Public-speaking skills will set you apart.
As graduate of Toastmasters Competent Communicator program I can confirm that Buffet’s recommendations are correct. That program changed my life.
Billionaire Warren Buffett has offered investment wisdom for five decades at the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholder’s meeting. Buffett didn’t disappoint the 40,000 shareholders who attended this year’s meeting, often turning questions about the stock market into tips for a successful life.
During the six-hour question and answer period, Buffett was asked twice to name the single best investment he would recommend today as a hedge, or protection, against inflation. While the two people who asked the questions expected a stock tip, Buffett gave what he considered a far more valuable opinion.
“I’ll tell you something even better than one stock,” Buffett said.
“The best investment–by far–is developing yourself.”
If you are exceptionally good at something, people will beat a path to your door, says the 91-year-old investor. If you develop the skills that others are willing to pay for, you’ll thrive despite what’s happening in the broader economy. According to Buffett, “your abilities can’t be inflated away from you.”
For years, Buffett hosted business school students who made a pilgrimage to his office in Omaha to meet with him. The students were often surprised when Buffett showed off his most prized diploma–a framed certificate from a public-speaking course.
“I have one diploma hanging in my office,” Buffett would tell them. “It’s from a Dale Carnegie course which cost me a hundred bucks back in 1951. It’s incalculable how much value I got from that hundred dollars.”
There’s nothing like working to improve your own skills, Buffett said. He then added, “I would say communications skills are the first area I would work on to enhance your value throughout life, no matter what you do, because if you can’t talk to people, you’ll have a real problem selling anything–stocks or anything else.”
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