How to Manage Public Speaking Anxiety: 6 Evidence-Based Strategies
This article was written by our Communication Coach Elspeth Yates, who enjoys public speaking alongside her coaching work.
Elspeth speaking at a conference
Public speaking anxiety, or glossophobia, is one of the most common fears we experience. The fear ranges from mild “butterflies” to intense physical reactions like trembling, sweaty palms or a racing heart. It’s your body’s fight-or-flight response kicking in and it’s perfectly normal. Annoying, sometimes debilitating, but entirely normal.
To understand why public speaking feels so threatening, it helps to look at what's actually happening beneath the surface. At a physiological level, standing in front of an audience can trigger your nervous system's threat response, the same system designed to protect you from genuine danger.
When we stand up in front of an audience we can feel like we are being judged, like it’s a competition and if we lose, we get kicked out of the pack. Evolutionarily this could mean death, and although we’re a long way from being left to a pack of sabre-toothed tigers our bodies can react in the same way.
Adrenaline and cortisol flood the body, heart rate climbs, muscles tense, and the brain's rational thinking becomes harder to access. In short, your body treats the boardroom like a battlefield.
For many people, the fear is rooted in past experiences, a humiliating moment in school, being laughed at, or simply never being given a safe space to find their voice.
While for some these experiences can be overcome for others they become reference points the brain returns to, quietly reinforcing the belief that speaking up isn't safe.
In these situations, we can fear being seen as incompetent, boring or unprepared, which taps into our deeper need to belong and be accepted. For those who lean toward perfectionism or people-pleasing, the pressure intensifies even further.
The internal bar is set impossibly high, and anything short of a flawless performance can feel like failure.
Understanding the fear isn't just interesting, it's useful. Because when you know what's driving the fear, you can begin to work with it rather than simply pushing through it.
In the short term the key isn’t to eliminate nervousness, it’s to manage and redirect it, using evidence-based strategies so you can speak confidently despite it.
However, communication coaching can also help you work on the root cause of the fear, not just the symptoms. If public speaking anxiety feels like something you keep having to battle through, coaching can support you to build confidence in a more sustainable way.
1. Prepare Thoroughly. Confidence Begins Long Before You Speak
The first step to manage nerves is to feel genuinely prepared.
The better you know your material, the less you’ll fear forgetting it or “going blank.”
Mayo Clinic recommends organising your content carefully, rehearsing multiple times, and even anticipating audience questions.
Psychological research supports this: familiarity reduces the brain’s perception of threat, lowering anxiety and allowing cognitive resources to focus on delivery rather than fear.
Practical Tips:
Write an outline with key points rather than memorising every word.
Rehearse in front of trusted friends or colleagues.
Simulate the speaking environment if possible, including what you’ll wear. This way, when you pull on that outfit, you already feel prepared and comfortable.
2. Breath Control - Not just an Instagram fad!
When we’re nervous, we unconsciously switch to shallow, rapid breathing. This reinforces the fight-or-flight response in your nervous system which makes thinking, articulating and even remembering lines harder.
Deep, controlled breathing, however, activates your parasympathetic nervous system (the body’s “rest and digest” response), lowering heart rate and helping you stay calm.
Techniques like slow diaphragmatic breathing or the 4-7-8 method aren’t just buzzwords from social media, they’re genuine physiological tools used in stress-reduction research and therapy.
Try This Before Going on Stage or into a Meeting:
Inhale deeply through the nose for 4 seconds
Hold for 7 seconds
Exhale slowly for 8 seconds
Repeat 3-5 times.
This simple exercise can make a measurable difference in how your body responds.
3. Your Brain Responds to Mental Rehearsal. Just Like Physical Practice
Believe it or not, visualisation works because your brain doesn’t fully distinguish between vividly imagined experiences and reality.
Research shows that mental practice activates the same neural circuits that are involved in actual performance.
When you visualise yourself delivering a confident talk, hearing your voice, seeing positive audience reactions, you’re strengthening neural pathways that help build confidence.
How to Visualise Effectively:
Close your eyes for a few minutes each day leading up to your talk.
Picture every detail; your posture, voice, even the audience’s faces.
Engage all senses, not just sight: imagine what you hear and feel.
This can shift your internal narrative from “I’ll mess up” to “I’ve succeeded before this begins.”
4. Remember Why You’re On The Stage - Shift the Spotlight
One of the most powerful ways to reduce public speaking anxiety is to remember why you’re there in the first place.
Anxiety thrives on self-focus:
How do I look?
What if I forget my words?
Do I sound nervous?
Research shows that when attention turns inward, anxiety intensifies. The brain becomes hyper-vigilant, scanning for mistakes and amplifying perceived threat.
Speaker and author Jess Ekstrom talks about ‘the Spotlight Effect’. The belief that everyone is watching and judging you more closely than they really are. Her solution? Turn the spotlight outward.
Rather than asking:
How am I performing?
Ask:
Who might need this message today?
How could this help someone in the room?
She calls this the Lighthouse Effect: A lighthouse doesn’t worry about whether it looks right. It focuses on shining its light so others can navigate safely.
When you move your focus from performance to purpose, something important happens neurologically. Attention moves away from self-monitoring (which heightens anxiety) and toward meaningful contribution (which strengthens confidence and clarity).
Before you step on stage, try this:
Finish the sentence: “The purpose of this talk is to…”
Picture one person who could genuinely benefit.
Remind yourself: “I am here to share, not to be perfect.”
5. Exposure Can Lead to Improvement
It’s a known fact that what we avoid, we fear more. Gradual exposure, speaking in front of small groups and incrementally increasing audience size, can desensitise the fear response.
We work with many people who find they’re suddenly asked to talk or present more, particularly as part of a leadership progression.
If you know you’re less confident with public speaking, start to look for small opportunities and start practising early! Take control of the situation rather than letting the fear build up.
Actionable Scale-Up Plan:
Start by recording yourself on your phone or laptop.
Progress to small groups (friends, colleagues).
Aim for regular, incremental exposure.
Regular exposure turns fear into familiarity, and practice builds competence.
6. Remember - The Audience Isn’t Your Enemy
One of the things we hear a lot is that people are afraid that at the end they might receive questions they can’t answer.
The best way to alleviate this is to:
Consider what questions might come up and have answers prepared
Have a clear and confident way of saying “I’ll get back to you”. For example: “That’s a great question. I’m not sure I can answer it fully in the time we have today, but if you email me afterwards, I’d be happy to send over the relevant links or information.” You can also answer as much as you can in the moment, then add: “I can send more detail after the session if that would be helpful.”
Many presenters now share their LinkedIn profile or even an email at the end of a talk so people can get in touch. This is a great way of delaying questions and making it more comfortable for you.
Public Speaking Coaching
While the strategies in this blog are a great starting point, coaching offers a structured, personalised space to work on both the surface skills and the underlying reasons for your fears.
Tackling these deeper rooted elements will mean the strategies in this blog will make you an even stronger speaker, without the sometimes crushing fear raging before and during your presentation.
Whether you need to build self-trust, learn to regulate your nervous system, or unpick the perfectionism and people-pleasing patterns you’ve become accustomed to, coaching can help.
Rather than managing anxiety indefinitely, the goal is to fundamentally shift your relationship with public speaking.
If any part of this blog resonated, whether you're preparing for a specific talk, navigating a leadership transition, or simply tired of dreading every presentation, it might be time to explore what's really holding you back.
Elspeth works with clients on exactly this: combining practical speaking skills with the deeper inner work that makes confidence sustainable.
Book a session to take the first step toward speaking with clarity, calm and purpose.
Conclusion - Nerves Are Normal. Mastery Comes With Practice, Presence & Purpose
Becoming a confident public speaker doesn’t necessarily mean you stop feeling nervous. Instead, it means using tools that help you perform in spite of that nervousness.
If you want to learn more, develop these skills further and begin to reduce that nervousness, book an initial session today with our public speaking specialist Elspeth.
Before becoming a coach Elspeth worked in the private sector speaking at conferences, sharing information verbally across teams and seniorities and chairing meetings. She continues to deliver workshops and speak at conferences alongside her 1-2-1 coaching work, so you’ll be in safe and experienced hands!
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