Why Confidence is Important in Public Speaking with Moira Ghallachoir
Welcome to another episode of “Dream Job with Danielle Cobo”!
Today, I am blessed to be joined by Moira Ghallachoir.
Moira shows entrepreneurs a powerful pathway to enrolling more clients, making way more money and having a globetrotting lifestyle – without the complicated strategies. So they can finally enjoy the success and the freedom they started their business for in the first place.
Moira went from being a youth worker living in London making 30k a year to a business mentor and speaking, building a multiple 6 figure revenue in less than 3 years. She has captivated audiences worldwide with her powerful presentations, her retreats in Paris and New York as well as her newest venture - stylish secret supper style gatherings for big thinking entrepreneurs to get their message out in a big way anywhere in the world.
“Without inspiration, it would be impossible for me to be successful" – Moira Ghallachoir
Listen on iTunes, Spotify, and YouTube https://www.daniellecobo.com/podcast
Highlights
💫 1:42 A little about Moira's career journey
💫 5:23 Some tips for female entrepreneurs searching to find their voice
💫 9:00 Your goals become less scary when you put yourself out there and try
💫 11:44 If you never ask about opportunities, you'll never know what's possible
💫 16:30 Three takeaways from today's conversation
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✳️ Website: https://www.moira.ie/
✳️ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/moira_nighallachoir/?hl=en
✳️ LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/moira-ní-ghallachóir
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I certainly wasn't always a speaker. But I guess you know, like, you know, in most jobs women have, there's always an element of speaking. But we just don't define ourselves as speakers. I was first in sales and marketing. I did that for a number of years. And then I moved into working with young people, preventing them from becoming homeless in the streets of London. And then I hit a wall around about my 36th birthday. I had a dream of becoming my own boss and living a life of freedom. So I moved back to Ireland. In the middle of the recession. In 2012, I first started a travel business that brought hundreds of people to my local area here in Donegal, Ireland. And from there, all the success I had with that laid the foundations for me to create my own speaking and mentoring business. And I've grown that from zero to multiple six figures in less than three years. So I'm delighted with that. I really feel like I've developed and created my own dream job.
From Marketing to Traveling to Speaking: The Common Thread in Your Career
When I think back to some of my first jobs, I think that inspiration has always been at the core of what I've always wanted to do. When I first left university, I was really inspired to work with communities. I love people. I just love speaking to people. I love helping people. And then, when I moved from that into sales, again, it was all about people. I got to speak to people. Believe it or not, one of my first sales jobs is actually door to door selling. I saw an advert in a paper as a graduate. And it said, “Are you energetic? Enthusiastic? Do you love people?” and I was just like, “Yes!” But I've also just graduated, so I thought this is a decent job.When I went into the interview, they told me it was door-to-door sales. And I thought, “Sure, I'm not getting any other offers right now. Let me just do it.”
I did that for almost two years. I was their top selling salesperson when I was about 20 years of age. It was incredible. But again, I was inspiring people to do something that made them feel good. And so I thought it is at the core of sales. When I moved into working with young people, I was inspiring young people to see another way, to see a way where they could contribute to the world, contribute to society, and come out of themselves a little bit. And then, when I moved home to Ireland, I started inspiring people to come to Ireland and experience what we had here. Then when I moved into business mentoring, I mostly started working with women around sales, because it was something that I felt women really hated. They really struggled with it. They weren't going to make any money. So I showed them how to inspire people to work with them, versus feeling that they had to sell people to work with them. So, I would say that inspiration has been a huge thread through all of my careers. And I think without inspiration, it's almost impossible to become successful.
Tools for Women when Speaking their Minds
One of the biggest things that stops most women—most people—from speaking is fear. That fear of being judged, that fear that something terrible is going to happen if they open their mouths, or something like that. But I think in the beginning, I'm sure people have issues with public speaking, it's hard to get them. It's really being okay with not being great in the beginning, and giving yourself a chance to get better, and not putting pressure on yourself to just be good. Sometimes there can be a misconception that you're either not truly good at speaking and presenting. But actually, you can become really, really good. Whether you're an introvert, whether you're an extrovert, whether you're a detailed person, you're a visual person—you can give yourself a chance to get good. And I think one of the main things that I help my clients with is that I give them all the tools they need in order to get good.
Now, in terms of what tools they are, I think it's really important that we're clear on the following areas:
who we are
what we stand for
what our messag is
Those key things can be everything you need to become really good at public speaking, because then, it's really clear what your intention is, and the purpose behind why you're actually standing up, presenting, and speaking. What's in it for you? So whether it's a promotion, whether it's winning a deal, or bringing in a new client, or whether it's engaging hundreds of audiences, being really clear helps as well. I could talk about the tools all day long, but those are some of the key things. This doesn't have to be complicated stuff. When it comes to success, it's usually the simple things that create the biggest outcomes and the biggest inspiration for us.
It takes learning the skills for speaking. I remember the first time I had to do a sales presentation, I was pitching a new copier—I was in copier sales, and it was an intimate group. And I cried. I was actually crying when I was presenting this. I was so scared of public speaking, and my hands would get sweaty. I would have to go the bathroom multiple times right before; I would get butterflies in the stomach. And in those moments, it's a matter of leaning into the discomfort. And every time that you lean into [the idea that] your skills for speaking are going to strengthen, you're going to get more confident. You're gonna get more comfortable. And if you constantly focus on perfectionism, then you really prevent yourself from the joy of speaking, following that passion, and speaking from the heart. And when you lean in, it gives you the opportunity to create things in the future. I mean, I went from crying in my first presentation, to then speaking in front of 1500 people, to having a podcast. It's just a matter of leaning in and following your passion.
I think that we often don't even give ourselves a chance to face those fears. Because it is in the facing them that you get over them. You know, I would say for the first year that I started speaking, I used to just want to run out the door. And at some point, I was like, “Oh my God. Maybe the event will be canceled. And they won't call me up on something like this.” And I was just like, “Why am I so afraid to speak? What is this?” It was like my body was doing these strange things. And I realized, after a number of years of doing, that it has a lot to do with the fact that I was always told to shut up in school. I was always the girl who talked too much, who was told to leave the classroom because she wouldn't stop asking questions. You know, I was always in trouble for speaking. So when it came to speaking on stages, there was a little girl in me who was afraid that somebody was going to tell me to shut up or to leave the event. But I didn't give up. And then, one day, it just clicked. I was driving by my school one day, and I just started thinking, that's why I'm so afraid to get on stage. There will be a reason for everybody. But I think that until we give ourselves a chance to uncover what that reason is or where it came from, or as you say, lean in, feel it all, feel all the feelings, then we can see it for what it is it and it loses its power. It has no more power over us. And that's a really a really big moment for everyone.
That's a very high level of self awareness, because they say that limiting beliefs, the negative thoughts or fears tha hold us back from leaning into uncomfortable areas within our life, starts between the ages of one and eight. So it's these moments in our lives. And as simple as that of being told to stop talking so much in class—that's what creates these limiting beliefs in our future. And when you're able to identify them, then you get to say, “Okay, I have self awareness around this. I know that that's a trigger. And I choose not to believe that anymore, because that doesn't define me.” And there's value in that.
I was talking and I was speaking at an event yesterday with this globe group of global women. And, you know, one of the things that we talked about was that somebody was afraid…But actually, you know, when you look at some of the principles of speaking, verbal communication is around 7%. People are just so obsessed over getting the perfect talk, getting the perfect presentation, and all that—when an actual fact is it's only 7% of what you're about to deliver. So paying more attention to how we look, paying more attention to how we feel inside our body, paying more attention to how we sound, all of those things, actually has 90% more impact to what we say.
It's just crazy. It's kind of unfathomable when you think that as a speaker, but it took me a long time to really get my head around as to why is that. And I noticed that when I go and I look at other speakers, there's so many out there that sometimes I don't even hear what the speakers say. But there's something about the way they move. There's something about the way they speak. There's just something about [them] and I'm like, “What is it?” and that's that other 90%. So we can really give up on worrying about what we say, because if there's one thing I know about women, we don't have a shortage of what to say, we just need the opportunities to speak more. I think the key to this is asking for them. And to never say no, no matter what. Ask for opportunities to speak at all times—even if that means raising your hand and a room where there's like 40 people or 10 people. But just getting that into your psyche, that you are a speaker, you're someone who has a message, you’re somebody who’s got something to say, that seriously boosts your confidence helps you be noticed.
You know, yes, I've gotten an awful lot of opportunities for speaking on stages. But sometimes some of my best opportunities have come from just asking a question. Just literally asking a question. And when I started my business first, or even when I was working in the nonprofit industry, I used to be sitting at events, and something used to always stop me from asking a question. I'd want to put up my hand. And you know, I wouldn't do it. Then one day, I decided, “That's it. I'm not even going to ask myself. I'm just gonna put up my hand. And I'm sure I'll come up with a question.” So I started doing that events. Did it help me? Because it just really that initial moment when you open your mouth and after that, we're fine. We just need more opportunities to do it.
You were spot on when you said, people don't always remember what you say. They always remember how you made them feel. And when you speak from the heart, and you're passionate about what you speak about, it doesn't matter about the mechanics of how you say it, what you say, and the little things that we can get tripped up, on because it's not about being perfect. It's a matter of speaking from the heart. And the other one is, when we speak up and we raise our hand, we give ourselves an opportunity to have a voice. And more often than not, the questions we ask, somebody else has these questions. They're just fearful to raise their hand for it.
What are three things that you want our listeners to take away from our conversation today to help them be confident speakers?
I think it's so important for a woman to put on something that she feels absolutely amazing. And so whether that's your Louboutin shoes, or your SGPs, or whatever it is, put them on. And the beginning of my speaking career, I didn't have that much money, I bought one Calvin Klein dress. Every time I got on stage, I wore it for almost six months. And it made me feel amazing. And if I feel amazing, the audience are going to have such a better time.
When you're going to present and you are someone who's a little bit afraid, or you're worried about saying the right thing, just think of one person who is going to be in that room. Just think of one person. When you're getting ready to take your pressure off of you, just put it into how you want them to feel. How do you want that person to feel by the end of your talk? Do you want to inspire them to want to excite them? Do you want to scare them. And like that beautiful quote from Maya Angelou, people will always remember how you made them feel. It's very rare that somebody has come up to me after, after I spoke and said, “Oh, I love that strategy that you shared an X Y Zed” It's very rare that it happens. That happens. But what happens all the time is that people really relate to my story.
Get clear on what your story is. Everybody's had an obstacle, everybody's overcome something. And when you share that with other people, it gives them permission to overcome it for themselves as well. But when you can get that right and share it with an audience, it does way more than just entertain people. In that moment, that can change someone in their tracks and change their life forever. It's happened to me. And we don't know the value of our own stories. We don't value our own experiences, but start speaking about them. Don't wait to get on stage. Start talking to people one-on-one, start sharing on Facebook Live, start writing about it. And then, I'm a huge fan of saying to all of my clients, “Your best stuff will come out in conversation.” And just don't be afraid to open your mouth, raise your hands, and see what you've got to say.
