Resources to Help You Speak Confidently

Most people think about speaking in the context of standing on a stage, presenting a prepared deck, with a defined script.

But what about all the other moments where you’re sharing a perspective, defending an idea, or generally speaking off the cuff?

I’ve found a couple of handy rhetorical devices and exercises helped me hone this skill.

Keynote Karaoke

First up, a quirky exercise called Keynote Karaoke. The premise is simple: narrate the slides as they appear.

The tricky part is that you’ve never seen the slides, they advance automatically at random, and often, the images are absurd!

The goal is not to tell the perfect story.

The goal is to practice thinking on your feet, adapting your key messages in real time, and maintaining your composure.

How to do it:

• Grab slides or create your own random deck. Don’t look at the slides before hitting “play slideshow”! See an example
• Record yourself speaking to the prompt on the title slide, keeping your topic throughline as the slides advance
• Watch the recording! (Yes, I know, it’s gonna be awkward, but ya gotta watch it)

If possible, participate in some improv classes as well! Improve is a great way to get you out of your comfort zone, thinking on-the-fly, and varying your tone and pacing, according to new situations and prompts.

Give Guardrails

For podcasts, panels, and other scenarios where someone asks me a direct question and I’m expected to give a succinct answer, I like to declare how many points I intend to make.

There’s a few ways to do this ????

Restate the question:

Question: What’s the number one challenge for teams trying to do… Answer: The top challenge is…

Make a list and then give details

Question: How do you get started doing… Answer: I recommend 3 steps: Step 1, Step 2, and Step 3. In Step 1, we [details]. In Step 2, you [details]. And finally, Step 3 helps [details].

I recommend no more than 5 items in a list, but 3 is better. It’s hard for the audience to remember more than a few points during a verbal conversation with no visual aids. You can add words like, “essential”, “key”, “simple”, “to start” if you’re concerned about the depth of the answer.

You can also give the option to dive into each item in more detail if you know there’s more time available. Sample phrases include, “We can dive into each pillar if you want more details”, “We’ll talk about these in a few minutes”, “I can share resources in the show notes with the tactics for each of these strategies”.

Thread the needle

Question: Tell me about [your career journey, a campaign you built, an interview you ran, a process you created, a bunch of your hobbies] Answer: I’ve done [experience, experience, experience or milestone, milestone, milestone]. The common theme across all of these is…, which allows me to [next action or benefit].

Curate your one-liners

Question: If you can share one final piece of advice or one key take-away from this conversation… Answer: I’ll end with this/The last thing I want to share is/The biggest takeaway is: [Say relevant one-liner, this should be the central point that you want to make for the topic]

And as always, listen to the interview or watch the recording afterwards! How does the length of your answers compare to fellow panelists? Can you trim or consolidate any of your examples?

Engage with Your Face

It’s hard to show that you’re listening, especially in a virtual environment, where chiming in with, “Exactly!” or “Yep!” is difficult due to the audio settings.

Instead, practice engaging with your face and your body. This might be smiling, nodding, silently clapping your hands, or giving a thumbs up as your counterpart speaks.?

The goal is to incorporate different types of encouragement with slight changes to your face and body. You don’t need to overdo it with a massive grin or open-mouthed belly laugh, but subtle nods, smiles, leaning forward or sitting back signal that you’re actively engaged in the conversation, but waiting to speak.

The counterpart to this is watching the room to see how your message lands or if someone is waiting to speak. I do this often on podcasts that include videos and panels with a moderator. If I start to see the moderator moving their mic up to respond, that tells me that I should start wrapping up my answer. If I see someone take a deep breath and open their mouth, that signals that they are probably trying to respond to what I’m saying.

Parallel Tracks

The tricky thing about speaking confidently off-the-cuff is that you have to hold multiple things in your mind and body at the same time.

When you’re onstage, you can focus on delivering your prepared script, with no interruptions and few distractions.

But in a spontaneous situation, you’re constantly thinking about whether someone is raising their hand, formulating your response to a question, searching for information to support your points, etc. There’s a lot going on! Thus, we need to practice multitasking.

I like to practice this during my workouts in a few different ways:

• I put on a song that I know well, and then attempt to sing the lyrics in my head, while counting the reps with my lips.
• Alternatively, I try to sing the lyrics with my lips, and count my reps in my head.
• I try to see BOTH the lyrics and my reps in my head, keeping my lips still. This feels almost like having two screens in my brain, with one displaying the lyrics and the other displaying the reps.
• I switch how I count, alternating between counting the reps in real-time, noting how many reps I have left, and alternating between counting up and counting down the reps. This is meant to keep my brain flexible, adapting to different ways of parsing information on-the-fly.?

Just do it!

Nothing beats practicing in real-time. I love LinkedIn Live for this!

You can use the free version of Streamyard to share livestreams directly from your personal profile. You don’t have to schedule a formal event or promote it in advance, just log in and hit the “Go live” button to start streaming.

How to do it:

• Pick a topic where you have strong expertise and passion
• Don’t write a script or key points. Instead, write down 3-4 prompt questions within 10 minutes of going live. Advanced version: ask a friend or peer to send you questions.
• Go live for 10 minutes and answer the questions you wrote out, using the tips described above. Alternate: ask your friend or peer to “interview” you with their own prompt questions.

The key here is NOT to formally prepare. Since it’s a topic you know well, your preparation should be the years of experience, not an official script. Livestreams from your personal profile are a low-stakes way to get started, particularly if you have a small following and you don’t advertise the stream in advance.

See an example

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Resources and Examples

There’s a few folks I love to learn from, and I highly recommend reviewing their content:

Nausheen Chen, Speak as a Leader: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/nausheenichen/

• She has a free LinkedIn learning course with micro-tips , including segments on getting rid of filler words, how to say you don’t know, and speaking confidently
• Podcast with guests from a variety of industries, skills, and seniority, including an interview with me

Mike Pacchione, Best Speech Co: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/mpacchione/

• Podcast with guests about all types of speaking engagements, including an interview with me

Lorraine K. Lee: https://www.dhirubhai.net/in/lorraineklee/

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Tips that I use for panels, podcasts, and meetings:

Declare your talking points

Build credibility