it must have a fear response.  That’s why it is nigh on impossible to ‘talk your way’ out of butterflies, palpitations and other physical manifestations of fear.

This automatic fear response is the bane of many a presenter’s experience.  We learn to ‘manage’ it, fake it, survive in whatever way we can – until the next time.  It doesn’t need to be that way.  You can transform your experience from surviving public speaking to thriving on it in ways others and you benefit from.

Below are some of the essential lessons I have learned about presenting/public speaking taken from my book “I Can Speak Clearly Now…the Pain has Gone”.  My history is one of ‘the presentation terrors’.  My present (from where I create my future) is one of service, stimulation, even satisfaction sometimes and always, profound learning.  I hope these ideas help embolden you to seek and speak your own truth with power and conviction.  Your world needs your voice in the mix.  If you want to explore further with support we’d love to see you on one of our workshops.

  • Presentation skills are not mysterious – we are mysterious
  • Preparation of your material is essential – and – so is preparation of yourself
  • You don’t need some special talent to enjoy expressing yourself in any context – we can all learn how
  • Anyone who wants to can learn – when we are willing to be a learner we make the fastest progress
  • Inner freedom comes from knowing who we are and accepting that
  • Self criticism is the biggest hurdle
  • Confidence evolves from the inside out
  • Practise makes progress – we are all perfectly human, no one human is perfect in all the ways we wish we/they were
  • Conviction + Integrity = Credibility = Influence
  • Presenting is about leadership
  • Presenting is about service

It isn’t everyone’s path to be a professional presenter but if you need to make presentations for work or play, your audience deserves your best.  We have all sat through agonising presentations.  Most people are quite forgiving but if they sit there and lend you their ears, your part of the deal is to make it worth their while.

Contact us if you or your team want to grow authentically confident and competent presenters – we know what works.

Amanda Fleming
p: +64 21 357753
e: info@amandafleming.co.nz
a: PO Box 56064
Dominion Road
Mt Eden
AUCKLAND