Facilitators

New to facilitating and not sure what to do?

New to public speaking and nervous to get started?

This page is for you!

Public Speaking

The first thing to realize is that people really do want to listen to you, and in a training environment especially, they will benefit from what you have to say.

In many organizations, you will have a Facilitator Guide, which functions as your script. Some are more detailed than others, because some will tell you exactly what to say, while others will give you an outline of the class schedule and content to cover.

But let's say you don't have a Facilitator Guide, or the one you have doesn't have enough information. What do you do then?

Objectives first. Objectives tell what you want the learners to be able to do when the class is over. Say them at the beginning of the class so the learners know what's expected of them, say them at the end of the class to recap what the lesson was about, and make sure what you're teaching connects back to them so your learners don't get lost in extra information they weren't expecting.

How do you keep the learner's attention?

Make sure that what you're teaching is useful to them. You can do this by telling them what's in it for them. Let them know what they will gain by taking this class.

During the class, center the lesson around a back-and-forth conversation with the learners. Yes, some parts of the lesson need to be just information imparting: telling them facts and stuff. But for the rest of it, ask questions to relate the content to what they're already familiar with. Use activities so they can practice the skill they're learning. If you have a slide deck, don't read it word for word unless it's legal material and you have to do that. Instead, expand upon it with examples the learners are familiar with. Don't know what they're familiar with? Ask them!

Some technical support advice here: test out your technology in advance so you can troubleshoot before class starts, like your microphone, camera, slide deck, websites, and online meeting platform. Print any papers you'll/the class will need as early as possible in case the printer is down or runs out of ink.

Public Speaking

Public speaking gets a bad rap as a scary thing to do, but what it really is is a skill like any other, that can be improved if you purposefully practice.

That means you should:

Practice speaking from a script in front of a mirror, with a timer to monitor how fast/slow you speak.
Practice speaking in front of a camera so you can watch the recording and note how you can improve. (Play the video in fast-forward, too, to see if you are over-using any gestures. It's easier to notice that way.)
Practice speaking in front of a small group. Then a larger group. Then a larger group until you're comfortable speaking in front of a group that's as large as your class is going to be. (If you haven't heard about it, Toastmasters exists for this exact purpose, but you don't have to join an official group to practice speaking.)
Get your audience's feedback from these practice sessions, but don't take the critiques entirely to heart. The thing about feedback is that it often differs depending on how the critic is feeling that day. If you resonate with the feedback, absolutely implement it to improve, but if you think they sound off-base, seek out more feedback about the issue and see if other agree. Feedback is just a tool, not a reflection of yourself.

Two resources that may be useful to you are my Public Speaking Basics video and David JP Phillips' YouTube channel. It might also be useful to you to study TED Talks (not TEDx talks, although some of them are good, too, they aren't as consistently top-tier public speakers as Ted Talk speakers are). I'm not affiliated with either of these channels or creators, but I have learned a lot from their videos, which is why I am sharing them with you. When you find a way of speaking, cadence, tone of voice, gesture, or anything else that stands out to you as something you'd like to use, just steal it. There isn't a monopoly on any of these speaking techniques.