Ninja Road Warrior Tip of the Day: What to wear when speaking

Hi everybody, Cheryl Knowlton coming at you with another Ninja Road Warrior tip of the day. This is my advice to you, have a uniform that you wear every single time you speak or the vast majority of the time that you speak. You could have an additional one for switching out, especially if you speak frequently, but know exactly what you’re going to wear. Know that it’s comfortable, know that it fits, know that it’s not going to bunch or gap or have anything poking out or you know, stretching in the wrong places and make you feel terribly uncomfortable, which is going to take you out of your zone of genius and make it so that you don’t deliver at the highest and best use of your talents and abilities.

That also includes how you wear your hair, the jewelry that you’re going to wear, and your shoes. Your shoes can absolutely zap your energy and make it so that you don’t deliver in your zone of genius if they’re uncomfortable. Or, for women, if you’re wearing heels that are too high or don’t give you a solid enough base, you can actually come across to your audience as if you are unstable, which makes it appear that your message is not solid and that you’re not firmly grounded in your message.

So, number one is to have your uniform, what you wear when you’re speaking and try it on. If you haven’t spoken in a while then make sure that everything still fits in and everything looks great. Look at yourself in a full mirror to make sure everything is totally awesome. Number two, do not let that uniform out of your sight. Sometimes we will try to pack a larger carry on than maybe we should and sometimes we get to the gate and the flight is overbooked and you’re sitting in row 76 Z and they tell you we would really like it if you would check your bag, and sometimes we let them check our bag.

Do not let your laptop or your uniform out of your sight. Keep it with you. So have a small enough carry on that contains those things and a few key toiletry items or essentials for your engagement that you can actually tuck it under the seat in front of you so that it doesn’t even … there’s no chance of it going somewhere and you losing control of it. And that is my Ninja road warrior tip of the day.