The following comes from TJ Walker’s upcoming book “The Wisdom of Your Audience”. Consistently, the worst advice speakers and presenters get, comes from everyone who is NOT your audience. The following gives examples of some of the WORST advice people are often given. It is followed by the advice of your audience. Listen to them. They are your true judge and jury.

Who/what should I look at when speaking?

Your Therapist: “Look at the clock in the back of the room. This will keep you from getting scared by your audience.”

Your Colleague down the hall: “I look at the top of people’s heads. This way I can’t see them staring back at me.”

Your Speech Coach: “Sweep the room with your eyes, moving in a counter-clockwise movement going from the top left quadrant, to the bottom left quadrant, to the top right quadrant and then the bottom right quadrant every 2.3 seconds.”

You: “I’d like to look right at my audience, but I don’t want to make any mistakes. Therefore I better keep my eyes on my script or on my PowerPoint slides.”

***

Your Audience: “Would you give me a job if I came to a job interview and never looked you in the eyes or shook your hand? Of course not. We hate to sound petty, but if you ignore us, we will ignore you back. If you want to get our attention, look us in the eye. Look at each one of us individually, not as some big sea of people. If we feel and see you looking at us individually, we will pay great attention to you, individually. That will add up to one big attentive audience for your speech.”

This entry was posted on Monday, March 17th, 2008 at 9:00 am and is filed under Fear of Speaking, Public Speaking Skills, Speaking, keynote speaking. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.