Are you fetishizing public speaking? Now folks, I am a public speaking coach myself and I think public speaking is really important. But it is critical to realise that it is not always about the speaking but also about the substance matter.
There are no awards for people’s writing skills. There is no Pulitzer prize for someone who can form a sentence about anything with good grammar, punctuation, and spelling. Maybe in the first grade. but not for adults.
It is always in a package with what the big story is. When it comes to breaking news or hard news or even literature, you need to have a story. Sure, writing skills are also very important, but nobody really gives you much credit for it after the 3rd grade.
The reason I am bringing this up is because many people fetishiize public speaking. They want to learn how to speak in public so they can win a competition. That is alright if you want to do it as a hobby but it will not help you make a career.
So if you have great writing or speaking skills but nothing of expertise in a particular area then you end up being kind of a wind up doll. So, of course I urge you to try and improve your public speaking skills and hone them but at the same time you need to improve your content so when you put the two together, it becomes powerful.
If you look at some of the great authors in the world, they can string few sentences together but that is not what defines their impact. That is why books are deemed to be best selling books instead of best written books. That does not mean you should try to speak poorly but it highlights the importance of having good ideas and content which you can present in a compelling way.