Leaning on the podium. Smacking your lips. Arriving late. Leaving early. Yelling (think Howard Dean) at the audience. Muttering. Forgetting ties, belts, shoes, pants, and passports. PowerPoint. Keynote. Boring.
No one’s perfect. Even the best presenters make mistakes, both in preparation and delivery. Presentations are 4-D: they require more of you than any other type of personal engagement, and certainly more than the digital channels du jour. But take a look at the 12 Steps program: #1- Admit that you have a problem.
Reform is never easy. Public speaking, by its very nature, exposes: if we’re prone to procrastinate, the content and delivery suffers. If we’re insecure, the delivery and closing argument lack power. If we don’t have passion, we suffer at the feet of an audience that doesn’t laugh, doesn’t cry, and doesn’t blink. Presenting, like jumping a moat filled with alligators, is only fun when you’re all in.
All of the myriad ingredients that combine to make great presentations (and the great career that always follows) come down to a single virtue: passion. Passion makes us prepare. Passion makes us study. Passion brings us before the mirror, rehearsing when no one is watching, because ok is not ok.
The real bad habit is always compromise. Kicking the habit means new standards and new levels of commitment. The New Year is always a good time for staking new ground, but we’ve all dropped resolutions enough times to know the ardor of January gives way to the bitter cold and gray of February–after that, our typical response is, “What resolution?”
This year, quantify the fruits of better delivery. Set goals for income, influence, and reach. Attach personal meaning and significance to success on the stage, in the conference room, and person-to-person. Pay value doesn’t have to come in dollars to keep us honest and committed to kicking last year’s bad habits; it just has mean something to us.
Question: What would happen if you sought new opportunities to present and nailed them?
