Find Your Voice
Learn how to give better presentations and boost your confidence
What's your problem?
Why so nervous?
We've all been there: heart thumping, sweaty palms, stomach churning, dry throat -- and all while knowing (cognitively) that it's really not that big a deal.
Luckily there are lots of things we can do to help (especially for us introverts) : from getting your content focused, so that's your main job, to breathing and using your voice more effectively.
Working out how your thoughts, emotions and behaviours interact is a grand adventure. Take control!
Where's the story?
Stories are the richest natural resource in the world.
And you only need a little to go a really long way.
It’s the smallest difference between the clean facts ‘dark, bad weather’, and the emotional pull of a story unfolding: ‘It was a dark and stormy night . . .).
Forget about having to tell a big, life-changing story -- just find a few storytelling techniques that help you make what you're saying vivid, clear and memorable.
Your audience will thank you (and crucially at work, they’ll be able to share your message with others).
Who do you think you are?
We often feel the need to bring main-character energy to a presentation -- to be the all-singing, all-dancing hilarious raconteur who leaves their audience hanging on every precious word.
Too often that comes across as fake, cheap and plastic — and usually cringe inducing.
It’s much more effective to explore your natural attributes, (yes you can be a powerful presenter as an introvert!) your own voice, rhythms, humour and physicality.
When you're in control of that stuff, you're in control or the room -- and audiences really love that.
How can I help?
Team workshops
Team workshops
Team workshops
Workshops are a great way to get a group quickly applying ideas and learning from each other, as well as from expert feedback. For a pitch team they can be brilliant for forming a group ethos and to create a set of shared skills to build on.
Over the course of a few hours we can weave theory and practice together and create a space for honest feedback (the most useful kind) -- and that's not something that happens very often, as office politics (and normal human reticence) gets in the way.
Workshops that involve honest criticism are often best facilitated by an outsider -- it creates a more fluid dynamic where boundaries are much more visible and easier to guard or challenge.
What sorts of things can we cover?
- How to be an effective writer at work
- How stories work
- How to design a slide presentation
- How to write reports people actually read
- How leaders use language
- How to be more creative
- How to speak to different audiences.
I’ve run thousands of workshops for all levels and always get great results, and great feedback. (Full disclosure, I was once told I swear too much.)
1:1 coaching
Team workshops
Team workshops
Presenting is a really personal thing, and it can bring up a lot of psychological and emotional challenges. Bad experiences often deliver a double whammy of existential dread and physical trauma (who the hell am I, why me, and please get me out of here.) After all, finding your voice has a strong metaphorical meaning, as well as the literal one.
Many of us are haunted by early educational or career experiences that taught us who we are, and a set of response or habits to deal with the ordeal of being on public show. Unpacking these vulnerabilities is really useful, and can really help challenge and change our approach to communication, and especially to presenting.
I give honest feedback on all aspects of presentation -- looking at what you're saying, the structures and techniques that you'r falling back on, as well as how you use your voice and physical presence.
You can use me as a rehearsal room, a sounding board, a director or literally as a coach — taking you through the basics, then pushing you to take more risks.
And guess what? After many years of helping people I can say confidently that you can always go farther than you think. And that you learn more than how to deliver better presentations at work.
One-to-one coaching can help you make lasting changes with proven methods for building healthy communication habits.
Webinars
Team workshops
Webinars
Modern working life means that (somewhat absurdly) we often can't find a time to get everybody in a room for a few hours, let alone for a day, but we can find time for an hour or two online.
Since Covid-enforced lockdowns we've all become more adept at managing the online virtual space (and using it to avoid meaningful interaction). So we all know it's not the best . . . but it's often a reasonable gateway.
I’ve become a huge fan of using the webinar as way to introduce ideas and get people thinking and feeling differently about the daily business of communication: email, reports, social posts, newsletters, updates.
It gives me a chance to practise what I preach -- people often say that my presentations are a lot more engaging than they expected, and that's by design -- not the magical force of my personality.
The most popular sessions I run are:
- How to write brilliantly at work
- How to write like a human (even when you're a lawyer)
- How to present with pizazz
- How to use stories to influence and persuade (or just sell).
I’ve run these as 45-, 60- and 90-minute sessions for large global audiences, as well as for small, integrated teams.
Who have I worked with?
Why on Earth should you listen to me?
My Background
Communication coach and brand language expert, Alan Brookes has spent the past 12 years running thousands of workshops around the globe for two of the leading Tone of Voice agencies, The Writer and Schwa (now part of Definition).
Before that, he cut his teeth on broadsheets as a subeditor and desk editor on The Sunday Times, The Times and The Guardian.
And, even farther in the distant past, he trained as a theatre maker at the Jacques Lecoq school in Paris, France, and studied Butoh in Japan.
Performance, journalism and corporate comms.
He's your basic triple threat.