Lilyan Wilder is a communications consultant who has worked with the world's most notable public figures, broadcast
correspondents at ABC, CBS, NBC, and CNN, and many Fortune 500 companies.
Review
"Lilyan Wilder has trained more broadcasters, politicians, and business executives than anybody."
--Charles Osgood, Anchor, CBS News Sunday Morning.
"Lilyan Wilder is the industry's undisputed grand dame of broadcast coaching."
--The New York Times.
"Lilyan Wilder understands how to make the essential connection between a speaker and an audience. In this
book, she tells you how to do it as she has told so well to so many famous communicators."
--Charlie Rose.
"7 Steps to Fearless Speaking has helped me to speak with persuasion and conviction....Follow Wilder's sage
counsel, and you'll find your public speaking much improved and more rewarding."
--Ivan Seidenberg, Chairman and CEO, Bell Atlantic.
"Lilyan Wilder is simply the best. I continue to use many of her exercises on a daily basis. They're wonderful."
--Dr. Bob Arnot, Chief Medical Correspondent, NBC News.
"Lilyan Wilder is simply awesome, personally and professionally."
--Maria Shriver, Correspondent, NBC News.
John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Publishers Web Site, April, 2001
Preface
Introduction
If you asked me what I came into this world to do, I will tell you: I came to live out loud.-EMILE ZOLA
Fear of public speaking consistently tops every list of human fears.
In an often-cited 1993 study done by the polling firm Bruskin-Goldring, 45 percent of those surveyed said they
feared public speaking. Thirty percent said they feared death.
In a study of 3,000 Americans published in the Book of Lists (David Wallechinsky, Little, Brown, 1995),
the number one fear cited by 41 percent of those studied was speaking to an audience.
And a similar study by A. Ronald Seifert of the Behavioral Institute of Atlanta indicated that "40 million
Americans hate speaking so much, they'd do almost anything to avoid it, and perhaps as many as 40 million who speak
all the time feel anxious and do not want to give a talk!"
If you are one of those millions who have been plagued all their lives by fear of public speaking . . . if you
feel that fear has impeded your career and diminished your life ... this book can help you.
The Seven Steps to Fearless Speaking explained in these pages are the culmination of more than 30 years of teaching
the art of communication-at the New School for Social Research in New York City, at Columbia University Graduate
School of Journalism, at Hunter and Brooklyn Colleges, in private sessions in my studio, and in corporate conference
rooms all over America.
The Seven Steps . . .
Experience Your Voice,
Get a Response and Structure Your Thoughts,
Establish a Dialogue,
Tap Your Creativity,
Learn to Persuade,
Achieve Your Higher Objective, and
Give the Gift of Your Conviction
. . . are a road map to a place where you can freely and fearlessly say what you know and what you believe.
A place where you can truly be yourself as a public speaker and communicate from the depth of your convictions.
My alumni, who number in the thousands, include broadcasters and businessmen, stockbrokers and senators, homemakers
and heads of state. Many of them suffered from fear of speaking. Our work together taught me how to help you.
"Why Are You Here?"
I begin each private session and class by asking the question, "Why are you here?" My students give me
answers like these:
"I feel I have limited my life because of my fear of public speaking. I have managed so far to fast-talk
my way out of most presentations. But the excuses are running out. I'm tired of living like this."
"I get petrified the night before I have to speak before a group, and can't sleep all night. It's as if no
matter what I do, I have no control over my thoughts or body. At the same time, it's something I long to do. Something
I want desperately. I envy people who can. I want to be one of those people."
"I get very hoarse in my throat. It's not dryness. . . . I can't eat or drink. I bring the water to my mouth
and I can't swallow. . . . Thinking on my feet, when I'm very nervous, all I can think about is how I'm standing
in front of a large group of people and they're all paying attention to me. How can I possibly even remember what
the person asked?"
"I have spent the last 20 years at work controlling situations and talking my way out of public speaking.
I do fine when I choose to enter a conversation, but when I have to get up in front of the group or get called
on . . . I've been very good at getting out of it."
My students are of all ages and from all walks of life. Their common denominator is their shared feelings of
frustration, fear, and confusion. They confirm the fact that fear of speaking is an equal-opportunity affliction.
It does not discriminate because of gender, age, religious belief, socioeconomic class, job description, or ethnic
origin.
Fear and the Famous
The famous aren't immune, either. The roster includes James Earl Jones, Barbra Streisand, Carly Simon, Willard
Scott, and Maya Angelou.
James Garner, a lifelong sufferer of fear of speaking, once paused during the filming of The Rockford Files
to admit to a newspaper reporter that he was extremely nervous about delivering an upcoming commencement address
at the University of Oklahoma in his hometown of Norman.
"It's been driving me nuts," he said, "thinking about the speech while I'm trying to finish this
movie."
Cellist Pablo Casals has had to be physically pushed on stage on several occasions. Once, after injuring his hand
while hiking, he happily announced, "Thank God, I'll never have to play the cello again." (Fortunately,
the injury wasn't permanent.)
Laurence Olivier is said to have suffered stage fright so acutely, he asked his fellow cast members not to look
him in the eye while he was performing.
Thomas Jefferson was terrified of speaking in public and never did overcome it. Near the end of his life, he confided
to a friend that he was outraged by what he regarded as the Continental Congress's heavy-handed revision of his
carefully written Declaration of Independence-but was unable to speak up and defend his work.
Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter was bedeviled by fear of speaking, too. Most of her life, she managed to avoid
public speaking. But as First Lady, she couldn't.
In her autobiography, The First Lady from Plains (Houghton Mifflin, 1984), she explains:
The idea of standing up in front of people absolutely terrified me . . . speeches were impersonal, and I was
certain I would be struck dumb if I ever had to make one.
But, on the campaign trail, there was no place to hide. And hiding wasn't her goal. Helping her husband get
elected governor of Georgia, and eventually president of the United States, was her goal. So, speak up she did,
over and over again:
I started practicing at small coffees and receptions, making a deliberate decision to say a few words at each.
I always arrived very nervous and headed straight for the bathroom, locked myself in, and said my lines (which
couldn't have been more than two minutes long) over and over. . . . For a long time it was torture for me. I never
knew when I opened my mouth whether any words would come out or not. My knees shook. I was always afraid I would
go blank in the middle of my remarks . . .
However, as time passed,
It got much easier for me . . . and before the campaign was over I was making brief speeches often.
Her fortitude, her careful preparation, and her willingness to go back again and again, practice and practice
some more, eventually paid off.
Mrs. Carter triumphed over her fear because her objective was clear and her desire to express her convictions was
strong-so strong that her need to say what was on her mind eventually replaced her fear.
Fear and the Real You
There is no relationship between fear of public speaking and personal resourcefulness, education, or imagination.
Far from it. I am continually impressed by the intelligence and creativity of the people who come to me for help,
and how much they have to offer. They are CEOs, doctors, lawyers, authors, artists, designers, accountants, financial
advisors, computer experts, homemakers active in their communities and their houses of worship, professional volunteers,
administrators of charities and nonprofit organizations, architects, and middle-management executives.
They are like you, people who can make a difference. What a shame, then, to hear statements like this, from one
of my students: "I had something to say and didn't. I might as well not have been there."
When you don't say what you know and feel, when you withhold yourself, the world is poorer for it.
A Fear Inventory
When you have a speaking chore to face, do you procrastinate? Do you avoid preparing, because to do so just seems
to make you more nervous? When you visualize yourself in front of the audience, do any of these thoughts run through
your mind?
"They'll think I don't know what I'm doing."
"I'll make a fool of myself."
"I'll look stupid."
"They'll know more about this than I do."
"My hands will shake."
"My voice will crack."
"They'll think I'm disorganized."
"I'll go blank."
"I'll lose my place."
"I'll be boring."
"I don't know how to do this."
"I'm not prepared."
"I don't know how to prepare."
"I'm no good at this."
"I can't do it."
"They'll ask questions I can't answer."
The Cost of Fear
The toll in lost opportunities and frustration exacted by the fear of speaking is enormous. It can thwart your
career advancement. In an era of corporate restructuring and downsizing, it can be the difference between keeping
and losing a job.
Face it: If you can't orchestrate a meeting, you're of little use to a corporation.
But the cost runs even deeper than that. It keeps men and women from fulfilling their potential and sharing their
unique knowledge, skills, and passions.
Fear of speaking can do the following:
Lead you to believe you are less competent and worthy than you are.
Keep your ideas from being heard.
Keep you from applying for the position you really want.
Become a glass ceiling on your career.
Cost you your job in a downsizing or corporate restructuring.
What I Teach and Why
I have devoted my life to teaching people to communicate effectively in public-to overcome fear, to find and use
their voices, to plan and say what is on their minds and in their hearts.
The Seven Step Program teaches you to replace fear with a deeper, more meaningful involvement in your message.
It is an alternative to the method that uses artificial inflections, mechanical gestures, and any other superficialities.
Realizing the difference between these two methods is what turns an ordinary talking head into a competent broadcast
communicator who is listened to, believed, and sought after.
Realizing the difference is what turns a forgettable drone into an effective business speaker whose information
and ideas energize his or her listeners.
Realizing the difference is what enables a lifelong fearful speaker to become fearless at last.
Because the Seven Step Program is rooted in human values and not performance mechanics, it is unlike any other
you may have undertaken in an effort to overcome your fear of speaking.
In this program, you will not be taught to:
Worry about when and how often to make eye contact with your listeners, as if eye contact were
a substitute for making a real connection with them.
Practice putting your hands in and taking them out of your pockets, or using other prescribed gestures for
effect.
Vary your vocal modulation, pitch, and tempo for variation's sake.
Pretend that your listeners are so many heads of cabbage, or that they are all naked, or some other nonsensical
fantasy that denies the reality of one-on-one communication. (One of my students, who stuttered as a child, told
me, "People were always giving me brainless advice like that.")
In this program, you will be taught to:
Breathe properly.
Hear and enjoy your real voice.
Get an immediate response from your listeners.
Sustain that response and make your presentation a give-and-take that is as stimulating for you as it is for
your listeners.
Speak, at all times, from your intelligence, experience, and beliefs.
Like all teachers, I had teachers, too. And two of them changed my life. What I learned from them formed the
foundation for what I teach.
The first was the late Professor Lew Sarett of Northwestern University, who taught me that an "able speaker"
is also an "able person"-a person of character.
"An able speaker," Professor Sarett wrote, "is one who possesses or is achieving the power to speak
excellently." At the same time, an able person is one "who possesses or is achieving excellence as a
human being, one who is developing his own best potentialities in the art of living."
The able speaker, Professor Sarett taught, has something of value to say and has as his or her purpose the communication
of those feelings and ideas "toward the achievement of some productive end."
Recognize yourself as a person of character who has something to say, and what you have to say will become more
important than your fear of saying it.
My second great teacher was Lee Strasberg, the immensely influential acting coach whose teachings are still practiced.
As a young actress, I learned from him his famous acting "method," which is based on two liberating emotional
exercises: the Private Moment and the Affective Memory. Both are designed to help the actor bring his or her own
memories and life experiences to bear on the portrayal of a character. That connection to real life brings a compelling
dimension of reality to the performance.
You are not here to learn to act, of course. But bringing your own experience, your own sense of reality to bear
on your public speaking connects you to your subject and your audience as nothing else can.
So I adapted both of these exercises to my teaching. They form the basis for the work we will do in Step Seven,
Give the Gift of Your Conviction.
The real you as a public speaker is there, behind the fear, just waiting to be brought out. All of the work we
are about to undertake together is aimed toward that wonderful objective.
But first, let's talk about the fear that has caused you so much pain.
Summary
When people say they'd rather die than address an audience, they're not kidding. Fear of public speaking has
even topped death in some surveys. But now top communications consultant Lilyan Wilder offers some sound advice
on how to overcome the crippling inhibition of public speaking. Her clients have included media icons Oprah Winfrey
and Charlie Rose, former President George Bush, John Sculley, and Katharine Graham. 7 Steps to Fearless Speaking
will teach you how to cope with the panic, avoidance, and trauma of speaking as you give the gift of your conviction
and experience your voice for the first time.
Table of Contents
The Five Fears.
Let's Get Started.
Step One: Experience Your Voice.
Step Two: Get a Response and Structure Your Thoughts.
Step Three: Establish a Dialogue.
Step Four: Tap Your Creativity.
Step Five: Learn to Persuade.
Step Six: Achieve Your Higher Objective.
Step Seven: Give the Gift of Your Conviction.
The Seven Steps in Action.
Special Situations.
The First Aid Kit and the Emergency Kit.
Be a Fearless Speaker Every Day.
Appendices.
Selected Readings.
Acknowledgments.
Index.