What skills must we all have to function within society? This is a very good question to evaluate. I personally feel that one of the most important skills that any individual should possess is the ability to speak in public. Public speaking is a very difficult skill although it is not impossible to master.
If you look around the activities that you partake in on a daily basis, you will see that there is an abundant amount of public speaking that occurs. Have you ever been to the store and a salesperson comes over and talks to you? Now for the most part this person should have a very good ability to speak in public seeing that one makes their living at talking others into spending money. How about when you go to the bank? The tellers should be able to communicate well with the public throughout the day. The more you think about it, the more you will start to recall the occurrences within one’s day that requires publicly speaking.
Now let us take a look at why it is imperative to not only obtain this skill, but to master it. Regardless of what you do for a living, you have to communicate with someone at some point in your day. I personally feel that sounding like something other than a blundering idiot is of the utmost importance. I am not saying that you have to perfectly articulate every word correctly all of the time, because we are all human and we all make mistakes. Limiting the amount of mistakes takes practice though. I would have to say that there are not many things that get under my skin more than an individual that either can not speak clearly or just doesn’t know how to use words correctly.
When you go to a restaurant, do you want a waiter or waitress that mumbles? Or one that sounds as if they have a mouthful of marbles? How about this one, I just love it when the person that is taking my order talks so low that I can not understand what they are saying. I would have to say that you have probably experience one if not all of these...