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Archives for June 2013

Passing out in a presentation (almost!) – lessons learned

June 24, 2013 By Change Masters Academy Leave a Comment

Every fantastic presenter you’ve seen has had a nightmare experience like this one. They’ve bombed massively. But they used that experience to learn the hard way how to recover.

00-0023_Passing Out In A Presentation“What do you mean? I thought I did a great presentation – I had so much information in it, it had to make me look smart!”  This was the reaction from a newly minted marketing vice president after I asked him if he had grown up in accounting. He was giving his first run-through for his first major speech to a very Type A global audience.

It stunk because it was so long and convoluted, no one would have been able to follow it. It was a classic case of intentions not matching perceptions. His intention was to impress his senior management audience with all he knew. The perception? I don’t know, because I was asleep after the first seven minutes.

Ever felt like passing out?

Of course, who am I to throw stones? After all, I’m only the communications coach who nearly fainted at one of her big stage presentations two decades ago. I know exactly what he meant when he thought ten pounds of material in a five pound bag was success! And while he turned it around through coaching to do a fantastic debut presentation, I didn’t follow my own advice – and paid the price.

The big ouch

Anyone with a pulse knows that when your audience starts walking out on you that you’ve blown it. At that moment, it didn’t matter that I was just following the marching orders of the meeting planner, who wanted a lot of material covered. It didn’t matter that I completely neglected to follow the cardinal rule of presentations, know your audience. All that mattered was how I was going to stay on my feet to finish this one! I was within seconds of completely passing out in front of 500 people one terrifying afternoon in St. Louis.

The #1 fear

The “whoosh-whoosh” sounds in my ear were getting so loud, I was certain the entire audience could hear them. Everything got gray and fuzzy in my peripheral field of vision. I began to l-e-a-n ….. ever so slowly to the right, grasping the podium as my knees began to buckle. In the back of my mind (the part of my mind that wasn’t dedicated to survival!) I could really, truly understand in those moments why the fear of public speaking is greater than the fear of death.

Drowning in flop sweat, I managed to mumble out the closing remarks. domain whois information I felt like a complete idiot. And no, I didn’t pass out. I didn’t die, at least, not medically. But it was a form of death to feel like such a failure. Since I was scheduled to speak on the same topic in Boston, two weeks later, I knew very well that decades before anyone had ever heard of social media, the word had already gotten out on the way I had bombed in St. Louis. I was terrified of a repeat performance.

So, with absolutely nothing left to lose (except my lunch!) I decided to explore what had not worked the first time. 75% of the content got cut. I started to do live coaching with audience members to get them engaged.

What happened in Boston? It worked. Got a standing ovation – and nearly passed out again with gratitude!

Take the risk to learn from failure

Trust me, every fantastic presenter you’ve seen has had a nightmare experience like this one. They’ve bombed massively. But they used that experience to learn the hard way how to recover. Sometimes, you can turn it around in the moment, and if you can, fantastic. But even if it all implodes, don’t run from presentations. Buck up, consider it relatively cheap emotional tuition and add it to your tool kit for recovery from a bombed presentation in the future. Let it be your impetus to understand what happened so it never happens again – at least, not in the same way!

Carol Keers  Vice President, Change Masters, Incorporated

 

Quote of the Week

June 18, 2013 By Change Masters Academy Leave a Comment

timeout“The capacity to listen and really understand what the person is driving at, to ponder the question in a significant way, make the interaction an exchange rather than blurting out the answer so the person feels shut down is the mark of the mature leader you remember the rest of your life.”

 

 

  site analysis

Who makes you smile? A survival technique

June 11, 2013 By Change Masters Academy Leave a Comment

letterman 

Two of my favorite people!

I would love to be a mouse

in the corner with them for

just one day….!

 

Who makes you smile? A survival technique.

 

QUICK SUMMARY: Use the energy of people who lighten you up to deal with the challenges of your day. Here’s how!

David Letterman and Bill Murray…an American talk show host and movie star. You may not like them or find them remotely funny, but I find them hilarious.  Every time I see a picture of them, they make me smile, without even uttering a single word.

I carry an imaginary family in my head. I have a fantasy set of parents, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles based on whoever gives me energy. In my imaginary family, Dave Letterman is an older brother of mine and Bill Murray is one of my younger brothers. Can you imagine how much they would drive me insane – and how much we would laugh?

Who gives you energy?

Who makes you laugh? Is it a family member, a television or movie celebrity? Do they just give you a little smile, or do they give you energy?  Whoever it is, give them a chance to inspire you more often. Goodness knows, you need it these days! Put a picture of them on your mobile device, put a line from them on a sticky note on your desk, or think of a hilarious line they said that makes you laugh every time you hear it.

If I just hear David Letterman in my mind saying, “I wouldn’t give his troubles to a monkey on a rock!”  I just crack up. I don’t even really know what it means, it just makes me lighten up. If I think of Bill Murray in the movie Caddyshack, imitating a golf commentator, whispering, “Cinderella story. Outta nowhere. A former greenskeeper, now about to become the Masters champion…,”  it transports me to a happier state of mind.

Survival techniques in this day and age!

Whoever or whatever puts you in a better mood is of tremendous value to you today. They can live in your mind forever – and the great news is that they can usurp the place of the voices in your head (and in everyone else’s – you’re not alone on this one!) that are taking you down.

They can also just get you through that moment when you are frayed down to your last nerve. When I think of Bill Murray, in Lost In Translation, saying, “You’ll figure that out. The more you know who you are, and what you want, the less you let things upset you,” it’s not funny, but it galvanizes me to have perspective.

Let those who make you smile or ground you get you through the day today – let them help you stay sane.

 

Quote of the Week

June 6, 2013 By Change Masters Academy Leave a Comment

00-0025_Quote of the day 1“Feelings are scary and sometimes they’re painful, but if you can’t feel pain and fear, you can’t feel anything else.” Anonymous

To have authentic executive presence, you need emotional competence. To have emotional competence, you need to be able to connect with your feelings, as well as those of others.

Think of feelings as a garden hose. If you ignore them, it’s like tying a knot in the hose. Eventually, it will burst. Better to feel the feelings and “bleed” the emotional hose – before it bleeds you dry!

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