You know those people who stand up and speak in front of an entire room, a microphone or a camera?
Yes, yes. Those politicians who can spend ten minutes developing an idea that could sometimes have fit into three sentences.
And yet, we listen to them.
The sentence is perfectly constructed. The pace is controlled. The pauses land in exactly the right places. Their gaze sweeps across the room. Their voice drops when a statement needs weight and rises when they need to carry the audience with them.
In short: even when the substance fails to convince us, the form of public speaking can be remarkably well mastered.
What if this skill were not reserved for politicians, keynote speakers and those other mysterious creatures who somehow enjoy finding themselves in front of 800 people?
Because before dreaming of giving a TED Talk, learning to speak with confidence can be useful in far more ordinary situations.
Presenting an idea in a meeting. Defending a project. Going to a job interview. Asking for a raise. Explaining to a client why you disagree with them. Or diplomatically telling your boss that their wonderful idea may be sending everyone straight into a wall.
Public speaking is about being convincing, but it is also about learning to defend your place and your ideas.
What exactly is public speaking?
It is easy to picture a lectern, a stage and a crowd.
But public speaking more broadly means speaking to an audience. In its oratorical sense, a speech is a developed statement delivered before a group of people; public speaking involves structured and intentional communication designed, among other things, to inform or persuade. Le Robert
And that “audience” can perfectly well consist of eight colleagues around a table.
As soon as you need to organise your thoughts, capture attention, convey information and perhaps persuade several people, you are already using some of the skills involved in public speaking.
The good news is that these skills can be learned.
Speaking well in public is not just about finding the right words
We place enormous importance on words, or more precisely on the script.
We think we need to prepare it, write it, rewrite it… that we need to create a magnificent 47-slide presentation that we will then inflict on innocent people.
And we forget the fundamental thing:
a speech is not made of words alone. It is, and should be, embodied.
Take a perfectly ordinary sentence:
“I think we should reconsider this decision.”
Say it quickly, looking down, shoulders hunched and voice hesitant.
Then say exactly the same sentence while looking at the other person, slowing your pace slightly and leaving a second of silence after “decision”.
Same sentence.
Not the same speech.
Your voice, rhythm, pauses, breathing, eye contact and posture all shape the way your message is received.
Eloquence is not a gift reserved for a lucky few
Some people seem naturally comfortable when they have to speak in public.
That does not mean they were born holding a microphone.
A large part of speaking with ease comes from skills that can be developed: structuring an idea, articulating your reasoning, using your voice, managing your pace, looking at your audience, mastering your posture and, above all, learning to tolerate that particularly delightful sensation of having twenty pairs of eyes fixed on you.
Because behind difficulty speaking up, there is often something else:
fear of judgement.
“What if I stumble over my words?”
“What if my mind goes blank?”
“What if someone contradicts me?”
“What if my question is stupid?”
“What if I am not legitimate enough to speak?”
Self-confidence in public speaking does not necessarily mean eliminating stage fright.
It is more about developing enough inner security to speak despite it.
Speaking up in meetings: public speaking in miniature
This is probably one of the situations where the skill becomes most concrete.
Picture the scene: you are in a meeting. A decision is about to be made. And you sincerely believe it is a bad one.
You now have several options.
- Stay silent and complain magnificently by the coffee machine an hour later.
- Blurt out:
“Honestly, this is never going to work.”
- Or learn to express disagreement clearly, diplomatically and convincingly.
For example, by structuring your intervention:
here is what I observe → here is the risk I see → here is why → here is the alternative I propose.
That way, you are no longer merely expressing an opinion. You are building an argument. That is already rhetoric.
And knowing how to speak up in meetings can considerably change the way your skills and ideas are perceived professionally.
Defending your interests without turning into a pushy salesperson
Public speaking is not only useful for presenting projects.
It also helps you defend your interests.
Take the wonderful human experience of asking for a raise.
Walking into your manager’s office with:
“Er… I’ve been here for quite a while now and I was thinking maybe we could perhaps talk about my salary…”
does not have the same effect as calmly presenting:
what you have achieved, the responsibilities you carry, the value you bring and the precise request you are making.
Asking for a raise is also an exercise in public speaking and argumentation.
It is neither about attacking nor begging.
It is about building a message clear enough for the other person to know exactly what you are asking for and why.
A successful job interview is also about knowing how to tell a story
The same mechanism applies in a job interview.
We often imagine that answering the questions correctly is enough.
But a recruiter only has a few dozen minutes to understand who you are professionally.
Your ability to present your career path, explain your choices, tell the story of an experience, give a concrete example and respond calmly to an objection therefore becomes essential.
Saying:
“I know how to handle difficult situations”
is a claim.
Telling, in forty seconds, the story of a difficult situation, what you did and what happened next is a demonstration.
And our brains like stories.
Knowing how to speak in public therefore also means learning to turn a succession of information into an intelligible story.
How do you make a presentation interesting without delivering a pompous TED Talk?
Ah, the famous TED Talk.
The black stage. The red circle. The little personal anecdote. The dramatic pause. And sometimes that strange feeling that someone is about to reveal the secret of the universe using three sticky notes and an experience they once had in an airport (I’m barely exaggerating…).
Still, the format reminds us of something useful:
a good presentation is not an accumulation of information.
It has a direction.
To prepare an interesting oral presentation, start with an extremely simple question:
What do I want the people in the room to understand, feel or do after listening to me?
One main idea.
Then build around it.
An opening that makes people want to listen.
A clearly stated problem.
A few arguments or examples.
A progression.
And a conclusion that genuinely answers the question you started with.
You have just created a mini TED Talk.
Without necessarily pacing slowly across a stage while explaining how meeting a Peruvian llama transformed your understanding of leadership.
Posture matters… but it should not become theatre
“Stand up straight.”
“Look at your audience.”
“Use your hands when you speak.”
All of this advice can be useful.
Until you spend so much time controlling your body that you start to look like a mime in the middle of an experimental workshop.
The goal is not to manufacture an artificial posture of confidence.
It is rather to remove what interferes with your message.
Breathe enough.
Do not speak at breakneck speed.
Accept pauses.
Actually look at the people you are speaking to.
Take up your space instead of trying to disappear.
Good posture supports the speech; it does not perform the speech for you.
What if I freeze when I have to speak in public?
Stage fright before speaking in public is not a sign that you lack competence in your field, only that public speaking itself may be a skill you still need to develop.
The main challenge is to prevent the emotion from taking complete control of your attention.
And one of the most effective methods remains spectacularly unglamorous:
prepare and rehearse. (yes, with a Coach, it’s even better…)
Not memorise every sentence word for word.
Know your structure well enough to know where you are going even if a particular phrase escapes you.
Prepare especially:
your opening sentence, your three main ideas, your transitions, and your final sentence.
Then you no longer need to retrieve a script from memory.
You simply find your way again.
Persuasion is not manipulation
This is a distinction that matters to me.
Developing eloquence and persuasive ability does not mean learning how to manipulate other people.
An argument can perfectly well respect the freedom of the person listening.
You set out your reasoning. You make your idea understandable. You explain why you defend it. You give the other person reasons to follow you.
And they remain perfectly entitled to answer:
“No.”
Learning to persuade should therefore also mean learning to listen, respond to objections and accept disagreement.
Otherwise, it is not really an exchange anymore.
It is a monologue with a witness.
Can public speaking be learned?
Yes.
And above all, you do not need to dream of becoming a professional speaker.
You can work on your public speaking simply so that you can say clearly what you think when it matters.
Speak up more often in meetings.
Present your work without apologising for existing.
Defend an idea in front of your team.
Go into job interviews with greater confidence.
Ask for a raise without wanting to disappear under the table.
Set a boundary.
Respond to an objection.
Present a project.
Or simply manage to say:
“I disagree, and here is why.”
Perhaps that is ultimately the interesting skill behind public speaking.
Not becoming someone who can talk for twenty minutes without saying anything.
But becoming someone capable of saying something when their voice matters.
Public speaking is also about learning to defend your place and your ideas.
Working on public speaking through coaching
Public speaking is particularly interesting territory for coaching because it combines several dimensions: self-confidence, communication, stress management, posture, argumentation, the ability to defend your interests and your relationship with other people’s judgement.
So we can work very concretely.
Prepare a presentation. Simulate an interview. Rehearse asking for a raise. Work through a difficult intervention in a meeting. Test several formulations. Observe what a different posture changes. Learn how to respond when someone interrupts or contradicts you.
Because between intellectually understanding how good public speaking works and actually doing it in front of someone, there is a particularly interesting little space:
practice.
And that is precisely where we can start playing — and you know how much I love to play…