The Middle Manager

Surviving & Thriving as a Leader

Speaking in Public

I want to start a series on a subject that affects a lot of people.  The technical term is Glossophobia – fear of public speaking.  This fear is considered a social phobia, and a paper published with the US National Institutes of Health noted that of people that had social phobias, the most common was speaking in public, by a significant – 89.4% – margin (Source: Epidemiology of social phobia: a clinical approach).

An inability to speak in public can actually negatively impact your career.  It can reduce your compensation by as much as 10%, and there’s a 15% chance that it would affect a opportunities for career advancement to higher leadership positions (Source: Columbia University: Social Anxiety Disorder).

I’ve heard that fear of public speaking ranks up with life-changing events such as divorce or death of a loved one.  It’s frequently quoted, but I couldn’t find any actual support sources.  But given the above numbers, it’s probably fairly accurate.

There are a number of organizations that can help overcome the anxiety related to glossophobia; however, despite these negative impacts, only around 8% who have this fear reach out for help.

I’ve been doing public speaking almost my whole life.  My parents got me started with it at a young age and as a result I have absolutely no fear of standing up in front of people – and I’ve been on stages from less than a dozen to many thousands (the largest was at a convention in OK City that had over 50,000 attending).  I’ve been speaking at tech support conferences for the last 15 years, and I know many people who would like to try it but the thought of appearing on stage makes them very anxious.

I’d like to spend the next few weeks sharing my thoughts about how to prepare yourself for public speaking, and once you’ve taken the plunge how to be a good speaker.

Stay tuned to this space, I’ll start with my next post.

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