If you're going to build something from nothing, you've got to know what really works.

I took a thousand dollar loan and built a five billion dollar business, and now I make smart investments in new businesses on Shark Tank. This is Barbara

Corcoran and you're listening to Business Unusual. Today I'm Business Unusual

I'll answer your questions about business, motivation, life, or anything else on your mind.

But first, if you're afraid of public speaking, you're missing out on one of the biggest opportunities to grow your business.

One of my jobs today is public speaking and I do a lot of it and I'm good at it but that wasn't

always the case. I used to hate it.

Like too many people, I lost my voice the first time I spoke in front of a live audience.

Although I must have spent a hundred hours or more preparing,

I made the mistake of opening with a joke that no one found funny.

And I promptly lost my voice.

After my first public failure, I knew I only had two choices.

I could hide out feeling ashamed and sorry for myself, never to speak again, or I could do something to fix it. So I cried in my soup that night, and by morning I signed up to teach a 10-week

evening course on how to sell real estate because that was the one thing I knew and

I figured I'd use a small classroom to get lots of practice.

Would you believe the very first night I showed up

I met Carrie Chiang, a young student who told me she was selling

lots of condominiums to the Chinese.

So I prepared very well for every class each week and did the best

I could for the remaining nine weeks and ended the course recruiting Carrie into

my tiny real estate company. Carrie quickly became the top broker in my time. My Tiny not a bad prize for getting back up.

A few tips for getting over fear.

...