Effective communication is of importance in both business and personal life.
When you connect authentically with your audience and communicate your message with clarity and ease, the relationship becomes alive, passionate and genuine.
Your message will be heard and received.
This is true whether you are connecting with an audience of one or of many.
The barriers to effective communication are fear, disconnection and blame.
These show up in the stories you tell about yourself, your audience and your content.
The ways to effective communication are courage, connection and compassion.
They are the courage to be yourself, creating connection with one person at a time, and allowing yourself to move towards what scares you.
Effective speakers focus on connection.
The key to transforming fear and becoming an engaging and effective speaker is to focus on the connection between speaker and listeners, building a connection between you and the audience.
Easy and authentic presence when speaking is about being in relationship with yourself and your audience.
The foundation for speaking with ease in front of groups of any size is learning to connect with them, allowing your eyes to rest upon one person at a time.
When you allow yourself to be available to connect in this way before beginning to speak, your own availability, in turn, allows your audience to meet you.
A relationship has begun.
Beginning to speak from this place, without trying too hard, to one person at a time, with eyes softly available creates flow and ease.
Assume support.
Speaking to an audience is different to a one on one conversation where you receive reassuring smiles and encouraging nods.
Blank faces in an audience can feel threatening.
You assume they want to judge, humiliate or attack you.
But blank faces are listening faces.
And when you assume support instead of attack you will relax.
Public speaking is a series of conversations.
When you sweep your eyes across an audience, focus on one person or the back of the room you miss the opportunity to be present, and connect.
Seeing public speaking as a series of 1:1 conversations allows you to build the relationship between listener and speaker, through presence and connection, one person at a time.
Be yourself.
When you show up with the person you think you are 'supposed' to be, want to be or a role you hide behind, you will be inauthentic, and fearful.
This 'personality' might hide your vulnerability, and it will also hide your magnificence.
If you dare to let go of the status and risk exposing your vulnerability you have the chance to reveal the much stronger, brighter self at the centre of who you are.