Read my lips: Don't read your presentations

We all have our comfort levels, especially when it comes to preparing to give a presentation or speech. Experienced presenters know what works for them, and usually find themselves evolving in their need to prepare, as well as the ways and means of doing so. When a presentation is repetitive over time, city after city, meeting after meeting, preparation becomes the collective experience of all the bookings and appointments that have come before, applying the learning that takes place when you live in the moment of a joke dying, a point missing the mark or an audience that erupts to its feet in applause or rushes to shake your hand. For some, few things in life are more terrifying than an appointment with a podium and a room full of blank stares. So what do we do to overcome this fear? How do we make it through the night before the Big Day? Answer: we prepare. Wrong answer: we write it all down… word for word… and then when we hit the stage, we read it aloud.