If you're an executive, a director, a supervisor, a manager, a department head, a content expert in your field or some other version of an "in demand" key player...
at some point you've probably also been asked to be a speaker.
A public one.
In front of a room full of amateur critics with every eye trained on your every move and every ear fixed on your every word.
Maybe you nailed it.
Maybe you delivered with flourish.
Maybe you simply delivered.
Or, maybe you under-delivered.
If your presentation landed short of your expectations, I'm interested in helping you raise the bar on your next one.
And to do that, you may need to lower the bar you set for yourself.
Here's why.
When you were first asked to speak, you probably went through a three-step internal process made up of, 1.
) Stoic Reluctance, 2.
) Grandiose Ambition, and 3.
) Abject Fear.
Amazingly, of the three, it's not fear but grandiose ambition that may end up preventing you from accessing your inner Lincoln.
And Lincoln may be part of the problem.
Here's why.
You're not a U.
S.
president on a historic battlefield in real-time delivering The Gettysburg Address.
You know that, of course.
But if you're like most of us when we're asked to speak, me included, sometime after downplaying your skills or the message you have to offer (stoic reluctance,) and just before cold sweat and the gut tightening sensation of a seemingly inevitable backstage vomiting episode (abject fear,) you went through at least a moment or two of grandiose ambition.
Or, to put it in street terms, delusional fantasy.
In this fantasy, maybe you imagined yourself giving your presentation with the force of an onstage super nova.
You may have pictured your words flowing like an intoxicating elixir.
You may have dreamed of commanding the room like Jackson Pollack commanded a canvas.
You possibly envisioned yourself captivating, enthralling and mesmerizing your crowd to the point of your boss falling to her knees backstage in homage as the audience gasps, swoons, tears up and laughs at every right moment.
And your big finale? Oh, sweet Socrates, your finale builds to a crescendo with the artistic brilliance of a Mozart concerto.
The walls shudder from your thunderous delivery while the celestial night sky parts and sends bolts of blinding lightning through the roof of the conference room.
The chandeliers shatter sending sparks flying like colorful fireworks through the air as the crowd leaps to their feet in roaring applause, calling out for your ascendency to your rightful perch alongside John F.
Kennedy, Susan B.
Anthony, Martin Luther King, Jr.
and Winston Churchill.
And as you imagine your pearls of wisdom being quoted in history alongside "I have a dream," "tear down this wall," and "Ask not what you can do for your country...
," you soak in the glorious adulation with the meekness of a humble field mouse, envisioning the audience going back to work knowing their lives, rocked profoundly to the core of their essence, will never, ever be the same again.
I think you'll agree, that's quite a bar to reach.
And while each of our own versions of grandiose ambition may be slightly different that the one above, to some degree most of us allow ourselves the indulgence of this imagined grandeur.
And while grand ambition can be a helpful tool, when taken to extreme, as our minds tend to do, it can also be debilitating.
Why? Because we can never live up to that illusion.
Rather than grandiose ambition enhancing our performance, it instead forces us into a finely tailored suit that may fit someone else perfectly, but doesn't fit us at all.
And the discomfort of wearing that suit of illusion when speaking compresses our breathing, restricts our natural movement, distracts our focus from who we truly are.
The gap between the presentation we imagine and the one we're capable of sets us up for failure.
Now, as long as we're sipping a reality martini straight up, here's the good part.
You don't have to be a Lincoln.
Or a Reagan.
Or a Steve Jobs.
No one expects that of you.
You can deliver a powerful, dynamic, effective presentation without the weight of cumbersome and unreachable expectations.
How? Buy lowering the bar.
Don't swing for posterity.
Swing for reality.
And the easiest and best way to do that is to simply be yourself.
Something I hereby give you permission to do.
The authenticity, sincerity and ease of presentation you'll experience by being yourself will take the pressure off you to deliver a roof rattling speech, and the absence of that pressure will increase your authenticity, sincerity and ease of presentation.
None of this is to say you can't improve your speaking and presentation skills.
You can.
With guidance, practice and experience you can grow.
Improve.
Develop.
Ascend.
Approach perfection, even.
It's a worthwhile endeavor, but one that works best when starting not from the rafters of an orator's cathedral, but from the tiny spot on the ground where you're standing now.
Not from an imagined place of flowery words and commanding stage movements, but from the honest, simple truth of who you are.
Lower the bar.
Be yourself.
Then, with practice, with experience, begin to raise the bar in measured, methodical, achievable steps.
The beauty of this is, as you expand your skills, as you enhance your presentation, you're developing your own speaking style.
Not Gandhi's.
Or Gorbachev's.
You're becoming more of yourself.
And learning to communicate your own vision...
in your own voice.
That, with practice and in time, will ultimately give you the confidence and comfort to engage audiences with deliberate, powerful and dynamic presentations that only you can deliver, because they will come from your experience, your insights, your wisdom and your personality.
Lower the bar.
Be yourself.
Develop your skills.
And who knows? Maybe someday scores of fledging, nerve-wracked speakers will indulge their grandiose ambitions of delivering engaging and inspiring presentations to awestruck audiences-by imaging they're you.