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A few weeks ago it was my son's birthday and to celebrate, we rented the video game Guitar Hero. For those who don't know this great game, here is a quick description.

In Guitar Hero III you play the role of a guitarist in an up and coming rock band. Your goal is to have a great career by covering other bands' songs in front of a wildly enthusiastic crowd. To play a song, a guitar fretboard (the handle) appears on screen and you must play the notes that scroll by, at the right moment. Every time you play a correct note, you hear the sound of a guitar playing and you receive points. If you miss a note, the guitar plays nothing and it sounds like there is a person missing in the band. A counter displays how well you are doing on your quest to become a guitar god.

If you miss your notes too often, the audience boos its disapproval and can eventually kick you off the stage before the song has ended. If you play well enough, you enter Star Power mode! In this mode, you can no longer simply play the guitar. You must raise your guitar handle in order to deliver a searing solo! The crowd goes wild! Your points are doubled! After a while, Star Power mode ends and you are back to playing as usual. 

This is a fun game for the entire family (my five-year old daughter can play Hit Me With Your Best Shot by Pat Benatar, without being kicked off the stage) and if you agree to let yourself go, it is easy to bring out the rock star in you.

When you compare Guitar Hero to public speaking, these are some of the similarities you will find:

• Your audience will allow for a few errors before kicking you off stage. The tolerance level can be fairly high, depending on the reasons your audience decided to hear you speak. Mistakes during the course of your speech are more easily overlooked than mistakes at the beginning. You must build your credibility towards your audience before you make mistakes otherwise it can be difficult to recover.
• When you are doing well, it is a good time to add some pizazz to your presentation. You have this latitude because you have already established your credibility. The audience will not perceive it as an attempt to hide your lack of content under a barrage of visual or auditory diversions. But it doesn't last forever: eventually, you need to bring down the intensity to allow your audience to catch its collective breath.
• You need to put some entertainment in your speeches. It doesn't need to be grandiose but you need to break the monotony of a litany of points presented one after the other. Break this monotony by using stories, humour, visual aids, poetry, songs, magic tricks, and so on. You are limited only by your imagination and your confidence.

More and more, the audiences you face will be expecting a show during your speech. We no longer want information only, we also want entertainment. Somewhere inside you lies a little rock star. If he or she has remained hidden for too long, give him or her the chance to emerge. Games such as Guitar Hero, The Werewolves of Thiercelieux and many improv games can help you do that.

This, in turn, will help bring out the speaker in you!