Amongst the many fears that co-exist in our life is the fear of Glossophobia. It is is the fear of public speaking or speaking in discussions. People are reluctant and find it hard to lead the conversations, get involved into conversations or coin their opinion. Largely one of the reasons is their introvert nature which would confine them in getting involved or beginning a conversation.

If you want to be heard speak up – Bill Cosby.

Going by the popular quote it is true that speaking is an excellent attribute in both personal as well as professional life. It requires you to take initiatives by leading the talk. One can easily practice and change his ways to be an effective speaker and gather attention. In my opinion to begin with this, the key is to start socializing, talk to more people around you and try to do small chit chat when you reach office, rather than landing at your desk and leaving on time and talking to your restricted few with whom you feel comfortable. You will realize that there is a wide world waiting to be explored around you, you might discover someone who shares the same passion on photography like you. Just break the jinx.

Presenting trainings and seminars over the past few years has taught me a lot in starting them, dealing with the audience and to closing it successfully.

After attending one of the programs I was not satisfied with the training; I decided to create my own tailored program on the subject and coordinated with the stakeholders regarding my plans and rolled it out. It was a huge success and after 2-3 sessions of 4 hrs I started full day sessions. The biggest success lies in the fact when people leave the program with a value add and satisfaction and it is always good to gather their thoughts and next steps after the session.

I learned a lot over all these years since then and have been leading many programs with enthusiasm.

The following aspects should be kept in mind when you plan to take up trainings/seminars or lead the talk:

1. Be a master of your topic
2. Break the ice and engage the audience
3. Listen patiently
4. Interact with people
5. Don’t let the session run out of your hand, interrupt where required.
6. Take feedback and monitor value add and work on continuous improvement based on it. It also opens another window of ideas from the participants.
7. A lot of passion! – If you are not passionate in the topic you are handling you will definitely mess it up.

When I started seminars, I was always comfortable to speak to an audience with all strangers, so the song from Pink Floyd Is there anybody out there, always used to jingle in my mind. There was definitely a sense of strange fear and anxiety when I saw a known face sitting in the audience. However as you progress it does not come in between and after some experience it ceases to exist.

Doctors know this feeling very well as they are more confident when they operate a patient not known to them rather when someone close to them is under the knife.

Thanks for reading, share your opinions too would be good to read about it and explore everyone’s view, love you all, lots of kiss and hugs.