Here at Slidemagnet, we worked late on Friday night and woke up on Saturday morning to thunderous applause. No, we hadn’t just broken a who-can-sleep-the-longest record or managed to find ourselves embarking on a particularly amazing hair day. The applause was coming from outside our office window and it was accompanied by what sounded like the sound of thousands of expensive running shoes pounding the pavement.
This was the sound of the annual marathon in the city where we work, an event we annually celebrate by staring at the unconscionably early hour on the clock right before continuing our own endurance-sleep-training.
This year was different.
Although we tried to catch the train back to dreamland, we just didn’t have it in us to lay there listening to all the ruckus in the street. After making a fast pot of coffee and grabbing our sunglasses, we headed out to see what we were missing.
We met a lot of fun people, including one marathon runner who was sitting out the local contest as he had just completed another out-of-town run a few weeks earlier. He gave us some great behind-the-scenes insights into the experience of running a long race, including the hard training involved. That’s when it hit us: Presenting is a marathon!
The fact is, presenting can be overwhelming. There are so many different skill sets to master that it can be tough to know where to start. Why shouldn’t we take some tips from marathon runners? Staring down 26 miles of shin-pounding, lung-tearing hell isn’t exactly comforting, so how do they do it? They start slow, they keep it manageable and they never run the whole race until its time to run it for real.
Generally speaking, marathon training involves three stages: (1) A gradual mileage increase, (2) Modest weekly totals, and (3) Injury prevention. Although you have little chance of severing an Achilles tendon during a PowerPoint presentation, you can definitely get a rough case of burn-out if you try to master every aspect of presenting all-at-once. As for pacing your learning and gradually building your knowledge base, you couldn’t ask for a better plan for presentation greatness!
Breakdown the skills you are attempting to master in convenient categories and create a schedule that will have you gradually acquiring skill sets until you are unstoppable. Pace yourself. Remember what the tortoise taught the hare about the virtues of “slow and steady”.
Here are some sample categories you can use as examples:
Charisma
As we have seen in other articles on this site, charisma is a critical component when it comes to owning the room at your presentation. Instead of trying to become Prince Charming overnight, break charisma down into all of its confident, sexy parts. What about clothes? Take stock of your closet and get some advice from someone who knows. How’s your body language, and your ability to use right-brain language at will? Evaluate, and then strive for better results. Don’t forget your voice exercises!
Presentation Sharing
You could spend months understanding every aspect of the Web 2.0 world, learning how to integrate your presentations into any number of digital nooks and crannies. Don’t! Pick a few select targets, get them under your belt quickly and move on! Start by selecting a social network, joining twitter or a slide sharing site. Create a YouTube channel. Maybe you are already immersed in the Internet, but are you using it effectively to market your presentations? Integrate, evaluate and then motivate on to the next goal.
Speaking and Writing
Speaking and writing seem like fundamental skills, but in the context of presenting they require mastering many diverse, nuanced techniques. How’s your pace, Speedy? What about your emoting, Al Gore? Find one weak spot, make it stronger, then focus on the next one.
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