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Perfection's not the be all and end all

With Dr Simon Raybould, Curved Vision TheatreTomorrow’s a big day for me. First thing the morning I’m making a presentation at IT WORKS 2006, about How to Stand Out From the Crowd“. Given that I train people to make presentations, I’d better get it right, hadn’t I? The pressure, as someone just said, is on. So how to handle it?Well firstly, there’s the usual ‘mindgames’ of telling yourself it’s not an opportunity to mess up (thanks to my friend Clare for suggesting that to me!) as much as an opportunity to impress and have fun. Secondly there’s all the specific techniques I’ve mentioned in this column over the last couple of years (and teach on my courses) such as the one only two weeks ago. Let’s face it, if nerves get the better of me, I should give up and go home.But that’s not the case for most people, because what they’re talking about is the “art and science of talking”. The talking-about-it is a secondary feature to the important one of knowing-about-it. That means that for ‘real people’ it’s not a disaster if they aren’t perfect. All you need to be is “good enough” not “good”. A presentation is intended to get some information over to your audience: if you’ve done that, you’ve done enough.Remember that the next time you’re called upon to make a presentation – it’s about the content. The presentation is there purely so that people can get at the content. That should settle your nerves a bit…

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .