My local newspaper reports that a drunk driver rear-ended a stopped police car the other night.
Fortunately, no one was hurt, but the vehicle impound fee, court costs, legal fees and citation are going to be expensive.
One might reasonably ask, "How could someone hit a parked cop car?"
But things that aren't supposed to happen occur every day.
Take presentations, for example.
A speaker has four weeks to prepare but postpones preparation and tries to pull everything together the night before.
A salesperson decides not to practice answering potential client questions in advance and botches the sales call.
A presenter decides to wing it and work without talking points. He leaves out important points, goes overtime, and gets negative attention from the boss.
An aspiring employee gives a series of presentations that lack originality and interesting content. Everyone notices and someone else gets promoted first. Then another person, but not our hero.
Delivering professional presentations is a lot harder than it seems. Worse, well-meaning people will say you did great, even if you didn't. This reinforces average performance and will keep you from being effective at getting people to take action.
Get a second--and third opinion
One way to better understand your presentation aptitude is to keep asking for evaluations until you hear a criticism. Then explore the veracity of the opinion. You can save a lot of time and trouble by asking a professional speaker to evaluate your presentation. I do a lot of free consults to get speakers pointed in the right direction.
If you've never had presentation training, I'm 100% sure I can help you improve in a big way.
I've helped attorneys, top salespeople, C-Suite folks, teachers, authors, and professionals in every industry to become powerful communicators and command a room.
Let's jump on a call to see where you're at and talk about what's possible. Ask me anything you'd like on this free consult.
Video is my secret weapon for improving
I record all my presentations and study them like athletes watch game films and actors look at dailies. Watching video of other speakers is also very enlightening, especially if you can do so with a slightly critical eye. Notice which techniques seem to work and which don't.
Subscribe to the Michael Angelo Caruso YouTube channel for great content. Click that silver notification bell to be notified of new videos. Here's a sample video with speaking tips for you.