Your fear of public speaking may be holding you back at work.

Here’s what you can do about it.

Glen Savage is about to go on stage wearing wings and a halo. He’s

terrified.

The year is 1961 and the five-year old Savage is playing the Archangel
Gabriel in the nativity play at St James School in Brisbane, Australia. He has
just one line: “Come here baby angels”.

Little did he know then, but the fear and anxiety of that moment would go
on to shape his entire career. “I just remember thinking that I can’t do it. I
can’t speak in front of all those people”, Savage recalls. “I was absolutely
trembling just before the curtain went up. My voice was shaky and I stared
at the floor… Thereafter I avoided any [public] speaking situations.”

Upon leaving school he became a pharmacist, attracted by the safety of the

glass screen that separated him from customers.

In 2000, he was asked to deliver some training for the wider pharmacy
chain. “Rather than just working with people in my own pharmacy, now I
had the opportunity to help develop people in 400 pharmacies. And I
thought ‘This will be really great’… until I remembered the stumbling block.”

It was “Come here baby angels” all over again. He didn’t know if he could
do it.

Fear factor

Many of us shy away from public speaking. A 2014 survey by Chapman

University found a fear of public speaking was the biggest phobia among
respondents – 25.3% said they feared speaking in front of a crowd.

However, that fear may be limiting our career opportunities. A survey of

more than 600 employers in 2014 found that among the top skills recruiters
look for, “oral communication” was number one and “presentation skills”
number four; traditional management skills such as “managing
administrative activities” came down at the bottom. Yet a 2014 online
survey of 2,031 US workers found that 12% would willingly step aside to let
someone else give a presentation, even if it lost them respect at work. Of
those who did present, nearly 70% agreed it was critical to their success at
work.

It’s well documented that people with public speaking fears say it interferes
with their life. There is much research showing that workplace anxiety can
directly lead to lower work performance. While anecdotally, Financial Times
columnist Lucy Kellaway has described her own fear of public speaking as
being “career limiting”. Legendary investor Warren Buffett even credits a
public speaking course as directly contributing to his success.
Face time

Despite the world of work being increasingly conducted behind computer

screens, career progression is still about being seen and heard. An IBM
report advising female managers on how to reach executive positions
recommends volunteering for speaking engagements and panel discussions,
alongside blogging or tweeting, to make your work known to the rest of the
company.

Harvey Coleman, business consultant and influential author of Empowering

Yourselfidentifies three key factors of career success as ‘performance’,
‘image’, and ‘exposure’. However, they aren’t equally split, he says, with
exposure accounting for 60%, followed by image (30%) and performance
(10%).

“Public speaking is no longer optional in your professional life,” agrees

speaking coach Steve Bustin, author of The Authority Guide to Presenting
and Public Speaking.

“It’s an essential business skill that needs to be learned and practiced like
any other skill,” he says. “Many job interviews, especially for senior level
jobs, now require a presentation to the interview panel”

As video conferencing replaces phone calls, many workers find they have
more face time with multiple colleagues not less. “The idea of
communicating ‘one-to-many’ is very hot at the moment,” says Bustin.
“Some conferences now aren’t flying speakers over, they are setting up a
video link, and you have to present from your office.”

The popularity and influence of TED talks has also changed audience
expectations. Initially conceived as an annual conference on technology and
design in Vancouver, Canada in 1984 and available online since 2006 under
the slogan "ideas worth spreading", the talks have become a cultural
phenomenon. Featuring a range of experts talking for only 20 minutes,
they’ve been viewed online more than a billion times and translated into
more than 100 languages.

Bustin says the skill of these speakers has raised expectations for the rest
of us. “You can now watch great speakers on YouTube, and when people go
to conferences or work events, they expect the speakers to be that good…
the bar has been raised.”

For people who fear public speaking, that is not good news. Those who
present to their peers only a few times a year find it hard to improve, says
Occupational psychologist and business consultant Gary Luffman, based in
Brighton, England.

“Some of the people I work with might have to present once a year or once
a quarter, and in those situations it’s very easy to stick your head in the
sand and not think about it.””
Fight or flight?

The reason why we fear it, is natural and deeply-embedded. Our brains are
three to four times more likely to see a threat than a reward, says Luffman.
“So when faced with a group of people you don’t know… We move to threat
mode”.

Our brain then slips into “fight or flight” mode. When this happens,
adrenaline is released into the body and the heart-rate increases – great if
you want to run or fight, but if standing still this excess energy injection can
constrict your throat and lead to blushing and sweating.

Preparation is the secret of speaking success, say both Bustin and Luffman.
Rather than learning your entire script verbatim, they recommend only
memorising your opening two or three sentences, or first few minutes, so
that you get off to a good start. After which, use cue-cards or slides to
move through the subsequent stages of your presentation.

Luffman also suggests visualising the setting of the presentation

beforehand, what the room will look like and where you will stand. “The
brain reacts very similarly to doing as it does to thinking.

“So, if in advance, you paint a rich, visual picture in your mind… you start to
reduce anxiety.”

There is, however, no substitute for practicing in front of people. Many

people have joined international public speaking organisation Toastmasters
to practice the skill – including Glen Savage. In 2000, when offered the
choice between staying behind his pharmacy counter or standing up and
delivering training, he chose to face his fear.

With the additional help of NLP training – Neuro Linguistic Programming,

which focuses on the language structure and behavioural patterns of
individuals – he began to overcome his “limiting beliefs and anxieties”. The
turning point was a key piece of advice: “It’s not about you, it's about the
audience. For most people who experience public speaking fear, it's based
around self-focus, ‘What if I'm a disaster? What if I fail?’… actually, the
important thing is that the message gets across to the audience. If they like
you, that's just a bonus.”

More than 50 years after his nativity nightmare, Savage walked on stage to
deliver a keynote speech at the 2015 APP Australian Pharmacy Professional
conference – a four-day conference which attracts more than 4,000
delegates. “I was thinking, this is a pleasure and a privilege to have the
opportunity to speak to these people and share some ideas… rather than
thinking ‘Oh, this is traumatic.’” He is now a regular conference speaker,
and coaches others to overcome their fears.

Does he ever wonder what would have happened if he hadn’t decided to

improve? “It would definitely have limited my career. I think I would have
just plateaued.”