I did a short interview recently for someone who ran a Toastmasters in Portugal and one of his questions got me to thinking about why people are afraid of public speaking: it’s not as if it’s a question that’s not been banded around and asked millions of times already. “If I can figure out why I’m afraid” goes the logic, “I can do something about that particular issue.” That idea in itself is a massive clue – as is the fact that no-one’s been able to definitively (for me) say why people are so afraid of making presentations.
My contribution to the debate is this:-
We’re afraid precisely because we can’t define what it is that’s going on for us. Let me explain a little more. According to some psychology I’ve read, many of our basic emotions stem from our relationship to our ‘goals’. Blocked goals lead to anger; impossible goals lead to sadness; uncertain goals lead to anxiety.
It seems to make sense to me: I certainly get angry when someone, or something, blocks my goal. Okay, not always ‘angry’ specifically but something on the ‘anger scale’. A trivial goal or a tiny blockage makes my just ‘annoyed’ where as blocking a bigger goal or blocking a goal more effectively leaves me feeling ‘cross’ or even ‘angry’. Ultimately, if you were completely block a critical goal (something like protecting my family, say) you’d push me to the top end of the ‘anger scale’ – something like rage or fury.
If I can’t see a way to achieve a goal I certainly feel sad – the more important the goal, the further along the ‘sad scale’ I am – from disappointed, through sadness itself, to being distraught.
And here’s where it gets interesting for presenters… because uncertain goals lead to anxiety – or rather lead to something on the ‘fear scale’. In my experience as someone who trains people to make presentations and help them with their public speaking, the most common issue I’ve had to contend with had been this: people don’t actually know what their presentation is supposed to achieve. And if you don’t know what it’s supposed to achieve, how will you know when you’ve achieved it?
If you’re playing a game of football you know you’ve got to score more than the opposition in a fixed period of time. You know what the rules are and you’ll know when you’ve won. If you’re playing chess you’ll know when you’ve lost etc. Each time the situation is clear. Okay, you might be anxious about losing but that’s because you don’t know what the consequences of losing will be – you do know what will happen if you win.
So it is with presentations! Or rather, it’s the other way around. Presenters know all too well the consequences of making a bad presentation – people laugh at them, they don’t make the sale, whatever; but if you ask them “How will you know if your presentation has been a success?” they’ll be at a bit of a loss. They might fall back on “I’ll make the sale” or something like that but that might have happened despite their presentation, not because of it. Besides, it’s not ‘immediate’; and it’s the immediate that affects our basic emotions.
If you’re making a presentation “because the boss said so” how do you know you’ve done it successfully? If you’re making a presentation “to tell them about change X” how do you know when you’ve told them enough? When you’ve outlined the changed? When they understand the change? When they let you leave the room alive? When they can remember five facts? Six? Seven? Just one?
If you don’t know what success ‘smells’ like you’ll not know when you’ve achieved it. All you’ll be left with, as a presenter, is a vague sense of anxiety as you struggle to achieve… well, what exactly?
If you don’t know what success looks like but you can imagine all too well what failure looks like, no wonder you’re anxious – and no wonder it’s so damned difficult to do anything about it!
Thanks for sharing.