From Behind the Desk to the Front of the Stage

Introduction

A speech is a solemn responsibility. The man who makes a bad 30-minute speech to 200 people wastes only half an hour of his own time. But he wastes one hundred hours of the audience’s time—more than four days—which should be a hanging offence.

—Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Unitarian minister and uncle of architectFrank Lloyd Wright

There comes a time in the careers of everyone who wants to be successful and reach the top of their chosen profession when they have to start standing up in front of audiences and—here is the tough bit—speaking to them.

For some, this is a challenge they relish and seem to rise to with ease. For many, however, this journey from behind the desk to the front of the stage is filled with terror. Surveys of popular ...