Thursday, February 23, 2012

Talking in Public

At school we had to give a talk in front of the class on a subject of our choice about once a term. I used to hate it. However it was a skill that I feel that I should master if I’m going to get on in the business world. Luckily I have a good outlet to practice on.

I love aviation and I’m a member of a society called Air-Britain and where I used to live in Bournemouth we have our own branch of the society. OK so they are all my mates but it still involved getting up and speaking, trying to hold their attention for a whole evening etc. Being mates they of course heckle a lot and that has helped me too. I’ve now got to the point where I enjoy the challenge of talking in front of people. I still get as nervous as hell and I think that may affect my performance but its fun.

I have a love/hate relationship with the preparation. I’m giving my next talk on Friday night and I’ve spent practically all my spare time over the last two weeks preparing the talk. In some ways it’s been great. If I have had to research a particular subject then I always find that I learn something more about it when I’m preparing a talk. It is horrible feelings when you’ve got a whole section of a talk set out and then learn something that completely contradicts when you were going to say.

I know I have to work on my authority. Most of the time I’m giving a talk on something that I know more about the subject then my audience members but still don’t feel like I have a tone of authority in my voice to say look I know what I’m talking about here. Something I’m working on.

So tomorrow night my main subjects I will be talking about are the Tannkosh Airshow in Germany, Museum of Naval Aviation in Florida and the Warner Robins Aircraft museum in Georgia.

I might as a little ‘treat’ to a friend do a small bit on how London Underground numbers its tube trains. We had quite a discussion about this when we were in London last. He’ll cringe at it but it will be funny.

Finally I’m also going to reveal for the first time a new website I’m working on, get their feedback and hopefully get them onboard with it.

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