Fireside with Voxgig

In this episode, host Orla Shanaghy talks to Wojciech Kolodziejczak. Wojciech specializes in cross-cultural communication, networking, and negotiation skills for British, Polish, and other international businesses. He also lectures on cross-cultural networking skills for the Federation of Small Businesses, London Metropolitan University and other organizations.

Learn more about Wojciech here.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

Lauren Currie is an award-winning European designer who is a champion for diversity. She has received an OBE for her initiatives to achieve diversity through design. As a regular public speaker on the subject of design, she’s also passionate about bringing diversity to the speaker line-up at conferences.

In our podcast, she reveals how a bright red sofa has helped reduce the nerves of more than 500 wannabe speakers. It’s a simple concept – people who are nervous about public speaking can apply to sit on a red sofa during conferences. There’s no pressure on them to speak or perform – they just sit there. And it completely changes their attitude to public speaking.

Lauren shared her passion for bringing new voices to the conference stage – more women, more people with disabilities, and more people of colour. She dreams of a day when a conference speaker line-up reflects the diversity of the audience watching. And the red chair is just one way she’s making that happen.

Learn about Lauren Currie here

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

Martin Brooks describes himself as an impacttologist, and he has spent decades studying the theory and implications of impact. He runs a training company that helps managers, media personalities and politicians discover the impact of great communication.

In a thought-provoking Fireside Chat, Martin and Richard explored whether great public speakers are born or made. Martin believes that your experiences of public speaking will shape how successful you are as a speaker. Martin and Richard also had great fun analyzing Mark Zuckerberg’s speaking style.

Martin was also full of insights about what to do when an audience throws a curve ball of a question. He warns that hope is not a strategy – but preparation is. You can anticipate the questions you might be asked in advance and have answered ready, so you won’t be thrown when that difficult question comes.

Learn more about Martin here.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter. View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com. If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

Emily Ross is an entrepreneur, public speaker, and founder of Inkvine Consulting, which helps tech and commercial companies to scale and grow. Emily has never been afraid to play with fire – she was a fire dancer and was regularly seen at event venues throughout Ireland, juggling balls of fire. As if that wasn’t enough, she’s also an advisory board member for South by Southwest this year.

Emily is also co-founder of a non-profit called Sportstech Ireland, which brings real meaning into her life. In an uplifting Fireside Chat with Richard, she advises aspiring public speakers to share their expertise with organisations that have meaning for them. Not only will they grow their network, but they’ll deliver talks that will bring real meaning to their audiences. She also reveals the secret of finding time to prepare speeches when she’s juggling so many balls in the air – she does it while she’s driving.

Learn more about Emily Ross here.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

In this podcast, Richard enjoyed a highly stimulating, thought provoking and honest chat with Andrew Vorster. Andrew is a thought leader and innovation catalyst, and a full-time professional public speaker. Andrew grew up on a farm in South Africa and immersed in African storytelling traditions from an early age. As a young child, he was gifted with the honorary title of storyteller by his local Zulu community.

Andrew tells aspiring speakers to have fun and ditch the script. That’s what he did, when he was crippled with nerves at the thought of speaking to huge audiences. His mentor gave him a valuable nugget of advice – the audience doesn’t know what you’re supposed to be saying. just relax and concentrate on saying the things you know need to be said. So, just relax and say what needs to be said.

Value was the central theme of this fireside chat – giving value to audiences and knowing your value as a speaker. To give value to your audience, you must first know who we are. Andrew gets to know his audience using avatars, and delivers takeaways that will add value for them. Andrew advises aspiring speakers to stay away from conferences that ask you to pay for the privilege of speaking at them.

Learn about Andrew Vorster here.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

Gina London has made communication the cornerstone of her career. She spent 20 years as a top TV correspondent with CNN and regularly reported live from the White House. Now she runs The Language of Leadership, a company which trains Fortune 500 CEOs and other business leaders to become brilliant communicators.

Gina told Richard how she borrows from the world of magic to grab the attention of her audience. She thinks of her audience at every stage of her talk preparations and shows you how to factor them into your own preparations. Gina also revealed her magic formula for preparing talks: strategy, structure and deliver.

Gina is a powerful and dynamic speaker, but she’s anxious to reassure wannabe speakers that they don’t have to be brilliant speakers from the get-go. You learn how to be a great speaker little by little, by paying attention to how we communicate with people every day. You can then bring the skills you learn during those small human interactions onto a bigger stage.

Learn about Gina London here.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

In this episode, host Orla Shanaghy chats to Anna Jordan, founder of ModwordsFest, Ireland’s first open mic festival for spoken word artists. Anna is also a freelance festival programmer, playwright, creative writing facilitator and publican.

We’re proud to partner with Simplecast to bring you our Fireside with Voxgig podcast.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

In this episode, Richard speaks with Andrew Macadam. Andrew is currently the Managing Director for startups in Western Europe at Microsoft. He has also held a myriad of other roles, including being an Evangelist, which at Microsoft means you go out and get people excited about new technologies.

Throughout Andrews diverse roles he has experienced a lot of public speaking. He discusses with Richard that terrible moment most public speakers encounter when their minds go completely blank and how strange it is to realize that the audience doesn’t notice because they interpret that pause as time to think. They discuss the adrenaline rush you experience right before speaking and how your body goes into a serious flight or fight mode. They also delve into what it’s like speaking with different accents and how you have to keep this in mind when performing to different audiences.

Learn more about Andrew here.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use  #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

In this episode Richard speaks with Neil O’Brien. Neil is the founder of the company Time to Fly and is currently one of Ireland’s most sought after professional conference speakers and life coaches. He focuses on the topics of mental fitness, mental health and wellbeing. He has many corporate clients and has coached elite and professional sports people in the past.

Neil tells Richard about how golf actually led him to his public speaking career and that his first public speaking gig was actually at a wedding! He discusses how he loves to make a game out of all of his speeches and how inserting humor into speeches is a definite must. Neil also explains how the arrival of the Celtic Tiger, also known as the Irish economy during the period of rapid economic growth that characterized the 1990s, encouraged him to branch out from his day job as a professional trainer and speaker at a bank and create his own business.

Learn more about Neil here.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use  #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.

In this episode, Richard speaks with Kwame Nyanning. Kwame is the founder and CEO of Dangerous, a venture studio focused on developing financial products and services for millennials and generation Z.

Kwame tells Richard about his interesting start in public speaking, which involved him on stage doing hip hop! They discuss how incredible it feels when you actually succeed at a talk—and how, unfortunately, you can always bomb, even when you are well established in your speaking career. Kwame also explains that it is a lot harder to give a talk to people you know. Expectations are a lot higher, so if you don’t do well, it can affect you on a much deeper level.

Kwame describes how he likes to use a ‘storyteller’ approach to speeches. By telling a story, you can convey truths to the audience, which makes them engaged and interested in what you have to say. He also explains something that he learned while working for McKinsey in London: the Minto Pyramid principle of top-down communication.  

Learn more about Kwame here.

To get a weekly dose of public speaking tips, information, videos of great talks, conference news, book reviews and more, sign up to the Voxgig newsletter.

View all show notes, links, and more brilliant public speaking resources at voxgig.com.

If you like what you hear on Fireside with Voxgig, don’t be shy―tell everyone! Use  #firesidewithvoxgig on your social media.