Think Faster Talk Smarter is full of many helpful tips to build confidence and combat anxiety toward speaking on the spot, including meetings, conferences, small talk, toasts, and more. It covers everything from mindset to practical examples to help strengthen your communication. It's practical and insightful and a great tool for everyone. I would recommend this book.

This book is a very comprehensive guide to help anyone wanting support with spontaneous speaking situations. The author his clearly very knowledgeable in this area and shares his knowledge with practical tips and plenteous anecdotes.

No stone is left uncovered, as the physiological, psychological and numerous other aspects of spontaneous speaking situations are covered in general terms, as well as in specific speaking situations, with the second half of the book (part 2) delving into specific situations we might encounter such as Q&As, engaging in small talk and giving toasts (amongst many others.

This is a book I took my time over, as the content is massive, and it took me a while to digest it all, I have practiced some of this (particularly around the breathing), and have found this to be helpful. I look forward to giving myself time to process much of the content and then try it out!

Overall I found this book to be a great resource and one I would happily recommend.

My thanks to Netgalley, author and publisher for the opportunity to review this book in exchange for an advance copy.

I was really pleased to get the opportunity to read an advance copy of this book. I've listened to several episodes of Matt Abrahams' podcast on communication and find it a fascinating and, for me, very relevant subject.

I have a job in which communication is really important and I'm definitely a words person. However while I'm confident in written communication, verbally - especially off the cuff - is a different matter. I flounder, can't find words, fail to finish sentences, and lose my train of thought. So, I was very keen to learn some strategies and techniques for communicating better "in the moment".

Matt Abrahams definitely provides these, with numerous very practical ideas, techniques and examples. Part I discusses a six step methodology to improving our ability to speak spontaneously; Part II considers specific situations such as small talk, pitching, giving feedback to others. He uses a lot of "formulas" to structure the content of what we are saying - I can see these are effective - the only issue for me is likely to be (a) remembering them and (b) remembering to apply them in the moment! I'll probably need to reread a lot of these sections to internalise it a bit more. He does provide lots of ideas for trying out the techniques so there's no excuse really for not using and benefiting from them. I guess it's all about practice....

A very interesting and approachable read which does what it promises and which I'm sure will be very helpful to all those of us who tend to freeze, panic and waffle when put on the spot.