The fear of speaking in public especially when you are not prepared

Joachim De Posada

By Joachim De Posada

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The fear of speaking in public especially when you are not prepared.

Millions of people would rather face death rather than speak in public.

Imagine what happened to me last Monday when travelled to Atlanta to deliver a speech the following day at 4pm.

A week before, I was in my car and I got a call from a lady that belongs to The Society of Human Resources Management (SHRM) to ask me if I could facilitate the Networking meeting of the Diversity group of SHRM, composed mainly of African Americans and Latinos.

Since I couldn’t hear her well because of a bad connection, I thought that what I was being asked to do was to be sort of an MC, a facilitator if you will, someone who was going to do a networking exercise so that people could get to know each other better.

I land in Atlanta, go to my hotel, drop off my baggage and my laptop and only with my I pad I head to the Imperial Ballroom of the Marriott Marquis. I didn’t even have time to take a shower and change since I was running late. Didn’t even have a tie, customary when I do most of my speeches, and I must confess that even my shirt was a little wrinkled.

As I get into the ballroom, I see a room set up with tables and a section of chairs behind the tables, enough room for about 350 to 400 people I estimated.

When a lady greets me with a big smile, and I look at the big screen in front of the room, I see that I was being announced as the speaker for the event.

Ok, so here I am, totally unprepared, not even that well dressed and just a few minutes before I had to deliver a speech.

What were my choices? Run, say that a headache was killing me, ask for someone else to do it or simply face the situation and do the best I could.

I decided I would do the speech and I want to share the experience with you, my dear readers, because in life you will face unexpected situations when you have to perform or face defeat or embarrassment.

Right in the front of the room, much to my relief, there was a full table made up of the SHRM delegates from Puerto Rico, some that had attended my speech last year in SHRM Puerto Rico and others that work for some of my clients such as Triple S and Doral Bank. (By the way, the SHRM PR convention is on September 19 to the 22nd in The Conquistador hotel, a must attend event if you are in Human Resources).

I got a great introduction from the MC of the event and I stepped up to the podium.

How did I start my speech?

I told them what had happened: I got a call from Mrs. Pamela Green, the person in charge of the event and I thought that I was going to facilitate a meeting, not give a speech and here I was, standing in front of them without my laptop or any type of prop.

I then asked the following question:  “Who in this room is afraid of public speaking”? About half the room raised their hands.” Imagine having to do a speech without any preparation whatsoever”. I could see the fear in some of the faces by only thinking about it. 

I then went on to tell them that preparation is essential in every aspect of their professional life and that even if they weren’t prepared they had to face situations in life when preparation is not possible.

I then went on to explain that preparation requires self-discipline and self-discipline is one of the most, if not the most, important factor needed to be successful in life.

That is the famous marshmallow principle, a principle so essential that I wrote a book about it.

So, let me describe what I did so that you understand this lesson well.

Number one, I was honest with them and described the situation exactly as it had happened.

Two, I involved them with a question where everyone had to participate.

Three, I chose to discuss a principle that would apply to the situation that I was facing and the importance of understanding that principle.

After I got into familiar territory, talking about the main theme of my book, the rest was rather easy.

The last part of my speech, I did a networking exercise. And that exercise was so well accepted and it is so useful that I will share it with you all so that you can apply it in your business.

I told them to take out their business cards and hand their card to a person that they didn’t know. When everyone had a card that belonged to someone else, I asked them to look at the card they had in their hand and whoever had a magnificent, different, original, creative card, a card that they would never get rid of because they would love to do business with such a creative individual, to raise their hand. Only 10 people or so out of the 300 raised their hand, they brought their cards to me and I did a critique of each card.

Most cards in the audience were printed on one side only; they were very plain, ordinary and demonstrated no creativity on the part of the business being represented by the card.

I then took out my million dollar card and the audience loved, standing after the speech in line to get one.

You must have a business card that shows innovation and creativity so that it is not thrown away or if kept, the person you gave it to will keep it until the need for your product or service arises.

I now see as a blessing the night I was leaving a wonderful party in the Caribe Hilton with my wife and on top of the tables I saw some of my business cards. That meant that many people I gave the card to saw the card so ordinary that they didn’t even bother to take the card with them.

That day I decided that I had to have a better card and the card I came up with has been very valuable in the success of my business. I hope you do the same. By the way, they loved my speech.

 

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