In the world of public speaking, there is a certain magic in guiding your audience towards an idea without explicitly stating it.

My advice for action in business is pretty much the same. It’s easy to get ready. You just have to act before you’re ready.

No paradox. Just different people doing their job best.

That process of collecting and developing good ideas becomes vastly easier, though, when you develop an active awareness and a simple system that you employ in your daily life.

Don’t make the mistake of trying to blend into the crowd when you’re standing up the front.

Any practice, perfect or not, is better than no practice. The implication that it’s even possible to create perfect practice without first indulging in quite a lot of imperfect practice seems entirely misguided to me.

Speak seriously about the topic, and jovially about yourself. Be discerning with regard to the subject, and playful with regard to yourself.

Honouring this mistaken obligation to your content should be avoided, because it's bad for the audience, and bad for your commercial outcomes.

If you want to measure success in dollars (you don’t have to, by the way, but if you do), you need to add a commercial angle to your professional game.

There's an oversupply of people great at delivering valuable results, and a large and growing vacuum of talent able to create commercial opportunity.

For whatever reason, as I sat down to write today, I had an urge to just tell you all about what I've been thinking about, and what I've got planned (or at least what I'm considering) both professionally and personally, in 2022.

However, it was yet another reminder that the most important question you can answer to open a presentation is "why are we here?", and critically, you have to answer it from the audience' perspective, not your own.

The first courageous question is "What's wrong with me?".

Whatever your preferred speech, I suggest you watch it again, and count the use of pronouns.

How many times does the speaker say "I" or "me"?

How many times do they say "you" or "them"?

And how many times do they say "we" or "us"?

Today from my bookshelf I'm reading Lead The Room by my friend Shane Hatton. For thoughts about the nuances of quality, the value of practicality, and the power of metaphor, watch this video.

Practice smiling at an imaginary crowd. Practice the pauses you'll make after sharing a key idea. Practice being a relaxed, confident version of you.