According to Scott Berkun, author of "Confessions of a Public Speaker," we say an average of 12,000 words a day -- mostly at work.  He shared his tips on how to be more interesting and engaging when we speak -- even if it's just to a small group of co-workers.

Scott Berkun will appear at the following book signing for "Confessions of a Public Speaker" :

• Thursday, January 7th
• 7:00pm
• Powell's Technical Books
• 33 NW Park (at Couch Street)

For more information about "Confessions of a Public Speaker," check out our books page.

 Here are Scott's thoughts:

• We all speak in public all the time.  On average we say 12,000 words a day, mostly at work. All ideas and decisions in life depend on our ability to speak well and convince others. Public speaking isn't something reserved for lecture halls . We do it all the time: pitching ideas to our boss, asking a girl, or boy, out on a date, convincing a client to follow one idea instead of another.

•  Speaking to groups is a skill anyone can develop. The book makes learning how to speak better fun as all of the stories are entertaining, real, and often involve me doing something embarrassing in front of crowds, and learning from them later. As the book explains there are some basic facts of biology that explain why we're afraid, and there are easy ways to minimize them.

•  The process of explaining your ideas improves your thinking. We tend to think of pitching ideas as separate from thinking of the ideas themselves, but we are verbal creatures. Trying different ways to explain ourselves helps us understand how we feel or  think, and improves the likelihood we'll convince others.