Tomorrow is April Fool’s Day. And the biggest way to make a fool of yourself when it comes to public speaking is to NOT prepare, and to just get up on stage and “wing it.”

I cannot stress enough that “winging it” is a terrible philosophy when it comes to presenting. It doesn’t matter how well you know the topic, even if the topic is you. If you don’t put in the proper preparation, and by that I mean writing out a script and rehearsing it – preferably out loud, to somebody, and maybe even on camera – you are setting yourself up for failure.

When you are performing, the goal is to be so well-prepared that you don’t have to spend any mental energy on thinking about what you’re going to say. Instead, you can take all that energy and pour it into your performance and being the most dynamic storyteller you can be. Rather than thinking about what you’re going to say next, you’ll be thinking about using your hands, your voice, and your body language and how you can captivate your audience. And that’s the goal!

So, don’t hit the stage without a game plan. You need to know the material! Use a script, use bullet points, memorize your speech; the point is, don’t just “wing it” because believe me when the bright lights are on, that becomes very hard to do. As the great Ben Franklin once said: “if you fail to plan, then you’re planning to fail.” And he certainly was no April fool!

If you’d like to learn more about becoming a powerful public speaker, just reach out to me here.

Have a great day!

Dave