cover image Think on Your Feet: Tips and Tricks to Improve Your Impromptu Communication Skills on the Job

Think on Your Feet: Tips and Tricks to Improve Your Impromptu Communication Skills on the Job

Jen Oleniczak Brown. McGraw-Hill Professional, $24 (296p) ISBN 978-1-260-45703-2

Brown (ImprovE) offers a helpful compendium of advice sourced from the Engaging Educator, her communication coaching company, in order to help readers manage the fear of public speaking. She recounts her realization, while working as a museum educator, that her colleagues quaked in their boots at the prospect of having to give unexpected presentations, and that her improv comedy background spared her the same fears. She started the Engaging Educator as a side hustle, only to find she had tapped into a real demand. The key, she says, is in learning how to prepare for the things that can’t be prepared for, by “learning how to pay attention to what’s going on around you, process that information, and respond to it.” She breaks her techniques down over a series of encouraging, if repetitive, chapters, variously aimed at helping readers with impromptu speaking, networking and small talk, leading meetings, acing interviews, and “getting out of your own way” while delivering a pitch (concentrating on achieving one’s personal goals isn’t enough; “you need to think about what’s in it for them”). The result is a helpful maven’s guide ideal for anyone who views a podium with fear and trembling. (Nov.)