How can you speak with confidence? The honest answer.

Public Speaking at a workshop on wellbeing

Gone are the days when we may have had to stuff our mouths with pebbles to enunciate clearly like the famous Greek orator Demosthenes. Yet public speaking continues to plague us in modern times – sometimes following us from school and university right into the workplace.

Ever wondered, “How can I give a talk when I get really stressed every time I speak?” or “What if I don’t have the answer to a question someone asks?”. You’re not alone. These are real questions audiences have posed to me during my workshops on public speaking.

The honest answer?

It’s a mix of practice and experience. The more you learn, the more you know, and the more you try, the more you learn.

Everyone needs a starting point. You may think, why bother at all? Arnold Schwarzenegger, Warren Buffet, Emma Watson all had their own trysts with public speaking. But they found ways to overcome their fears because it mattered when they had to navigate important moments in their professional lives.

The hard truth is you may still get a case of the nerves even after speaking or presenting a hundred times.

Maybe someone you look up to is in the audience. Maybe you had an argument with a friend or a colleague that day. Maybe you’re talking about something you’ve dreamed of for years and your chance is finally here.

So how do you overcome these fears?

Find a routine that helps settle you

It might sound like fairy dust and magic, but a solid approach can ground you and prepare you for what is to come. Your routine could vary in terms of a short meditation, listening to calming music, pushing your body into a stretch or a dance movement, or visualising how your talk or presentation goes with your audience. What you’re aiming for is activating your parasympathetic nervous system – the one that helps your body break out of stress mode and move to a state of calm.

What your audience doesn’t know…

Your audience – whether it’s a group of 3 or 50 or 5000 – doesn’t know every line in your head. Sure, they likely know the topic of your presentation, but they will never know every word coming out of your mouth. And they will never know what you have forgotten. Unless you let them. Some of the best orators are great at disguising a gap or misstep in their talks. Always create a structure for the content of your talk, but don’t craft every line. This way, even if you slip up, your audience doesn’t know.

Find a distraction

Ever seen that movie Maid in Manhattan (2002) starring Ralph Fiennes and Jennifer Lopez? Fiennes may have played Christopher Marshall, a political figure, but it didn’t stop his character from getting nervous when he spoke. A handy paper clip in his palm helped divert his nervous energy and focus on his talk. If you’re having a Marshall moment, find a distraction that helps channel your nerves and deliver your content with laser focus. Maybe it’s a paper clip. Maybe it’s a fidget spinner. Maybe it’s doodling on a notepad kept on your dais. Maybe it’s a familiar face in the audience. Your setting can help define what your potential distraction could be!

Be ready to take a walk

So, you’ve worked on your content. Practised and practised. Recorded yourself. Rehearsed in front of mirrors. And then midway through your talk, you realise you forgot what you wanted to say. Remember Point No.2? Your audience doesn’t know what line you were going to say. So, if neither do you, be ready to take a walk. Use the time to ask a question, share an anecdote, or even make a joke. And in that time, circle back to what you wanted to share – your structure comes in handy here. Chances are you remember the flow of your talk, but not the exact line or example. And that’s perfectly okay. Every walk isn’t the same. Sometimes you just got to walk the talk (all puns intended).

Speak from a space of authenticity

Your audience can tell when you’re being genuine and when you’re wearing a mask of pretence. Unless, of course, you’ve managed to convince the world you’re also a pilot, a doctor, and a lawyer. Think Leonardo di Caprio in Catch Me if You Can (2002).

You only need to be yourself. This means foregrounding your values, speaking about what you know, and using speech and body language that is natural rather than artificial or forced.

Speaking with the goal to share your knowledge rather than a claim to fame helps create a bond of trust with your listeners. This space of authenticity opens the door to engaged listening and curious questions.

What your audience wants…

Once you’ve opened the door to engaged listening and curious questions, you’ll get queries – provided you’ve structured your talk for a Q&A – that might seek...

Confirmation (Is that what you meant?)

Affirmation (This is what I felt!)

Application (How would that work here?)

Extrapolation (Would this work too?)

And every so often, you’ll get a question that ends in…

Complication (What about this here and why and when and how and this list could simply go on and on like an awfully tedious meeting that could have been an email?)

Something you hadn’t expected. Something you don’t have an answer to.

You have two ways of dealing with this.

One. Admit you do not have the answer, but offer a working understanding of what you think it means. (You can always share your answer later on, too, now with online portals and apps, and follow-ups often sent after workshops, conferences, or festivals.)

Two. Acknowledge it’s a tricky question, and answer using a combination of expertise and application. (You need to be actively listening to your audience, and apply your lateral thinking skills to your domain of expertise.)

You may not be an AI expert, or a tech juggernaut, but if you can figure out the heart of the question – building resilience, decision making in challenging circumstances, encouraging creativity – then all you need to demonstrate is how you have applied that within the body of your own experience.

The next step for your audience is to see how they can apply your insights to their own field of expertise.

While your audience may or may not be 100% satisfied, there’s something you shouldn’t ever forget. Your audience doesn’t always know what they want.

Your content is a goldmine

Remember my honest answer? When you speak, share, or present, you are drawing on experience and learning. Never undermine what you know. And never undermine yourself when you present.

There is, of course, a difference between expertise and conceit. Just like there’s a difference between realising you have something genuine to offer, and oh, I’m going to pull a fast one!

As you practise how and what you speak, you are constantly building on a well of knowledge. The more you put yourself out there, the more you will discover that people have takeaways from your talk.

You will also discover that you know how to field questions and provide inputs that are of value to your audience of listeners. The best part? You never know how what you share, impacts the person listening. Public speaking is an art, a rigorous practice, and a platform for shared knowledge. Refresh yourself in your field of expertise, structure your talk with intent, and be willing to build on observations, insights, and statements of your peers. The last one is something you might do live during your talk, especially if another speaker shares something that ties well to the objective or content of your own talk.

Public speaking isn’t something that just happens. It takes solid work. Learning, rehearsals, feedback, reinvention, failing, experience. The next time you think you are stressed about giving a talk? Prepare for all eventualities.

I explore the nitty-gritty of public speaking in my module Art to Start: Speak Up. If you’d like to indulge in learning, experimentation and, of course, speaking, then write to me with your requirements. I promise you won’t have to talk with a mouthful of pebbles.  

Apeksha Harsh - Art to Start: Speak Up.pdf

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