How an Introverted Ex-Design Director Improved His Speaking Skills

Last Friday, I started my first paid design training session. Both the company boss (a friend I know) and the team gave positive feedback on the first class. One team member even remarked that my speaking was like a “torrent.” That took me by surprise. Of course, it also gave me a sense of accomplishment because over the years, I’ve made significant progress in communication and presentation skills.

In truth, I used to be an introverted person who wasn’t good with words. I often didn’t like to speak much and avoided expressing myself in public. But despite being so introverted, I managed to lead a design team of dozens and a business team of nearly a hundred people. And now, in paid design training, I’m being called “a torrent.”

Here, I want to share a bit of “life experience.”

Embrace Being Introverted

For many years, I felt that being introverted was a flaw, especially when people labeled me as such. Generally, introverted people are perceived as less social, not great at communication, and therefore find it harder to make friends and build a social circle. Often, the terms self-abasement and reclusive are bundled with being introverted.

One day, I decided to face this characteristic head-on. After reading some books, I had a revelation: being introverted isn’t a personality flaw; it’s just a trait. Like extroverted people, many excellent individuals are also introverts. Introverts tend to be thoughtful, logical, reserved, understated, concise, and direct.

So if you’re like me and identify as introverted, make sure to acknowledge that personality. Being introverted isn’t a flaw.

Don’t Avoid Improving Communication Skills

The default “setting” for introverts seems to be weaker communication skills. But introverts need to recognize two points: First, in both the workplace and in life, normal and effective communication is a necessary survival skill. Second, introverted people should actively work to enhance their communication skills rather than avoid them.
As an introvert, I have gone through several stages in improving my communication and presentation skills:

• First phase: unwillingness to communicate, and fear and resistance towards it;
• Second phase: willingness to communicate, but feeling afraid and nervous;
• Third phase: a strong desire to communicate, but inconsistent execution;

Currently, I’m still in the third phase.

First Phase: Unwillingness, Fear, and Resistance to Expression

Why fear and resist public expression? For me, probing the reasons revealed a few: a major influence was my family; I grew up without much atmosphere or opportunity for communication. Another reason was self-consciousness. Up until university, I felt self-conscious about being short. Although I am no longer self-conscious about it, the self-consciousness had long-lasting and multifaceted effects.

In the first thirty years of my life, I suffered many disadvantages due to a lack of good communication skills. Yet, I still didn’t pay attention to it and deliberately avoided it. I always hoped for jobs that required minimal communication, wanting to stay in a small team with simple interactions. During actual work, I’d often substitute emails and messages for face-to-face communication. I mistakenly believed I didn’t need to change and that a job suitable for introverts would naturally find me.

While at Liulishuo, over several years, I was “forced” to improve my communication skills. One day, I had a realization or an awakening: language is powerful.

Why do I say language is powerful?

I first understood the power of language through my Christian faith. The Creator spoke the world into existence with “let there be,” His words are life for us. The human tongue can speak words that build up or words that poison and destroy.

In life, there are plenty of examples: When someone is in distress, comforting and encouraging words can bring solace and help them rise again. In war movies, you’ll often see pre-battle speeches that instantly boost morale. This kind of language-driven motivation happens in companies too, especially when kicking off new projects.

Whether in the workplace or life, we need to express our thoughts normally, accurately, and efficiently via “language.” Regardless of the profession, one needs excellent expression skills. At home, with parents, a partner, children, family, and friends, good communication is also essential. It’s a skill—a necessary survival skill.

When I came to this understanding, I began to break through the first stage.

Second Phase: Willingness, But Fear and Tenseness

Previously, at Liulishuo, one of my biggest psychological barriers or challenges was holding meetings, public reporting, and presentations. Any such occasion made me extremely nervous. Especially, during quarterly or annual reports to hundreds or thousands of people about the design department’s work. Once I stood on stage, my heart would race, my head would spin, and various negative thoughts would pop up: What do the design team members think of me? Does this leader seem weak? What are my colleagues saying about me? I seemingly saw them whispering and critiquing me…

During this stage, before each time speaking, I was nervous and scared; on stage, I couldn’t control my nervousness—my voice would shake, I’d stutter, and I’d sweat profusely, being drenched even in the cold winter. After speaking, I’d feel extremely anxious, self-critical, ashamed, and defeated, unable to face the team.

However, despite that, I remained willing to “embarrass” myself repeatedly. Reflecting on this stage, there are two people I’m particularly grateful to.

I’m grateful to my former boss, Liulishuo founder Wang Yi. I once candidly admitted to him that I was very bad at public speaking and asked if he could give me some advice and share some experiences. He said something to me about “presentation skills” that has motivated me ever since: Diff, you’re indeed not great at speaking, but your words are influential, and people want to listen. Many people can speak, but others may not be willing to listen or fully understand. You just need more practice.

I’m really grateful for those words from Lao Wang. This further proved that language is indeed powerful and capable of influencing a person.
I also have to thank God. Before each speech, I’d pray (had to pray), placing the speech process and outcome in God’s hands, asking Him to help me. After speeches that didn’t go well, filled with frustration and embarrassment, I would only come before God in prayer to calm my disappointment, dispel my inner assumptions of others belittling me, and fear. Because I believe God knows my heart, and my sense of worth lies entirely in Him.

This stage lasted for at least two years. Besides expressing myself at work, I also started preaching occasionally in church. It’s a state of being eager to try again despite previous setbacks. My skin thickened, and my articulation became clearer, and sometimes, I could give a talk or presentation that satisfied me. This gradually led me into the third phase.

Third Phase: Strong Desire to Express, but Unstable Execution

Carefully preparing materials (keynote, meeting agenda, etc.) and adequate practice beforehand are essential for a good presentation.

Material Preparation:

• Write down the purpose of this communication, what the audience should accept, understand, or learn from it. Though this doesn’t need to be conveyed to the audience;
• Have a clear framework for the entire expression, logical transitions, progressive layers;
• Include stories—real stories and personal ones. Everyone likes stories;
• After the stories, present the points, clearly and sincerely, without exaggeration;
• If it’s the first time presenting the topic, write a verbatim script;

Speaking of the “verbatim script,” this is related to Liulishuo founder Wang Yi. Lao Wang is an exceptional speaker, spontaneous yet skillful in handling the atmosphere and persuasion. Anyone who worked there would agree. Once, during a company quarterly meeting, he sent me his Keynote (as I was compiling everyone’s materials) and I was shocked when I saw he had written detailed notes for every slide. Later, he expressed himself based on these notes. This shows that even those with more talent than me put in more effort.

During my transition from the second to the third phase, I would often feel disheartened because of one thing: the content I planned and wanted to say often got skipped during the actual presentation or expression, feeling it wasn’t sufficiently conveyed. I read some presentation tips online: don’t focus too much on whether the actual presentation perfectly matches the plan; expressing over 60% is enough, the rest is ad-lib. This perspective eased me a bit.

I’m still in the third phase now. Eager to express and welcome any speech opportunity, but my execution remains unstable. For this phase, my takeaway is: With sufficient preparation, control the pace and rhythm—especially at the beginning of the presentation. You must stabilize volume, tone, speed, and body language, and manage eye contact with the audience. Generally, this leads to better performances.

I hope this can help fellow introverts like me.