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Public Speaking: When Fear Blocks a Career
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David Carbonell, Ph.D.
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Feb 04, 2007 09:51 PST
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THE ANXIETY COACH®
Helping People Thrive in an Anxious World
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Volume 8, Issue 1
IN THIS ISSUE
Dr. Carbonell has some suggestions for businesspeople whose
fear of public speaking may be an obstacle to promotions and
career development.
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INDEX
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1. Dave's Note
2. Public Speaking: When Fear Blocks a Career
3. About The Anxiety Coach®
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Dave's Note
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February 4, 2007
Dear Reader,
The annual conference of the Anxiety Disorders Association
of America is coming up, in late March. This year's meeting
will be in St. Louis. It's a great conference for anyone
with a strong interest in anxiety disorders, consumers as
well as professionals. For information and registration,
visit http://www.adaa.org.
See you next month!
Dave Carbonell
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Public Speaking: When Fear Blocks a Career
by David A. Carbonell, Ph.D.
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I work with a lot of people who want to overcome a fear of
public speaking.
I encourage them to focus on the task at hand - give the
audience the information that they have come for - and work
with whatever anxiety they experience. I suggest that people
treat public speaking as a time to convey information ("just
like regular talking") and not as a performance.
When you think of public speaking as a performance, rather
than just talking, you focus on yourself and how you think
you appear, rather than on the content of what you have to
say. You try to hide your nervousness, and this effort
makes you feel more self conscious and uncomfortable. This
method - just talk about the information the audience has
come to hear, and accept whatever anxiety you feel - coupled
with diaphragmatic breathing and a few other suggestions for
managing anxiety, is often enough to help people start to
roll back the phobia.
I've spelled this out, briefly, in Volume 2, Issue 7 of this
newsletter, which is available in the archive. I also
describe it in more detail in the chapter on public speaking
in my Panic Attacks Workbook.
This approach is usually pretty helpful for most people. But
sometimes a businessperson will consult with me who believes
that the public speaking he or she is called upon to do in
a work setting IS a performance. Businesspeople often think
that the way they handle public speaking will be an important
factor in how they are evaluated for future promotions. They
consider it to be one of the elements that may determine
future career advancement. So, for them, some public speaking
IS a "performance".
I think it's easy for a person who struggles with public
speaking anxiety to over estimate the importance of this
concern. But I recognize that the way businesspeople handle
some public speaking assignments can be a factor in their
subsequent career advancement.
If this is your situation, I suggest a different approach: if
you have to perform, pick a role to play that highlights
your actual strengths.
So let's consider - what businesspeople get asked to make
such presentations?
In my experience, it's businesspeople who perform well in
their functional area. They get asked to make a presentation
because their boss thinks they have some useful information
to offer. The boss thinks that the employee's presentation
of this information will be a useful service, and also that
the employee's presentation will reflect well on him or her
as a supervisor.
If you're a person who fears public speaking, and your boss
asks you to make a presentation, the two of you are probably
focussed on different things. Your boss probably sees that
you do good work, and have good information to share. You,
on the other hand, focus much more on your fear of public
speaking than you do on your qualities as an employee. You
worry about being a good, calm public speaker.
The key here is to carry your most successful role into your
presentation. You didn't get asked because you're a great
speaker. You got asked because you do something - manage
accountants or salespeople, select investment opportunities,
provide technology support, or whatever - very well.
Don't strugge to play the role of a good public speaker.
Instead, stay with the role of a good manager, or a good
accountant, or whatever your professional role is, who has
been asked to talk about what you do. You're better at doing
your job than you are at talking about it. That's fine! Let
that come through. You probably don't make presentations with
nearly the same expertise and confidence that you do your job,
but you don't have to. They just want to hear your view on the
topic at hand.
You can, in fact, allow your lack of polish and comfort with
public speaking to come through as you play the role of the
very capable manager, or salesman, or whatever work role you
fill, who is a lot better at doing his job than he is at
public speaking. This will make it easier for you to accept
and work with, rather than resist, the nervousness you feel.
If you do this, you can abandon the effort to portray yourself
as someone you're not. Instead, you can internalize the
"Unaccustomed as I am to public speaking" attitude and more
honestly show them where you fit in the organization - a good
worker, one who has valuable things to say, but isn't always
comfortable saying them to a group.
There are plenty of people who are better at public speaking
than at actually doing anything else. You don't have to be one
of them!
Do you remember the TV character, Lieutenant Columbo? He was
a brilliant detective who never tried to look the part. In
fact, his personal style as he interrogated suspects was that
of a bumbler. He didn't try to impress people with his style.
He just did his work, and took advantage of his personal
foibles to lead suspects to underestimate him. Naturally,
that worked to his advantage.
Perhaps you can "channel your inner Columbo" and portray
yourself as you are - a person who is more comfortable DOING
work than talking about it - a good, capable employee who
happens to have some discomforts with public speaking.
++++++++++++++++++++++
THE ANXIETY COACH®
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The Anxiety Coach® is a publication of the Anxiety
Treatment Center, Ltd. The Center is a small group of
clinical psychologists who specialize in the treatment of
anxiety problems. The Center has offices in Chicago and
several nearby suburbs.
Dr. Carbonell, a licensed psychologist, is the founder and
director of the Anxiety Treatment Center.
The information contained in this publication is not a
substitute for consultation with healthcare professionals.
Each individual's health concerns should be evaluated by a
qualified professional.
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SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION
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To unsubscribe, follow the link at the very end of this issue.
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CONTACT INFORMATION
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David A. Carbonell, Ph.D.
Anxiety Treatment Center, Ltd.
E-mail: dcarb-@anxietycoach.com
Web: http://www.anxietycoach.com
5105 Tollview Drive, Suite 103
Rolling Meadows, IL 60008
847.481.5251
© 2007, Anxiety Treatment Center, Ltd.
All rights reserved.
Anxiety Coach® is a registered mark of Anxiety Treatment
Center, Ltd.
Distribution Rights: The above material is copyrighted,
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may not copy it to a web site without prior permission.
Reprint permission will be freely granted, upon request,
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