Declutter: Presentation Quick Fixes

I am a total amateur when it comes to presenting. Though I am somewhat a sucker for attention, myriad of thoughts and emotions come to my mind whenever I am given a chance to be in the spotlight. Presentation is a skill I strive to improve on because I know how crucial communication is and how important it is to get your point across clearly.

To be fair, I am not an amazing presenter with those sexy punchy charisma- well I hope to be there someday. Yet, I feel, being an amateur allows me to be aware of the tiny fixes I have to work on in order to create a difference in my approach to presentations.

These are a few quick mindset fixes that I feel has helped me tremendously. It helps you clear your mind of those unwanted thoughts in your head:

1. Do not be afraid when people get bored: It's something that has come back to haunt me for being bored at lectures during school days. I constantly worry if people do not find my content/me entertaining. The thing is, while you can make presentations interesting, you must understand your goal is to get your message across. If people do get bored, focus your energy on those that aren't.
2. Learn to pause: I guess this is the trickle down action step from point 1. I tend to finish my presentation as quickly as possible to please the audience's short attention time spend. Ironically, the thing to do is to pause. Pausing makes your audience feel something unexpected has happened ("why did the presenter stop talking?") and drives their attention back to you.
3. Be aware to slowdown: The last trickle down action step. It's a thing I realise whenever I present, worrying that people would get bored and also nervous! Certain important points may end up lost by the audience because these points have been spoken too quickly. Thus, be aware time to time to slow down in some parts that you want to emphasise on. This is how you can make people listen and also remember! 

If you have read all three points, you might realise that the main conclusion I wanted to bring across is that your main agenda is not to please the audience. You main agenda is to be convicted in what you are presenting - for your message to be heard clearly. Entertaining your audience comes after.

If the audience is refusing to listen, they shouldn't be in your talk/presentation in the first place. Thus, do not worry about the responses, focus on the message.

This reframing of mindset worked really well for me to present my points clearly!