Stephen and Evan Carmichael explain how beginners can start speaking publicly without hurting their credibility. Start with familiar audiences like community groups or former workplaces, ask for honest feedback after each talk, and use a YouTube channel to practice on camera. Every talk is a test drive to improve.
John Holt is writing in asking about becoming a public speaker. Wants to be a speaker, wants to find places to speak and fail as a beginner, but in places that won't ruin his credibility in the future when he's awesome. So what do you— what advice you have about becoming a speaker and failing at the start and finding places to get some experience so you can overcome those early adversities?
Yeah, you kind of said it, I think, in terms of the question. It's all about practice. You know, I don't know, some famous golfer named Gary Blair who said kind of the more I practice, the luckier I am. The more you practice, the better speaker you'll be. And I just think it's a gift, but it's a gift that can be taught and learned. And it's an area where, you know, we've talked about mentorship before. It's an area where I'd start if you wanted to get into it. Go into an area actually which is sometimes the most difficult area of people who actually know you. Sometimes you will feel that it's easier to present to complete strangers than people who know you, but actually if you work and start presentations with people who know you, then it could be like, I don't know, your community group, or you go back to your school. If you've got a job or you're a startup or a coder, you go back to talk to the computer science kind of high school kids and do a presentation about why should they be excited about the world of computer science and coding. And that's a great way. And then you can kind of go along to the teacher you used to teach and say, kind of, how did I do? What could I have done differently? What could I do better? After, though, when you've done a presentation, then it's about those magical open questions, those friends of yours, like, what could I have done better? What could I have done differently? You know, what messages did we kind of resonate? And also kind of just always ask for feedback because Feedback is absolutely the food of improvement. So that's what I'd say. I'd test drive it, exactly what you say. Don't worry about failure, there is no failure, it's just practice.
I totally agree. I would also start a YouTube channel. Get used to speaking in front of a camera and having people see your opinions, and maybe it's a little less intimidating than speaking in front of an audience at the start. I get a lot of, or maybe most of my speaking gigs through my YouTube channel. People see me talking and they want to hire me to speak at different events. And you talk about— the question talked about places to speak would ruin his credibility in the future. I don't think there's that many places you really have to worry about ruining your credibility. You know, the first place I spoke at was the YMCA, and 3 people showed up at my free event. You know, not the biggest start, but does it look bad on my resume that I started at the YMCA? You know, I don't think there's that many places that really would be a knock against you if that's where you started. So just start. To all of Stephen's points, reach out to your network, places that you've worked before, teachers, clubs that you're a part of, and just offer to do a speech to get some practice. And also get on YouTube, film those speeches, do your own sessions just one-on-one with the camera. And the more practice you get, like Stephen said, the better you're gonna get at speaking.
The other thing, throw out there, you know, back to your business, your dream, following your dreams. Try and pick something you're passionate about because people, when they're listening to you, will feel that kind of infectious, contagious energy, that passion, and that will travel across and it will be absolutely compelling. So try and, you know, if Evan, you're a great motivational speaker because you're passionate about entrepreneurs, you believe, you've got loads of experience relevant, but your heart is totally aligned to the passion, and that's why you're such a compelling speaker. And I kind of think you have to be something that you really care about, and that always helps to give you that energy, uh, and, and the motivation for people to listen.
