People often ask me for advice about public speaking, since I do a lot of it. Of course, it's often reported that people are more afraid of public speaking than death (which is not exactly empirically accurate, but it is close). In my experience, becoming a good public speaker is not a natural skill for anyone. While I now speak professionally about once a week, for sums I could never have imagined just a few years ago, I have had to learn through many difficult and painful experiences and a great deal of feedback how to basically just be myself on stage.
The reality for any creative process, from public speaking to innovation to playing the piano, is that we must be able to go from "suck to non-suck," as Ed Catmull describes the reality of Pixar's creative process, something he has observed and understood for over 30 years as the company's cofounder and president. That takes hours of practice — and a lot of easy-to-ask for, hard-to-implement advice.
To read the original article: Going from "Suck to Non-Suck" as a Public Speaker - Peter Sims - Harvard Business Review
