5 Important Principles of Public Speaking Every Professional Need To Know

Recently we had politicians who were campaigning and selling their agendas and manifestos to the public. Most of them were confident and they were at ease persuading the audience. If some won your heart through effective communication, you must have asked yourself if great speakers are made or born. Well, the gift of eloquent speech might be inborn for some people while others have trained themselves through a public speaking course in Kenya and they have perfected their skills through practice.

Before you deliver a speech the question of why should the audience listen to you is key. So, what is the secret to effective public speaking? I had a conversation with Mary, the public speaking training coordinator who highlighted the five principles.

Keep reading!

1. Select A Topic That You Love

Ever been asked to present a topic that you don’t love? Definitely, you might feel uncomfortable and it will be hard to draw the audience’s attention unlike when you present a topic you have an interest in.

“Choosing a topic you are passionate about is the basis of communicating with confidence and the audiences are likely to pay attention,” Mary said.

How about if you are forced to speak about a certain topic?  Will you try to fake your passion? If you do so, the audience will not trust you. So just frame the topic in a way that excites you.

2. Present Something New

The human brain is wired to love new things because old-fashioned things lead to boredom. Neuroscientists claim that when we learn new things, our brain releases a hormone that makes us feel good and receptive to what is being said.

Public speaking fundamentals involve the content,’ what you say’ and delivery ‘how you say it’. The content defines how impactful your talk can be, and your delivery determines how impactful your talk actually is.

New content can be information that is unknown to the audience or a new solution to a problem. To avoid boring the audience with old information and losing their attention, consider adding novelty by packaging it in a new way.

3. Keep Your Talk Brief

This golden principle of public speaking covers the time you take when presenting. Limiting your presentation to a few minutes or breaking it into sections prevents the audience from getting tired and bored.

To ensure that your presentation is brief, follow the rule of three, where you communicate a maximum of three ideas in one talk. Studies reveal that the human brain can only process a maximum of three ideas once.

One of the valuable lessons that people learn in speak with confidence training is that less is usually more in public speaking because the concentration span of human beings is short.

4. Use Humor

When some politicians were addressing a large crowd of audience during the election period, some incorporated humor to make the audience laugh. The more the audience laughed, the more they liked the speaker, and the more they supported what was being said.

The golden rule of effective public speaking is the use of humor by sharing an anecdote, an analogy, or a funny comment from someone else. Avoid telling relentless jokes and humor that audiences have heard many times.

5. Plan and Practice

Rules of effective planning when speaking in public involves mapping out how you want your speech to unfold.

Draft the headline that summarizes your main topic, the sub-topics that support the main point, and a brief explanation or examples.

If you have a clear idea of what you want to say, your presentation will run smoothly. After planning, rehearse it for you to master the structure or content very well and it takes practice to improve public speaking skills.

Finally

If you have an upcoming presentation, follow the above five principles for you to capture the audience’s attention and you will leave them wishing you had spoken longer.

Be an effective public speaker and boost your career with this Communicate with Confidence Course!