Every now and then we focus on effective use of time so as to get best output possible. Ignorance, lethargy and negligence of not putting in efforts in preparation for that final show are the main causes of not been able to grab the best of the best opportunities.
What I mean to say can only be explained through an example. So here you go!
You have been working on an assignment for years. The work products, the processes, every small level detail is known to you. In due course you might have found and experienced very challenging situations. You have done some fantastic discoveries, identified solutions for most complex problems. Whenever you got an opportunity to present your work you did little work but due to sheer involvement and understanding of the subject you managed to get audience’s attention and praises. After some time you start taking the subject/assignment little lightly as you know in and out about it. Suddenly an opportunity of life time comes in front of you and you are asked to prepare formally and come out with a detailed write up of all that you worked upon and put it in proper understandable format. It goes through some reviews by peers, supervisors. Some give useful comments, some ask you to do changes which you do not approve but finally manage to put things in place. You are desperately waiting for the day when you will get the opportunity to put forward your years of hard work in front of the world. The entire process till the day is so tiring that as you are closer to the day of final presentation you start losing patience, you no longer want to sit down and go through your own work, contents again and again and try to fine tune it, by heart it, try to rehearse, do mock sessions in privacy etc etc. Then typically what happens is on the very day of your so long awaited presentation day you become nervous, skeptical, you start getting the feeling as if you are not connected and prepared at all.
On the start of the day itself you eagerly await for getting it over. Anxiety is gone and in its place comes mind block, cluelessness, closely coupled threads starts falling apart and suddenly you lose track of what you have been doing so far. You are in no mood to rehearse, practice at that 11th hour. When you start the presentation you suddenly feel where am I? What am I supposed to speak? Where to start from? To it adds the first 10 minutes of silence and no response from the audience. Then by the time you start feeling comfortable, your thoughts fall in place, you start getting control and you are in a mental state to give your best shot and answer all the trickiest of the questions, it’s all over. When your energy level and confidence is at its peak you have almost consumed 90% available time. Your first impression has already been established and audience is in no mood to further listen to you or your great work.
That’s over, all the time you waited for is gone as flash of light. You lost the battle without getting a chance to put your best foot forward, all the ammunition you had is still intact, you never could use it and the war is over with you left behind to think on why and how things slipped off your hands and you could do nothing expect for witnessing it and cursing later throughout your life.
So what could have been done to save this and to make sure that you make most of the opportunity and avoid setbacks later.
1. Never ever give up on that last day preparation, minute details
2. Think and speak out the examples that you want to give, the best practices that ou want to highlight
3. Prepare starting speech of not more than 2 minutes
4. List down all the points in specific order that you want to cover and keep it handy
5. Know your presentation path and slides in and out
6. Think of scenarios where you might have to traverse back and forth the presentation
7. Think of some funny stories you can use in between the presentation
8. Know facts and figures, use them as punch lines
9. Make confident statements and have at least one take away for all variety of audience
10. Never have too much technical details in the slides if you have less than 30 minutes to present the entire subject/topic
11. Do not go through the slides, make last minute rehearsals.
12. Keep your mind away from the topic before few hours of the presentation and indulge in more generic activities like dress up, read news paper, speak to few people around
13. When you enter the presentation room or get up for the presentation take a deep breath and try to read audience
14. Get well versed with the ambience and things you are going to use during your presentation
15. Always make sure you put your best contents/highlights in the first 5 minutes it self
16. Always give a brief background of what topic you are going to cover, what areas you are going to highlight, success stories
17. Last but not the least, never ever lose focus, if you feel that you are going wrong, take a pause (use one liners) and come back to the track
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