Note from Diahann: I’m taking somewhat of a different approach with the topic of Presentation Skills. I often select a great book on a particular topic and interview the author. The breadth of this topic made it difficult to narrow down one all-encompassing book. Here are several resources to help you master the skill.
Fear of Public Speaking
How real is the anxiety you feel when you are asked to speak in public? Recently, a man sitting next to me shared that his heart rate jumped from his resting average of 75 bpm to 108 bpm during his 10 second introduction (he was wearing a heart rate monitor watch). According to Speech Topics Help, here are several public speaking facts:
Fact0One
Research results demonstrate people rather die than talk in front of an audience. Top 5 global fears (phobias) are:
Fear of public speaking (Glossophobia)
Fear of death (Necrophobia)
Fear of spiders (Arachnophobia)
Fear of darkness (Achluophobia, Scotophobia or Myctophobia)
Fear of heights (Acrophobia)
Fact Two
Fear of public speaking has negative effects on careers and influences success in life negatively when you do nothing about it
Fact0Three000
Three out of every four individuals suffer from speech anxiety: that's 75 percent
Fact Four
Women and men are equally affected.
Although there are fear of public speaking statistics that present
figures in which more women suffer from speech anxiety related problems
Fact Five
More men than women seek treatment to cure fear of public speaking
Reading Resources
Here are 4 reading resources to help you conquer any public speaking fears you may have: Design a Presentation: Have trouble creating the visual storyboard?
Say it with Presentations will help you:
Design your presentation knowing what to put in and what to leave out
Determine your message, how to make it clear, direct, and appropriate for the intended audience
Write the presentation, crafting the most effective story line, introduction, and ending
Say it with Charts
reveals time-tested tips for preparing effective presentations, then
shows you how to combine those tips with today's technologies for
sharper, stronger visuals. You’ll learn:
How to prepare different types of charts: pie, bar, column, line, or dot, and when to use each
Hands-on recommendations on lettering size, color choice, appropriate chart types, and more
Techniques for producing dramatic eVisuals using animation, scanned images, sound, video
