I started my company on my own years ago and now I'm at it again. In my case I when I go without verbal communication for a while (like doing long days & night

I started my company on my own years ago and now I'm at it again. In my case I when I go without verbal communication for a while (like doing long days & nights of computer science), my enunciation is compromised during the first few live conversations after that. When I know an important phone call or personal appearance needs to be accomplished, I will prepare by "warming up". For me, it helps to play some familiar vocal music and sing along distinctly and loudly as a practice session. It warms up the voice for better quality and gets the brain into more of the presentational flow that I know I am capable of. It always helps the confidence and that flow is more easily carried into remaining conversations for the rest of the day, once the brain has had some preliminary guidance along the path under non-challenging conditions to begin with. I might imagine you can probably sing along with the radio or your favorite CD without stuttering. Or maybe read aloud from a familiar book or document. These can help. It may be worthwhile to recite something that has been memorized, it's not essential, but give it a try too. With pop music or the printed word you do often end up uttering things that will not be part of your regular vocabulary, and that is good. When you are talking to people later on, your conversation actually becomes less of a stretch than the practice session was, which makes it easier. When I talk about my life's work, I know it's important and sometimes there is a lot at stake, but I don't want to rehearse what I am actually going to say or it may be too "canned", instead I just rehearse some vocals to get in shape, then wing it from there. It's my life's work, and I do have more answers than anybody else on the subject. Still I do look forward to having a representative and/or spokesperson once I get to be a CEO again. A highly technical person needs this more than a regular technical person, if nothing else so I can concentrate more on creating the science that no one else is doing. I've already got a few anxious associates who would love for me to get funded so they can come on board. It might be a good idea to start "recruiting" a strong spokesperson yourself, especially a close friend who might make a good partner or associate later when you can afford to bring them on. Until then it would be great to practice 1:1 with them when you can, concentrating on smoothness of conversation yourself while letting them casually learn more about your life's work as you go along. That way if you don't end up landing an investor on your own before too long, you will might be able to have your "assistant" accompany you to a meeting or two and see how that goes. hoppe this helps, dano