ResumeWeAssist Enterprise

First of all, my apologies for not writing any articles for some time in this blog. I was tight up with our latest product that will be available in April – May’09 time frame. I’m extremely excited working to complete the product that I’m sure will benefit and enhance your career marketing. Stay tune!!

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Glossophobia or fear of public speaking is the most common fear among many of us including professionals who are making a living out of public speaking. What makes them to be successful is their ability to overcome their fear by leveraging some skills that many of us can learn effectively. The focus of today’s article is to share some tips on how to collectively learn and build the skills needed to overcome glossophobia.

As a start, for me the word glossophobia itself is a new word I’ve learnt while writing this article. Most probably it is also a new word to you hence I would like to take this opportunity to share from where this word was derived. Based on Wikipedia, glossophobia originated from the Greek word glossa which means tongue and phobos, fear or dread. 

In whatever career you are in, to a certain extend, you will be forced to speak in the public regardless if the group is small or as large as a nation or globally. When this situation happens, many of us would rather avoid it but not realizing this is a good opportunity for their self development. Mastering the skills of effective public speaking not only will accelerate your career growth but also will help to improve your communication skills in your personal live. I’m sure you will be amazed when listenning to great speakers such as nation leaders; Obama, Dr Mahathir and many more who are able to engage and move audiences with their rhetoric use of words and composure to overcome their glossophobia. We can also be like them as long as we are willing to do these 2 things: Control your mind & Just do it!

Control your mind

The major hurdle to be successful in public speaking is your mind. Ironically, at the same time it is also your mind that will determine your success. Logically, if you are able to control your mind then to overcome glossophobia will be simple but yet practically it is not. Naturally, we have been programmed to fight or flight when we are confronted with anything that we think will cause us danger or challenge our status quo. Hence going against glossophobia will require us to change our programmed mind. Thank God we are able to do that.

Firstly, we need to understand the possible root cause of glossophobia which most likely due to traumatic single or multiple public speaking incidents by your own or someone’s experience. The incident might be a rejection or negative perception from the public after failing to deliver a good speech which eventually leads to a series of belief that public speaking will only bring negative perception from the public. Furthermore, it will also cause self defeating and anxiety provoking situation where your thoughts will only picture yourself to be a failure and start to have panic attack. The best way that we thought to mitigate this situation is just by avoiding it. From time to time, this will be a dogma in your mind which will build the glossophobia in yourself.

If this is happening in you, then the first thing you will need to do is control your mind. Even though it is tough but as long as you want to change then it is possible. You can do it by yourself through listening to some great speakers talking in tv, radio or in You Tube to motivate your change. Your amazement listening to them will help you to realize that public speaking is actually a positive interaction that will benefit yourself and also the audience. That is a start to a positive change.

Next, to accelerate your change is to join a community of people who is in the same boat as you. There are several established communities or clubs which focus primary on improving communication skills. One of the club that I just recently joined is Toastmasters International. 

Basically Toastmasters International is a leading movement devoted in making effective oral communication achievable by everyone through learning of speaking, listening, thinking, leadership potential enhancement, foster human understanding & contribute to betterment of humankind. Toastmasters clubs are available throughout the world, you can click HERE to check if there is a club available near you. For those who are in Penang, you are cordially invited to join our club meeting as a distinguish guest. As a guest, you will witness how a Toastmaster Club meeting is conducted to train their members at their own pace to enhance skills to be an effective public speaker. If you are interested to join us, please drop me an e-mail at career_advisor@resumeweassist.com with your contact # to book a seat.

Just do it!

Finally, with the skills you have learnt, now it is the time to put them in practice. Participate in events where you will be able to demonstrate your skills as an effective public speaker.

Good luck!

I would like to read your inputs about this article. If you have any comments or experience to share, please feel free to drop them at below.

Thanks.

Till then,

Take care.

Regards

Yusoff