A practical guide to better public speaking: part one

Communicating clearly in front of a group of people is one of the most valuable life skills you can acquire. It will help you throughout your career and in every aspect of your life. 

I’ve been working in the field of science communication for almost 18 years now, during which I have attended numerous presentation skills masterclasses, delivered a few myself and spent quite a lot of time on stage. I have experimented and made a fool of myself (on more than one occasion), but also shared my ideas effectively and inspired audiences. I am very passionate about communicating complicated ideas in a simple and pleasant way and here I’ll share some of my ideas on how to do so.

• Let me introduce you to the art of saying hello
• Conferences, TED talks and social media: the ultimate tools for academic profile building
• Tips for effectively communicating your research’s impact

I’m an alumna of FameLab, the world’s largest science communication competition, which offers bright young academics the chance to pitch their research to a panel of judges for three minutes. Competing has really shaped my own journey to better presentations, and my advice has been influenced by the advice and feedback I received along the way. Applications for the 2025 competition are still open until the 30th of January.

Confidence

Why are we afraid of public speaking? Author Scott Berkun, in his book Confessions of a Public Speaker, offers an interesting explanation. Our brains, for all their wonders, identify the following four things as very bad for survival: 

• Standing alone
• In open territory with no place to hide
• Without a weapon
• In front of a large crowd of creatures staring at you 

In the long history of all humans, any situation where the above were true could very well mean that you would soon be attacked. Your body needs to get ready to fight or flight, and an adrenaline rush makes your palms sweaty, your breath quick, your feet shaky and your throat dry.

Is there a way to stop this happening? 

Well, no. 

Even the most celebrated public speakers in the world, people who speak to large crowds for a living, still feel anxious before going on stage. The difference is that professional public speakers prepare. They plan before they speak. They practice.

Addressing your anxiety symptoms

How can you prepare when you know that your legs will shake? Try to think in advance of what you can do to help yourself. You could, for example, place yourself behind a podium. If your mouth goes dry, you could carry a bottle of water with you. 

When I started giving presentations, people could easily understand that I was nervous: my voice trembled. I couldn’t think how to alleviate this, so I thought I would be upfront about it. I welcomed my audience, thanked them for their time and asked them if they had noticed that my voice trembled. I then explained I was nervous but that wouldn’t stop me. Annoyingly, the more I did this, the less my voice trembled until it finally stopped happening at all. 

Don’t fail to prepare

When I mentioned above that I have made a fool of myself on stage, I truly meant it. One of my most embarrassing experiences was in 2008, at a prestigious event where the British Council had brought together FameLab alumni from all over the world to network. Each national team of alumni had 15 minutes on stage to introduce themselves. When my team met to get organised, we decided we would do a mini science show with live experiments, and then we would do a quick dance around the Zorba soundtrack (I believe you can guess where we were coming from). 

We wrote a script, we went shopping for the experiments and we sourced the music. We thought we were ready, but we never rehearsed. So the evening comes, and we find ourselves on stage – half the props were forgotten, no experiment worked, the Zorba music played over our voices…so we decided to drop the science show and to start dancing. And then the music stopped. Absolute silence followed. I remember getting off stage, my ears burning. I remember this feeling every time I see people frantically adding slides in their presentation while the previous person is talking. 

I can laugh about it now, but I believe this experience is the reason for my very personal presentation rule: before I present anything, from a short talk to a job interview, I rehearse at least five times in front of an audience. Usually, a very reluctant audience of friends and family, who didn’t see me coming early enough to escape. This works even better for me, because if I catch the attention of this captive audience, who have no problem telling me when I am not good, then I know my actual presentation will go well. 

Connection

There are many ways to be charismatic on stage – I would argue as many as there are humans on Earth. But there is one tried and tested way to deliver a bad presentation. We all know it – speakers sitting down, speaking softly, mumbling, reading from their notes, their backs to their audience, doing everything possible to avoid making a connection. 

Before giving a presentation, think about why you are giving it. Who is your audience? Why is a group of people sitting in a room or waiting for you online? 

People might want to learn something that you know – this could be a cooking tip, a life skill or a way to solve a problem they might have. People are also eager to listen when they know they may be inspired. Are your words going to motivate them to do something? Or, even simpler, are you going to share an interesting idea, something to stimulate them mentally? 

Of course, people are eager to listen when they know they will be entertained. This is more than listening to someone making a joke. One can be entertained by a nice visual, by a story, by something they find surprising. 

Social networking is when people are willing to listen to you because they might be interested in working with you, in sharing their own ideas in return, in meeting people who are interested in the same things as they are. In a captive audience situation, such as a classroom, offering any of the above will make you stand out as the speaker who made them think, gave them a good time or inspired them to do something. 

I strongly believe that your audience wants you to succeed. They are investing their time in listening to you, and the only way for their investment to bear fruit is if you do well. Think of your audience as a supportive group of people who want you to succeed, who want to make a connection with you. 

Also, they don’t have your script. So, it’s perfectly okay if you forget something, skip a part or find out that you left your demo at home! As long as you can pull together a presentation that makes sense, with a beginning, a middle part and an end, your audience will never know any different. 

Find A practical guide to better public speaking: part two here.

Anna Christodoulou is senior knowledge exchange manager at the University of Westminster.

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