A good friend of mine was recently downsized from an executive position at IBM. Like many people who suddenly find themselves with a J-O-B, she decided to strike out on her own.

Since she is passionate about career paths for women, education, and finance, she decided to offer her services to local organizations, schools, and business groups looking for speakers on various topics.

Tip #1: start local. Many organizations are happy to have a speaker to cover various topics. If you have some experience, qualifications, or an interesting angle, it shouldn't be difficult to find "free gigs."

After a few months getting experience and networking to "get her name out there," my friend decided to up the ante, so to speak, and begin charging for her services. This is an important step, since the National Speakers Association accepts members only after they have completed a number of paid "gigs."

Tip #2: check out their website: www.nsaspeaker.org. They have a tab at the top for "Aspiring Speakers."

You'll need to have a couple of topics with speeches prepared, and then you'll have to market your services. There are a number of coaches who can better counsel you on how to get more paid "gigs." You'll need a "1 pager" to outline a bit about yourself and your topic. A speech coach I know personally is Mike Landrum (you may have seen him on an AARP commercial).

Tip #3: find someone who is actually qualified to help get you to the "next level"

Since I know a couple of people in the profession, but am not a professional speaker (yet?), I can only provide a rough outline of some resources and tips that can better answer your questions. If you'd like to contact my friend Mike, his email is: mike@coachmike.com. And feel free to mention my name (no, I do NOT get a referral bonus or anything else from this.) He's a great guy, and will be very helpful.

I hope this brief hub was helpful. I guess the main factor is, find useful resources, do a bit of digging, and find qualified people who can get you up and running in the best possible way.