EP 249 From Stutter to Stage: Peter George's Public Speaking Journey

And welcome to another episode of stuck in my mind podcast. I'm your host, w I z e. I'm I'm very excited for my next guest. Just found out he's a Yankee fan, so that's a great thing. Welcome to the show, Peter George. Let me Thanks so much. Pleasure to be here with you and your audience. Oh, pleasure's all mine. Thank you for for stopping by. I read this section in the in the in the book, the, the pod the the Pod Master grad book. It was, it was great. I actually have the, I have the

podcast's edition. Alex sent me somewhere. But, it it was it contributed to both the the podcast You contributed to both of them. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm the only person it helpful. Oh, man. This is, being part of this community has been has been great, man. Being a being a part of the PodMatch community has been has helped my helped me grow my podcast in the last couple years. Gone gone from not many many downloads, not many views to it really taken off in the last year

and a half, 2 years. So it's been great. It's been a wonderful experience to to be able to to see the growth in my podcast. Alex and his team have done a great job. Oh, wonderful. Yeah. Oh, they they do a wonderful job. But let's let's let's start off with you. Can you can you share your journey from dealing with a lisp and a stutter to becoming a a a public speaking coach? Yeah. It's kinda ironic, isn't it? That

Yeah. I went from a kid who wouldn't speak to anybody other than my friends, and I played sports, so my teammates, but I wouldn't speak in school. I was afraid I'd embarrassed myself or teachers would be impatient, whatever it would be. So I kept quiet and watched. And by the time I got to high school, both the lisp and the stutter had all but gone. They both show up every now and again, but for the most part, had gone. And I still didn't communicate

a lot. And then when I got to the corporate world and realized I had to communicate, I wasn't I I had spent 21 years not communicating with people. So I wasn't all that good at it. And I asked for help, and they sent me the company I worked for, large a worldwide company, sent me for help, and it was group public speaking training. And what I learned was I had been studying public speaking my entire life by observing and trying to avoid it. You're still looking at it when you're

trying to avoid it. And I said, well, this is really coming not natural to me, but I enjoy it. And then I asked them if they would send me to a private coach. So one on one training, which they did, and that's when it took off for me. And I left that company after 9 years because my dad died, so I came back to Rhode Island to be with my mom. And I started my own company, and my wife was my partner in it, and she's an accountant by education.

So it didn't take long for this accountant to see that every time I went out and spoke at events or whatever it might be, conferences and the like, that we got a bump in revenue. And she she just said, do more of that. And I did, and that's how 30 some odd years ago I got started in speaking. And I've been speaking on stage and, guest elsewhere ever since. And about 19 years ago, I started helping others do the same. So I speak on

stage, and I'm a coach. Okay. So so how did your personal experience with with speech challenges shape your your coaching approach? My my approach is to really help people with their particular strengths. And I have a framework. It's called the AMPD framework where we look at the audience that you'll be speaking to, the message you wanna deliver, developing the actual presentation, and then working on delivering that presentation. So

AMPD, AMPD. And with that, we work with people's strengths, minimize the distractions. And people can use this in any situation, whether it's one person across a desk, 10 people in a conference room, or a 1000 people in an auditorium. It's the same theory where it's 2 minds or more, but 2 minds connecting and staying engaged so you can help those people. Most people think, hey. I'm the guy up here speaking. Well, that might be true, but it's

not about you. The only person I ever cared it was about me up on the stage was my mom. She was like, oh, you're speaking again, and she was all excited about it. No one else cared. They're there for themselves, the audience. They're there for what they're getting out of it. So when we start looking at how can we get you up there to help people, to serve them, that's a different thing than just teaching public speaking.

Okay. Can can okay. Can you explain the AMP speaking framework and and how it benefits the speakers? Yeah. A lot of speakers say, you know, this is my message. Well, that might be great, but depending on who's in that audience, you might have to provide that message in a different way. So that first one, the a, the amped, is who's in the audience? How do you wanna make them feel? We often forget that. Do we want them to be encouraged? Do we want them to be ramped up?

Does a sales a sales manager or sales vice p wanna light a fire under someone's butt or the team's butt because they're not hitting their numbers and they want them to feel a little, oh, I don't know, cautious? Or, we might lose our jobs if we don't step up here. So how do you wanna make them feel? What do you want them to walk away with? Now I gotta believe. You know, you you've been on this planet for a little

while. I gotta believe you've been in a meeting once or twice, and you left that meeting and thought to yourself, I will never ever get that time back. It was a complete waste of

time. Yes. That's the whole joke about meetings. Right? Is there a waste of time? And that's because the people left no differently than what they entered. If you don't transform the audience, then why did we have this meeting or this event? Mhmm. The audience has to be transformed. Otherwise, send an email with a PDF to give them the information, and you're good. So that's what the a is looking at is who's this audience, and how am I going to approach them, and what do I want to accomplish

in serving them? What do they want to know? What do they need to know? What are they going to do when they leave here? What are they physically going to do, or how are they going to think differently? How are they going to be transformed? And then you also wanna know who's in the audience for things like, if I'm on stage and I'm speaking at a corporate event and I have marketers in the room, okay, they

process information in a particular way. Salespeople in the same room, slightly different, but not a great deal different. And the IT people and financial people from a company in that same room, they both process information completely differently. So you have to know who's there so you know how to present and connect with each of those groups or all the people. That's the a. And the message is, what's your point? And a point is not a topic. A point isn't

well, taxes. That's not a point. A point could be, I believe that we could lower taxes and raise services at the same time. Okay. That's your overall point. Now to get to that, what are you going to speak about? What are your 3 main talking points? So your 3 talking points. So in this case, it might be here's how the situation is now with taxes and services. Here's how I believe we can change those, and here's the result. So now you have your 3 talking points,

and that's the message. And then we get to the p of amped, which is presentation. Okay. What's your opening? What's your now how are you gonna flesh out your first talking point? How are you going to transition to your second one? How are you gonna flesh that out? Are you going to tell a story for your evidence in connecting with the audience? Are you going to have an analogy? Are you going to have a demonstration? And then you

have a transition to the third one. And after the third one, if you're going to have q and a, that's where you have q and a, not after your presentation is done. Q and a should be part of your presentation, not a separate entity from your presentation at the tacked on at the end. And then you end your presentation. And the reason you wanna do that is end it after the q and a so it ends how you planned on it ending. A q and a, you're not

really sure how it's going to go. Yeah. It could end on a bad note. So this way, you know, it's gonna end as you had planned. Okay. And then the d is working on the delivery. How you use your voice, how you use body language. The way we use our voice and the way we use our body language transmits information just like our words do. You know, we've all been there, right, with, I love this gift. Okay. Great. Or I love it. No. You don't. No. I

love it. This is this is awesome. I I really love it. Like, no. You don't. Your voice doesn't sound like you love it. The look on your face doesn't seem like you love it. Your body language doesn't everything about it says you don't love it. What's wrong? So we have to have all three things, our message, the words, our voice, and our body language be in total alignment. If any of those 3 is out of alignment, now instead of getting one cohesive message, the audience

is receiving multiple messages and they get confused. And when they get confused, phones come out or they daydream or whatever it might be, but you lose them. So that AMPED framework that I created, make sure all this happens and you just build on each section and it just continues to build. And it kind of becomes once you do your initial homework on the audience, it almost becomes plug and play. Almost, not quite, but pretty close. Not quite that easy, but it's close.

What what are what are the key elements of of captivating of of a captivating public speaker? One of the things is having confidence. Now a lot of people say, well, I'm nervous or I'm afraid of public speaking. You know, people can be clinically afraid of public speaking, and I can't help them. They they need to go to a psychologist, and that's not all that unusual. But the people say I'm afraid of public speaking. Like, you're probably not. You're probably more afraid

of messing up and looking stupid. Alright? You know, think of what people say. I'm afraid I'm gonna forget what I'm going to say. I'm afraid I'm gonna look like an idiot. I'm afraid they're gonna think I'm dumb. All these things, we're afraid of embarrassment. That goes back to the 3rd grade standing up in front of the class and screwing up, everybody laughing, and that has stayed with us for 40 years.

So we're more afraid of that. And we're also afraid without realizing it as I'm going up here to speak in front of people, and I don't know how to do this. I'm sure there's a way to do it, and I don't know what that is. So I'm just going to spill information, vomit information on people, and that very seldom goes well. You wanna learn how to engage other people. And once you do that, that confidence comes. And once that confidence comes, that permeates other areas of your life as well.

So many times I hear from my clients, Peter, the one that sticks in my head the most, and I wrote about it in my book was the president of an international company that I worked with. 55 years old, came from another country into the US knowing 2 words, please and thank you. Okay. Three words, please and thank you. And he became the president of a worldwide company. So very accomplished. At the end, he said, Peter, I hired you to help me with my public speaking skills, and you did that extremely

well. But what I got that I never expected was a new level of confidence I didn't even know I could attain. So that's really how I help people is that confidence. And then they have the tools to go out and speak, whether it's 1 person,

10 people, or a 1,000, and they can have that going for them. And one of the things we need on stage, even though we're nervous and everybody is nervous when they speak on stage or in the front of a room or end of a conference table, is we have to have confidence. Because if people don't have confidence in us, they won't have confidence in what we're saying, and we won't be able to serve them.

So it's building that confidence. And anybody who says I'm not nervous is probably I I agree with what Mark Twain said in the 1800. There are 2 types of speakers, those who are nervous and those who are liars. I we're all nervous. It's it's not you and I Yankee sense. This is no different than Aaron Judge being up with down by a run-in the 9th, bottom of 9th. Is he nervous to get up to the plate? No. But his adrenaline crossing through his body? Mhmm. Yes. He just sees it as this is a time for

me to shine. Yeah. So when we get nervous about speaking, we can either think I'm nervous. I shouldn't be doing this. Oh my god. I'm gonna screw up. Or my body is telling me something pretty cool is about to happen. It's the same adrenaline. Doesn't make a difference. It's the same adrenaline. So it's how we label that. And once you get used to it, you label it the positive way. Okay. So how do you help clients overcome public speaking anxiety? Like, what are the what are some of the things

you help them do to overcome it? The first thing we look at is why this happens to us. And like I just said, it's adrenaline going through us. So you might love the modern day roller coasters. You know, these that clock screw and they're so fast and so high. You might love those. I might be terrified of them. And we could stand in line together, and you could have adrenaline going through your body. You'd be an adrenaline junkie and going, yes. This is gonna be so cool.

I can't wait to get in that car and and go up that first high hill. And I might be thinking, oh my god. I'm going to die. But it's the same adrenaline going through your body as it's going through mine. We're labeling it different. So we look at why we get this way. And it's normal for people to be nervous when they're up in front of people. It just is. Again, we might have screwed up in 3rd grade, and that stuck with us, so that's gonna, taint the way we

act. But it's also in our brains. Your brain's primary function is to keep its organism, you, alive. And when we're up in front of a bunch of people and we're feeling nervous, our brain goes, wow. This can't be a very safe place for him. So therefore, it's the the adrenaline is the fight or flight, and we're doing neither. And so, our brain doesn't understand that. And that's why we get our heart beating. That's why we begin to sweat because if you're gonna run or fight, your body has to do

this. It has to increase your blood pressure so so your extremities are stronger. It has to give you more oxygen so you can run or fight. All these things are happening, and we feel that is, oh my god. Look what's happening to my body. This is a disaster. The same thing happens if you're gonna do something pretty cool. Yeah. So it's getting them to understand this is absolutely normal. Yeah. It

happens to everybody. So what are some common mistakes people make in public speaking, and how can they avoid them?

One of the one of the major mistakes is we put the spotlight on us. We think about that. If you're on stage, you actually have a spotlight on you. But even at the front of the room and of a conference table, the spotlight's on us. It's about me. Isn't this cool? And we make that mistake, and and I'll give you in a second, I'll give you a sample of how we do that in ways we wouldn't even think about. But once we make it about us, we're not

making it about the audience. And every speaker has to remember, it's never about you as a speaker. It's always about the audience. You are standing up there, sitting there, whatever you're doing, to serve them. You are there as a servant. You are not there to be the star. All that being said, think of what a lot of speakers say. They get out there and they today, I'm going to talk about well, that's about me. Let me tell you what I'm going to do. That makes it about me.

As opposed to over the next half hour, you are going to learn a, b, c, discover how x, y, z does this, get a sneak preview at that so you can go accomplish your goals, whatever those goals might be in that particular instance. So when you make it make it about them Yeah. You're going to learn. You're going to discover. Use the words you want. You're going to see. I generally use see, and I very seldom use slides, but I I believe we're visual animals

for the most part even though people learn different ways. And so I just use see whether they're gonna see it or not, but, mentally, they'll see it. So I like how you made it you when you said it, you you made it about them. It was the news. About them. Yes. No one's listening to us now saying, wow. I am thrilled he has Peter George on. No one's saying that. If my my mom's dead, so she can't even listen and say that. So and my wife doesn't

care. She's heard me speak for 30 some odd years. She's she's doesn't care anymore. My best friend, absolutely best friend, but she doesn't care anymore about it. Oh, no. I I I it's funny. Right? Because when I started my podcast, right, like, my wife is my biggest fan, but she has not she has not heard an episode. And she she still hasn't. And she probably heard 1, but other than that and but she's my biggest fan. She wears my T shirts.

She wear my merch. She talk more and and they'll go, why why don't she she like I speak to him all the time. What why why would I wanna speak to him? Why would I wanna hear him speak on on TV? Or she's I'm I'm speaking to him all the time. Like Exactly. Exactly. My my wife's my biggest fan. She's you know, even be when I came into my office here, she always says the same thing to me when I go to speak. And when I walked by her, she said it, and I walked into my

office. And, but, you know, no one's gonna be more frank with me than she is. Yeah. And she'll remind me every once in a while, you made that a little bit about you. You said I, oh, too few too many times. Remember, it's about them. So that's the biggest thing. It's all about the audience. As a matter of fact, that was the original working title of my book is it's not about you, it's all about the audience. Ended up being the

captivating public speaker. But someone who has written 6 New York Times bestsellers, a friend, said to me, Peter, no one's going to buy a book that says it's not about you. Oh, that's a good point. And what I didn't know, he says, do you know the title of my first book? And I told him. And he says, right. Do you know what it was originally? Nope. It's not about you. And it didn't sell. And I had to re so he's telling me this. I had to republish it with a new new name. So he knew for a fact

it would sell. But that's still the crux of it. It's not about us. It's about the audience. Serve them. Do you have to be perfect in serving them? Of course not. Let me ask you this. If you were drowning, you went overboard, and I was along the rails, and I see you go overboard, and there's the life ring. Right? And I throw you a life ring, and you grab onto it. So now you're not going to sink and drown. Do you care if I threw it with perfect form or not? No.

No. Just get me the light. Just throw me the light for him. Yeah. So once you understand how the minds connect, how you can keep people engaged, then do you have to be perfect every time? No. And by the way, you're never gonna be perfect, so stop worrying about that. I've screwed up in 37 years. You can't come up with a way that I haven't screwed up. Oh, it's it's it's even with with podcasting,

there's times where there might not be mic. Like, halfway through the show, I'm thinking that my mic is connected because I could see it on my on my on my board, but on StreamYard, it's reading something else. It's not even reading my mic. Right. And so at the like, halfway through the show, something just tells me to go look, and my mic might be on a wrong setting. And I'm like, oh my god. I've been recording my camera my camera and not my mic. Or Happen

happens to all of us. Oh, yeah. The the when I first started, sometimes I didn't press record. I I we we like, we've gone through a a half hour conversation and and realized, like, I didn't press record on my on my on my sis on my on my podcast, on my broadcaster pro. Like, oh, man. Right? And when when that happened, you died a 1,000 deaths. Right? Oh, I was embarrassed. And you were just chuckling a little bit while you're telling the story.

Our biggest mistakes, for the most part I mean, some can be really life changing in a bad way. But for the most part, these mistakes that are gonna happen when we're speaking, they become our best stories later on. Mhmm. Yeah. Our favorite stories. Oh, yeah. Because it because people because people can relate to this stuff like that. People can relate to mistakes happening, to to something happening that is, like, is unexpected. Right? And and that

and that just shows people the human side of you. They're just like you're just like everyone else. Like, hey. I'm not perfect. I made mistakes. They happen. It's

you know, my one of my favorites. I have a whole bunch of things going wrong but one of my favorites was I spoke in 9 for 90 minutes in London on stage big bright spotlights on me in a dark blue suit navy blue suit with a crisp white shirt with my zipper down. So every time I moved left or right while I started to move, the fly on the pants, of course, would gape open, and there's the tail of that bright white shirt shining through the navy blue pants of

the suit. And it wasn't till I was sitting at the bar later on with someone who said, you know your zipper's down. Right? I'm like, of course not. I said, how long has that been down? I said, tell me it was down while I was presenting. He said, from the moment you walked on stage. And he laughed and he said and I was dying. Right? Just dying. He says, Peter, we're not in the 5th grade.

It's not a big deal. He says, but I gotta tell you, every time you moved and that fly opened up, that shirt is so white, there's nothing else you could see with the spotlights on. That your eyes would be attracted right to that white shirt and your pants. I'm like, ah. Now I tell that story all the time. Yeah. You have to. You have to tell that story. You just That stuff happens. It does. It really does. Even for me, one of one of my favorite stories, son, is, I had these, Brandon

shot. It's just a couple and this is before I even started doing video. I I was strictly audio. And and but I was using the StreamYard to record the the sessions. And it was so you don't do video? I'm like, no. I'm not ready. I'm not just making up excuses. And he goes, you sure you don't do video? Like, are you you really are you are you sure you don't do video? Oh, yeah. No. I'm waiting till this till I'm perfect. And and then the third time, he goes, you sure you sure

you don't do video? I goes, yes. I do. And and I understood they were me like, it was like, like, dude, you're using this platform. Might as well use the video. It's some it's a Right. Gives you other it gives you other content to be using. And I was like and and and for the most part, I was, like, hesitant because I wanted it to be perfect. And then I'm realizing to myself, like, it's

never gonna be perfect. Yep. I'm I'm not gonna until I start doing that, I'm not gonna know if I'm capable of doing that or not. So, yeah, yes, I do video now. And and from there, it was and that's where it took off. And so now and from from video, I went to going live because now I don't wanna edit. I don't it's, like, so much time editing video and everything. Right. So now by going live, I'm like, it's out there. People people gonna see the mess ups. I don't know how to edit it. So here you

go. Nothing wrong with that. You know, again, like you said, it just shows that you're human, that you make mistakes, your guests makes make mistakes. It happens. It does. I I always go back to and I tell my clients this, I tell them a little story about my great grandmother. My great grandmother was from nowhere Maine. I mean, you go up to Bangor, Maine and keep going into the woods, and that was where my great grandmother was from. And when we would have family reunions up there, reunions are

huge. 253100 people. Mostly because there's nothing to do up there other than make more cousins. So my great grandmother at one point would come to all her great grandchildren. It'd be a dozen or more of us. And she'd take us aside. We're all teenage and less. And she'd take us aside, and she'd give us one line, just one line, and turn around and walk away. And you could ask her all day long, what does that mean? She would never tell you. It's like, figure it out. It's you

have to figure out what that means to you. So in her own country, wisdom way, she was very, very bright woman. And one time when I was about 12 years old, she takes us aside and she says, if they look that close, slap their face. And I went up to her, chased after and said, Graham, what does that mean? Think about it. And all I could think about later on as I get a little older, never left my head. I always remembered it was she was a very, country girl and and very religious. Sat and

read the bible every night. And I said, I will bet you she was talking to the girls mostly. And if the boy yeah. You're gonna be 14, 15 years old. If the boys get a little too familiar, slap them. I believe that was her message. And for us boys, it was just we were there. But as I get older, I thought, you know what? If someone criticizes me, not critiques me. If I ask for their to for them to critique me, that's

different. But if they just come up and criticize me and you didn't do that well and you don't speak clearly and you have a Rhode Island accent and don't pronounce your r's, all that stuff. You know what? I can't slap them. Metaphorically, I can. It's I just don't care. Yeah. I'll take someone critiquing me all day long. I wanna get better. I still strive to get better at what I do. But if someone just wants to criticize you, let them. That's their problem, not yours. So to your audience,

do the best you can. No one cares if you had perfect form throwing the life ring. You're there to serve people, to help them accomplish something. Serve them serve them well, but don't try to be perfect. That's just cutting your own legs up from under you. So so do you tailor your coaching methods to to different types of professionals such as like, do you have a a a method for authors and a method for consultants and a meth and a method for executives? It depends on what the it

it's very close. It will change somewhat, but it's very close because most of those people come to me for presenting in one way or another. Yeah. And so we're gonna follow the AMP framework no matter what. But I do work with lawyers a great deal too. And with the attorneys, we don't get so much into the message because that's them. They're the experts at writing briefs and the like, not me. I'm not gonna help them write better briefs. That's not what I do. But

if they said, hey. I wanna go out into the community and speak, or I wanna go out and do bar associations when they have their annual meetings, I wanna speak. Then now they're just a speaker like any other speaker, whether it's an author, an executive, whomever. So, yeah, we'll go back into that AMP framework. But attorneys, other than that, we're working on their voice and their body language, the delivery, and how they can not perfect, but get as close to perfection as humanly possible.

So what what kind of advice would you have so for someone like myself who's interested in public speaking? Like, where would someone like me get get their start at? Get it locally. Chamber of Commerce, Rotary. Rotary is always looking for speakers. You can go from Rotary to Rotary to Rotary. They're always looking for speakers for their members. Now you're only gonna speak for 10 minutes, and you're not going to speak about what you do. You're you're there to help them in some way. Mhmm. But

with that said, it's a great way to just get your reps in. And your reps have to be you've got to learn a little bit about public speaking, whether that's working with a coach like me. But if you don't wanna go out on that that extensive, Toastmasters is a great place to go. Inexpensive. They meet weekly or biweekly, whichever it is, but they're all over the world, been been around for a 100 years for a reason.

So that way when you're getting your reps in, you're getting better at it. Because, you know, they say, well, if you do something 10000 times, you're an expert. Not if you did it incorrectly 10000 times. You know, that'd be like and and people say that all the time. Well, just go and speak. Just keep speaking. You'll be fine. All of a sudden, you'll be

making 1,000 of dollars. Yeah. That'd be like me saying, I wanna go to the Olympics as a downhill skier and someone saying, well, just keep skiing. Well, probably, I won't become a downhill skier in the Olympics that way. No. I'll be a good, you know, leisurely skier, maybe. But I'm sure if I had a coach even then, it would be I'd be a better leisurely scare. Yeah. So first thing is go out and speak, and a lot of people, well, you know, my knowledge is worth this much money. Now if no

one's willing to pay you, it's not. You're worth what someone's willing to pay you. So I tell everybody, get in 50 or a 100 speaking gigs for free. I tell my clients that who are aspiring speakers. They'll come and say, cool. How fast can I stop making money? I'm like, well, how fast can you do a 100 talks? You go to rotary or the chamber or other organization, whatever it might be and speak a 100 times? Cool. Now you probably can stop making

money. Okay. And it it's just getting the reps in like most things. You you can't wait till you get to the major leagues. You can't wait till you get to Yankee Stadium. Yeah. To wanna stop practicing like a major leaguer. Doesn't work that way. You have to get your reps in at the lower levels first. So so we we we actually spoke on the importance of storytelling and

and and effective pro. Because it that storytelling in the way it how how is what is the importance of storytelling and and the effectiveness of public speaking? Storytelling is one of the best techniques you can use, And the reason is we are made

for stories. Mhmm. Whether our brain connects with stories because that's the way our brain works or if it connects with stories because we surround ourselves with stories since the day we're born, You know, fairy tales and the like, and, then we go on to read books, stories, if they're novels, stories. Watch television, stories. Go to movies, stories. Stories surround us. Honey, what it how was your day? Stories. Let me tell you about meeting with this client. We love

stories. So a great way to connect with your audience is to tell a story. And when you're telling a story, one of the things you wanna do is make sure there's conflict. There's gotta be conflict in a story. Take any great movie, any great book, there's conflict. I I hesitate to use Star Wars. I'm finding as I'm getting older, and I talk about the 3 original Star Wars. There are a lot of people who

haven't seen them. But so but taking that, if if he even know about Star Wars, Luke Skywalker, the the farm kid, he he didn't know he had the force. He didn't know he had confidence or he didn't have any confidence. So not only did he have to fight the rebellion, he had to fight the insecurities within himself. Yeah. And we often find that. So in stories. So it's not just the external forces that they have to overcome. It's the internal ones as well. And that

makes it more complex, more sophisticated, more enjoyable to watch or read. So when you tell a story, make sure people also know the moral. A lot of people in my industry say, no. If you tell a story well enough, people will understand the

moral. Uh-huh. If you tell it well enough, if you didn't leave something out by accident, if they didn't start daydreaming because there was something in the story that made them think of something and they missed the most critical part and they come up with a different moral for that story. So at the end, just say what this means to you or even the moral of the story is and tell them. They'll remember the story and what the story was told for before they ever

remember anything else. They'll forget everything else, but they will remember the story. So tell stories. It's important. And have that conflict, have a moral, and people will remember them. Yeah. So we we we talked we talked about feedback and and critique. And how how important is that in someone in helping someone improve their public speaking skills? The feedback? Yes. It's it's it's immensely important. Now here's the difference. Some people we can say, hey. Let me let me help you out and

have no clue what they're saying. I was speaking to someone today who said, you know, when I get nervous when I'm speaking, I look up into the balcony if it's in a theater type situation. Because I was trained in drama that if you get nervous, just look at the balcony. I said, so how long do you do that? Do you just look up, get your breath, and look back down? She said, no. You you just keep looking up into the balcony. I said, anybody up there? No. She goes, that's the the good part

of it. I said, so you're not even looking at your audience? No. She goes, I was told that a long time ago to do that, and it works. I tell everybody to do that. Look up way above the audience. You're not you're not connecting with them. You're gonna be looking lost. Is well, they they gonna be they gonna be looking up at the all my.

Exactly. If you plopped 100 of dot 100 of dollars to sit in the front row, it's probably more than that now, in Broadway, and all the actors were not connecting with you in any way, they have their back turned most of the time, they're looking way up at the ceiling. They would never do that. It would never happen. So get feedback, but make sure the people giving you feedback, they mean well. Make sure they understand not what someone told them, but what actually works. The

here's the funny thing is we love when someone says, hey, Peter. Great job. Probably not. When someone tells me I did a great job, I didn't provide enough to help them. Mhmm. So they could come and say, hey, Peter. You know what? I never knew that before. I'm going to implement this. Or thank you so much for for bringing this up and let us letting us know about that. That's gonna help me so much. That's the feedback you wanna get. That's what you wanna hear after a

talk. If someone is the most they can come up with is, hey, Peter. Good job. They're being polite, and I failed, most likely. Different if you're in a conference room, that type thing, and you're walking back to your seat. You couldn't stop me. Right? Because now someone else, our boss, is up talking at the end of the conference room table. You couldn't stop me and say, hey, Peter. I never heard this before. This is gonna help me a lot. In passing, you

might just say, hey. Good job. Fist bump and move on. So that's different. But when you have time to talk in someone, the most you provided them with is the the opportunity to say good job, you probably struck out. So what what's the benefits of of personal coaching compared to self study or group training? Any is good. Self study, books, and the like. I did a lot of self study at the very beginning, and, the thing is whether even my book, my my book has

won 6 awards so far. It's done very well, and it provides a ton of information. The one thing it doesn't provide is feedback. So with a coach or people who are willing to help you with a Toastmasters or that type thing, you get feedback. And feedback is immense. Yeah. It's like any other coach. I could learn how to try to learn how to golf from YouTube and books. But if I have a coach right there to help me, I'm going to get better faster. I'm going to be

better at it. It's going to be more enjoyable. So working with someone in my industry, just like working with someone in any industry, I play the guitars. I have a guitar coach. We call them teachers, but they're coaches. And, you know, when things matter, people who wanna do karate or any other martial art, they go to someone who knows what they're doing Yeah. To help them progress along. Coach when things are important,

coaches help a lot. Shy of that, books, YouTube, and the like, they're very good. A lot of great books out there. So, yeah, I have a, one of my my, she was actually a guest on the show, Fran. She says, she's a Toastmaster, and, she uses those rotary tips. Oh, does she? Yeah. It's it's the, just a well known place to do it Yeah. To get your reps in. Awesome. So how has public speaking evolved over the years, and and what trends do you see

emerging? It's evolved, you know, back in the days of Aristotle. We're going back earlier earlier. Couple of 25 100 years or so. And and we're gonna take it year by year to the present day. But, you know, from there to a 100 years ago, if that, it was oration. Right? We talked about the great orators of the Yeah. Times on their times.

So it was oration. And by the time Kennedy, King, these great speakers came along in the sixties, it's still a little oration, but it was turning more to what we might call a speech today. Okay. Well, let's go back a

100 years before that to the 18 sixties. The guy from Harvard who spoke before Lincoln, Gettysburg Gettysburg Address, spoke for 2 hours. Lincoln spoke for 3 minutes. Which one do you remember? So so I can't even think of it, said I I think it's Ed, but I can't even think of his last name who spoke before him. But back then, when Lincoln only spoke for 3 minutes, everybody was like, what was that? A president doesn't come here and speak for 3 minutes. A

president comes here and speaks for at least an hour. But he delivered what he wanted to deliver in a few minutes. 262 words. So what we're more aware of now is speak for how long it takes to get your message out. Okay. If that's 3 minutes, that's 3 minutes. Now you can't be hired for 1,000 of dollars, and they want you to fill an hour and you just speak for 3 minutes and go, I'm out. Send it to you. You know, 3 minutes for the rest

of my money. That's all I got. You did the job. No. They want you to be at that conference or wherever for an hour, so you have to come up with the content, relevant content to fill that. And there have been times when people said we I want you to speak for 90 minutes on this topic about public speaking. And I'll say that topic alone, yes. I can't fill. I could. It would be all fluff. How long could you speak? On that topic, probably 40 minutes. And if

you want me to speak on that topic alone, you need to adjust. I'm willing to work with you, but you I I can't turn 40 minutes into 90 minutes. Yeah. So, it'll just be too much fluff that's gonna put people to sleep. Mhmm. So back to how is it changing? We're getting used to things like TED Talks, 18 minutes max. Yeah. That doesn't mean you can't speak for an hour. Many people do. Many of my clients still speak for an hour, but

they're very, very good at it. They've gotten very good at it, and they can enter entertain or keep people engaged for an hour. And they're just that good. So we don't do oration anymore. Then we went from oration to speech to presentation, and I think TED hit it right when they called it TED talk. Now it's a conversation. It's a talk. It's a conversation. And we're always having a conversation with the other people. So you could be up in front of 300 people. I'm still gonna

say create it like it's a conversation. Just like you would be if you were sitting at home talking to 3 people, 3 friends watching a game. Have a conversation because that's what we're geared towards now, conversations as opposed to long orations. And when you have a conversation, those people are answering you. You can have rhetorical questions. You know, when's the last time this happened to you? And then you pause and you let them answer it in their head. That's

a conversation. You asked a question, they answered it. Mhmm. Yeah. They just didn't

answer it out loud. That's a conversation. So when you create in the style of a conversation, which is what I have my clients do, now this is something we already know instinctively. Now when we start adding on the other layers of who are we speaking to in particular for this particular talk, how do we want them to feel, how what do we want them to go do? Now that's just adding on layers to stuff we already know and then adding on the other things of why the brain acts this way when we see this.

I'll give you an example and for the people watching, they can see this as well. Many of us when we get up to speak as a defensive mechanism, we try to soften our look of our body. So we'll stand on one hip and look what happens to my body when I stand on 1 hip. My shoulders slant, my head has to counteract that. Right? And everybody says, well, it's more comfortable. It's mentally more comfortable because I don't wanna look overpowering. And I'm only 58, so I could never look

overpowering in my life. But I can look confident. Right? Oh, I don't wanna look overconfident. So this is what the brain is saying at an unconscious level. So I'm gonna have you stand this way. Well, this isn't physically comfortable because what do we do 30 seconds later? Just shift. Alright. Unless you're a crane, you're not made to stand on one leg. You know? So we go and shift and cock the other hip. Now our shoulders go the other

way, and we have to turn our head. Just stand with your feet shoulder width apart, stand in a vertical alignment, and that shows confidence. And you've when you show confidence and exhibit confidence, you can see in the people you're speaking to that they have confidence in you. And what does that do for you? Makes you more confident. It does. Alright. So

you have to start with it, but get that ball rolling. And once you learn these techniques of why people react to certain things, if I if I was had my hip cocked, it's not a confident look. So once you learn that, okay, how do I exhibit confidence? How do I connect with their brains? You layer these things on to stuff we already know, and it's it's not as difficult as people think. It's a pretty cool thing, actually. It's a great, great skill to have. You wanna you wanna know

how much this skill means? How much? You know, you and your audience probably have heard of this guy called Warren Buffett. Yes. Right? If if he hadn't given away most of his fortune, he'd still be the wealthiest man on the planet. Yeah. Warren Buffett said the the best investment he ever made now think about this guy. When this guy makes an investment, the world notices. Mhmm. 100 of 1,000,000 or 1,000,000,000 of dollars might move one way or another.

The world notices when this guy makes an investment, buys or sells. He said his greatest investment ever was his public speaking course when he was 27 years old. So much so if you go to his office and you look behind his head, his undergrad degree isn't up there in a frame on the wall. His graduate from Columbia is not in a frame up there on the wall, but his certificate of completion at the public speaking course is framed and up behind

him on the wall. Because he knew if he wanted to get people to follow him, if he wanted to be able to speak in a way people would understand him without confusion, both in the office as well as publicly, then he had to have the skill to speak and to connect. I wish we didn't call it public speaking. I wish we called it engagement or connection because that's what we really do.

And he knew how much that would help him. And all these years later, he says that was his greatest investment of all the investments he's ever made. Wow. Right there, that tells you how significant it is and the power it affords you. No matter how you I don't care if you're speaking across the desk or table to one person. That's public speaking. Now how do you get people to I'm not saying you wanna influence them. Do you wanna persuade them?

For them. It's not about you. We're not trying to sell things here that they don't need, but we are trying to sell stuff. Will they buy what I'm selling? That old saying, well, you're speaking. So but you're doing it for something that's going to help them. They're there to lose weight, and you're an expert in showing them how to lose weight. Well, you've gotta get them engaged and keep them engaged so you can show them the

technique so they can go do it. Without that, you don't make that connection, and they say that was a waste of time. Okay. Alright. I got couple couple more questions. Sure. So how do you handle challenging questions or interruptions during a presentation? I'm sure you've had interruptions. Yeah. I was thinking of 1 in particular as soon as you said that, and that's kinda why I'm laughing. I was doing a corporate training. Okay. And I've been doing this corporate training for years.

And in this one occasion, it's a 3 hour training. And in this one occasion, this guy raises his hand. And I told them, raise your hand at any time during this. And if it's something spurting to what we're saying, I'll answer your question. If it's not, I'll ask you to hold on to q and a or that particular topic comes up later on. And he raises his hand. What's up? And he said, I think everything you're saying is BS. Okay. And he went on to elaborate of why he thought it was all BS. And I

said, okay. Is this something we can talk about later? And he said, I'd rather discuss it now. And I said, I don't think everybody else here who only has 3 hours to learn what they're here to learn wants you and I to take up this time, take up their time that's not truly benefiting them. So why don't you and I speak later? I'll I'll spend all evening here with you if you wanna discuss this. And at that point, he says, well, I just wanna let you know. And I finally looked at

him and said, you know what? He said, what? I said, you might be right. You might be right. Maybe it's all BS, but these people don't seem to think so. Would you say something like, you might be right? Yeah. You're an idiot. You might be right. What can someone say? Uh-uh. I'm gonna say it again. I think you're an idiot. No. It's like, hey. You might be right. Yeah. And it was another speaker who was also a comedian, stand up comedian, who told me that. He

goes, just look right at him. You might be right. There's nothing they can do. So that but handling a difficult question, if it doesn't pertain to what you're speaking about At that moment? Just ask at that moment or that training or that speech or whatever it is, that talk. Just say, like, when I get into q and a, I say, over over the next 15 minutes, we're gonna open the floor for questions and answers. What questions do you have as opposed to do you have any questions? I just

spoke for 45 minutes. I'm assuming they have questions. What questions do you have based on what we've discussed today? Now that sets up parameters. So when someone asks something that's not based on it, that just doesn't belong at at that meeting, then you can simply say, you know what? That's out of what we spoke about today and I understand that you're interested in that. Let's speak when we're done. And I can be more specific with you, and I can even spend more time

with you. So it benefits them. Okay. So you can handle questions like that. And a lot of them, if they're just questions where someone's, you know, I my boss wants me to do this. I'm like, well, I can't answer. I I can't object to what your boss wants. I just can't do that. So I'll say, you know what? Let's talk later. We'll we'll we'll speak in private. So not only can I not counter what the boss says, I'm certainly not gonna do it in public Yeah? You know, with 50 other employees there.

So, yeah, it's a great way not to get the gig again. So we're gonna close we're gonna close it out with this question. Yeah. What what motivates you to continue helping others become captivating public speakers? Well, I'll preface this with a year ago now, I was in the hospital up in Boston for emergency heart, open heart surgery. My aortic valve decided it didn't wanna work anymore. And I was supposed to be there for 6 days, and I ended up being there for 26 days. I

had some complications. And when I got out, I was 65 years old while I was in the hospital. I turned 65 and I thought, you know what? My wife wants me to retire. I guess I'm going to retire. And I promised her I'll take to December 31st off 1st 3 months, I had to take off through October because you're recuperating. And I said, but I'll take to December 31st off. Let me decide on New Year's Day what I wanna do.

I walked into my office for the first time in 6 months on New Year's Day, And I looked around and I thought, I'm home, baby. This is where I belong. And this is all based on the fact and you can see over my shoulder, there's a fire helmet there. That was one of my dad's fire helmets. My father was a officer of the fire department, Providence Fire Department. And that particular helmet is one of the old metal ones. That one saved his life. A ceiling

fell on his head. It's all beat up and everything. So that's my favorite one. And I always wanted to be my dad. So I grew up idolizing my dad. Great, great guy. Other than he was a Red Sox fan, but every but no one's perfect. So he he I idolized him. I said, not only do I wanna be like my dad, I get to be a firefighter. And what I learned, my father told me do you have time for a story? Yeah. We have yeah. We have time. Right. You have as long as you have time, I have

time. I told my father I went to school, and I did well in high

school, and I told my father while I was thinking about telling my father that I decided not to go to college, I was going to become a firefighter with him. Same department, Providence. And I thought, wow. When I tell him this, he is just gonna blow his top. So one day during the summer, he was rocking in his favorite chair out on the porch, and I said, hey, dad. I was thinking about not going to college and becoming a firefighter, and I'd be the 1st person in my family going to college.

And, he didn't blow his top. He just kept rocking. And he looked at me and he said, you know, it provided a fine life for me. It got me out of poverty. My, you know, I would have still been in poverty otherwise. It's a great way to make a living. It's an honorable way to make a living. Great. And I'm like, wow, this is pretty cool. I'm going to I can be a firefighter like my dad. So one day that summer, he calls me up on

a Saturday morning. He was at the station. He says, What are you doing today? He said, I'm a little late around. I'm going to play ball with a bunch of the guys. He says, Before you do that, come over to the to the station. So I drive to the station and I get out. And when I get out, I look and there's the ladder truck with the ladder extended like a 45 degree angle, 4 stories high. And he says, I ever take you up on one of these? I said, no, I've been on the

trucks, but never up on the ladder. And he says, come on, we'll go up. And he puts this belt on me with a clip on each side. And he goes, You go up first all the way to the top. Well, I don't know if you've ever been on one of these ladders, but they bounce up and down. It's only the hydraulics down at the bottom holding them up. So the further you go up, the more it bounces. And that's a weird feeling if you've never been on it before. So anyway, we get to the top.

He says, turn around and sit down. And I'm sitting on the next to the last rung, and he clips me in. And he says, I'll be back in exactly 30 minutes. Do not move. He goes down the ladder and into the station, and I'm sitting out there with this thing bobbing in the wind. 17 year old. I'm going I'm an athlete. I've got this. It's no big deal. Well, after about 8 minutes, tears start running down my face. And I'm like, this is this is a tough thing to do. 30 minutes later, Trudeau is where

he comes walking up that ladder. He unclips me, says, Follow me down. We got on the turret. We didn't even get to the ground yet. We're on the turret of that ladder. And he turns and looks over his shoulder and says, college. I said, You bet. So he knew I was not cut out to be a firefighter. He knew there were different ways for me to help people. He didn't know what it was. I didn't know what it was. But anytime I go, well, maybe I should retire, or do I still have the

gusto I've always had to help people? I think that's what I do. I don't teach public speaking. I help people. And the coolest thing about that is I help them achieve something that is very difficult for most people. Shouldn't be, but it is. There's I can say all day long it shouldn't be, but it is. Mhmm. And I get to help them with that. And

a lot of my clients are younger people. I will never ever live long enough to see them at the end of their careers.

But I do know that if public speaking can help them be more confident and can help them further their careers or become professional speakers and have that as a career, whether it's their sole career of or part time career, and they have greater income, then possibly if they want a house in on the Jersey Shore, or they want a boat, or they wanna take their spouse around the world, or whatever it might be, or just be comfortable and send their kids to

the colleges of their choice, whatever it might be. If I can help them do that, even though I may never see it come to fruition, that's a pretty cool way to spend a life. So I wasn't able to say to help people the way my father did. He saved lives. Yeah. But I'm able to help them in my own way. Mhmm. And I wanna do that to the day I can't do it anymore. And that's what, that's what podcasting has done for me. It's given me because I was 40 4 years old. I I have a well paying job,

but but I didn't have a purpose. I I didn't I didn't know what I was supposed to be doing. And so I started podcasting and and started helping deliver these messages and and having these great interviews. And people would give me feedback, and people would say, hey. I listened to this episode. Thank you. I needed to hear this. And Nice. And so that that

gave me purpose. So the the that's when I really, really started really getting into podcasting, and and started investing in equipment and and wanting to make sure that when people listen to my show, watch my show, whatever it is, that they're getting the best quality because they they give me something very precious, which is their time. And so I I I wanted to make sure that my audio sound good. My video looks good. I just wanna invest in quality because

people deserve that. And and for me, it was just hearing people who say, hey. This story resonated with me. Thank you. Even like, one of my early early episodes was a friend of mine, me. He's a he's a big time he's he's a big time real estate broker in in in Brooklyn, and we had a great conversation on manifestation and and goal setting. And and a friend of ours from high school saw our interview, and she was a little hesitant on starting her own business.

And she saw us 2 speaking on goal setting and all the stuff that we were doing, and she was like she sent me a message. She's like, thank you. Like, listening to 2 guys that I knew growing up grew growing up and seeing what you're doing what you're doing and what he's doing. And she's like, it just made me decide, like, I I can if they can do it these are 2 regular guys that I know.

Yeah. If they can do it, I can do this. Right. So she she she she took that leap of faith, and and it's paid off for her. So think about that. Yeah. You're podcasting, but that's really not what you're doing. You're using podcasts to help other people. Mhmm. Right? Isn't it a cool feeling when we help other people? Yeah. It's a great way to live. And we all help people in different ways. Mhmm. You know? Or or many of us do at least. And when we do, that's a pretty cool thing. It is.

We may never become stars or, you know, known all over the world, but who cares? We get to help the people we can help. Yeah. And that's what's that's what matters to me. It's just if I can impact one person's life, I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. Yeah. But using a podcast, look how many lives you're that's one person you know about. Think of the people you'll never ever ever know Yeah. That you helped. True. Yeah. It's it's it's a cool

thing. I I congratulate you for it. Thank you. Appreciate it. Well, it was a wonderful conversation, man. I appreciate you being on the show. You get the solo layout now where you get to plug away, let them know where to find you, everything. Easiest place to find me is my website. You can go there and hit a a link and go get my book at Amazon if you want. You can find out about my services, whether it's speaking or coaching at Peter George Public Speaking dot com. My name,

Peter George, and then public speaking dot com. Nice and easy. Awesome. It's actually in the description of this episode, so you can reach them there. So anyone who's interested, go back into the descriptions, and you'll find it there. So thank you, Peter. It was it was great having you. I had a I had a blast. This is this is great, man. I I appreciate you coming through and and sharing sharing your stories and sharing your knowledge. It's really, it's helped me. I

know that personally. It's been a pleasure being here. Really has. I it was a great conversation. Thank you. Thank you. I try. I try. And I got to spend, what? A little over an hour with a Yankee fan. So Yeah. Made my night, I'll tell you. Oh, man. Hell yeah. Hey. Hey. Oh, Fran's had great podcast. Peter drops a lot of gems. He did, Fran. He did. He dropped a lot of lot of gems. Thank you, Fran. Oh, and and we greatly appreciate it. We we really do. It was a great show.

But, let me close out this show. Don't leave just yet. We chat a little bit more off the air, but, thank you once again for being such a great guest. My pleasure. Thank you. Alright. Another great episode is in the can. Oh, man. I I had a great time. Great conversation. Shout out to Fran for stopping by and leaving comments. Greatly appreciate it. Big shout out to to everyone who's gonna tune in

later. You just you're gonna catch a great episode. If you haven't subscribed, please do. If you haven't signed, click the bell, know all that stuff. All that other stuff I did tell you to do, just do it. Big shout out to our RealWise fan, Papi Jade, Brandy Jade. Love you guys. Big shout out to the boss lady. Love you and appreciate you. And as always, a big, big shout out to all the essential workers out there. God bless y'all. Be safe. You know how your boy, Wise, does it? Peace out.