Professionally Speaking...

PRESENTATION NERVES: UNMASK THOSE PERCEPTIONS

As Mark Twain said, "There are two types of speakers -- those that are nervous and those that are liars."

The panic about having to present or speak in public goes by many names: stage fright, jitters, performance anxiety, nerves. But whatever you call it, this feeling can range from mild anxiety, where you may experience a racing heart and sweaty palms, to downright dread, where flight seems the only viable course of action. If any of that spectrum of emotion is familiar to you, it may (or may not) be comforting to know that you're not alone. Even famous celebrities suffer this kind of anxiety.

FEARFUL CELEBRITIES

For example...the intrepid hero of Raiders of the Lost Ark, Harrison Ford, called speaking in public "a mixed bag of terror and anxiety." Johnny Carson, the king of witty quips and brilliant comic timing, experienced significant nervousness each evening before walking out on stage. Even the great Sir Laurence Olivier, in spite of his many hundreds of appearances and his stellar stage successes, felt terrified before each performance.

WHERE DOES FEAR COME FROM?

When we are faced with something we perceive as stressful or dangerous, our brain responds by initiating a chain reaction which releases the chemicals that cause physical reactions like shortness of breath, sweaty palms and a stomach turning somersaults.

Unfortunately it doesn't matter whether the stressful stimulus is a car careening toward us or the questions we'll get asked in next week's presentation; our brain responds with the same fight or flight response. Anticipating a stressful event can produce the same reaction as actually experiencing it.

HOW CAN WE OVERCOME FEAR?

So how are we to turn a perceived "dangerous" situation, like giving a presentation, into something more sanguine? According to Stephen Maren, professor of psychology at the University of Michigan, fear overrules reason every time because the fear circuitry in the brain is more powerful.

Counterintuitive though this sounds, Maren says the solution to overcoming fears is not avoiding them. Rather repeated exposure to perceived fears in safe conditions helps us to realize that these threats are not real dangers. So that means get in front of people and present as often as you can. Don't slide away after the big conference or meeting, content to avoid any more presentations until next year.

IT'S A MIND GAME

In the fight or flight response, the brain is reacting instinctively to a perception, calling the autonomic nervous system into action. The brain, then, is precisely where we need to focus to reframe the perception. Here are some things that can help recast those stressful perceptions of presenting in public to more benign, or even positive, images:

• Visualize. The subconscious doesn't differentiate between fantasy and reality, so create your own "story" about the stressful event. Visualize yourself feeling confident and competent, eager to share your information with your audience. Shifting your perception of the situation allows you to change behavior. This technique, however, is not one that you can employ once and expect miracles. You need to visualize several times a day, particularly in the week or so prior to your presentation, to solidify these images in your subconscious.

• Listen to soothing music (your definition of soothing) before your presentation to trigger your relaxation response.

• Clip a photo of loved ones, your pet or a favorite vacation spot to your notes or put it on the podium or table you are presenting from...this will help you stay grounded and remind you of something pleasant.

• Enlist friends to sit in the audience and then search out those familiar faces once you start to present. Share your anxiety with them ahead of time and they will be sure to offer you big smiles of encouragement every time you look at them.

• Mingle with people in your audience before the presentation and even chat with a few of them, if time permits. This will establish a human connection. It's less likely that you'll perceive the situation as stressful if you've just established a nice rapport with people who are going to listen to you.

• Check out two of my previous posts, 5 Tips to Managing Presentation Nerves, Part I and Part II.

The more you understand the physiological reasons for fearing or dreading a presentation, the easier it will be to stop blaming yourself for shortcomings and move forward with a productive plan of action. With a commitment to overcome your fear and a dedication to present as often as you can, you will be able to unmask your perceptions for what they are and create a new reality.

PRESENTATION NERVES AT A PRESIDENTIAL INAUGURAL

You may be able to identify with feeling nervous when speaking to a group of people. It's perfectly normal. We all worry, to some degree, about forgetting what we intended to say or stumbling over our words.

Now imagine standing in front of 2 million people (with countless more millions watching on TV and the internet) and blowing your lines.

That is exactly what happened to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and our new President at the swearing-in on Tuesday.

Justice Roberts started to utter the oath that President Obama was supposed to repeat..."I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear..."

But Roberts got only as far as the first four words when the President chimed in and spoke over top of the next three words. This apparently threw the Chief Justice off and he flubbed the following line, getting the next part of the oath woefully confused ("...that I will execute the office of President to the United States faithfully..." instead of "...that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States").

And in that moment, President Obama hesitated and waited for the Chief Justice to offer him the correct line. When Roberts didn't, the President quickly repeated the line that Roberts had given him, even though he knew it wasn't correct.

LESSONS TO BE LEARNED

So what is the point of highlighting this uncomfortable moment in an otherwise flawless ceremony?

It captures three lessons we can all apply:

• It's easy to get nervous in front of an audience...even when we are accustomed to speaking  frequently to large groups.

• It's the sign of a professional to keep calm, even after a mistake. Neither the President nor the Chief Justice appeared shaken or paralyzed by the gaffe (despite the millions of people watching and listening).

• It's helpful to stay focused on what's most comfortable for the audience. Both the President and the Chief Justice realized, in the moment, that the audience would find it awkward for them to belabor the mistake by going back to the beginning and starting again. What their audience wanted was for them to simply keep going.

PRESENTATIONS AND MURPHY'S LAW: HOW TO HANDLE THE UNPREDICTABLE

You arrive for your presentation, flash drive in hand, confident that you are going to be pithy, witty and brilliant. You survey the room, check the equipment and conclude that everything is in order. Your audience arrives and you confidently launch into your presentation, comfortable with your message and your ability to deliver it. And then Murphy shows up.

Murphy's Law is the oft-quoted adage that says, If anything can go wrong, it will. No matter how carefully you have prepared, no matter how well you know your subject, no matter how much research you've done on your audience, there are still things that can and do go wrong in a presentation.

Here are a few common pitfalls and what to do about them:

INTERRUPTIONS ~ Audience members frequently interrupt a presenter with questions, particularly when the speaker has sparked interest or controversy. This can throw a presenter off track, causing him to lose his train of thought and blank on the answer being requested.

A change of mindset is the best way to handle this type of unplanned interruption. Be humbled that your words have generated enough interest in a listener that she is compelled to ask for more of your wisdom. Treat a question as the ultimate compliment.

During your before-the-presentation preparation, anticipating what questions your audience may have will make you more comfortable dealing with these interruptions and easier for you to get back on track.

SHORTENED TIME ~ You have been given an hour for your presentation. You arrive in the Boardroom to find that previous presenters have run over time and you are now asked to cut your presentation to 30 minutes. A sure-fire cause for panic!

Deal with this possibility by modularizing your presentation. When you are initially designing it, create distinct sections that are joined by transition statements. Then if you need to condense your remarks, you can fairly easily skip some of the sections. [Additional hint: if you are using PowerPoint, be sure to mark in your notes which slides go with which sections so you can quickly forward to the right slide.]

EQUIPMENT SNAFUS ~ This might be the most ubiquitous of unpredictables. Best advice: Don't rely on the equipment to work. If it does work, treat it as a pleasant surprise. Now I admit that's a bit tongue-in-cheek, but my point is... If you would be unable to give your presentation if the PowerPoint or the projector failed, shame on you. Your audience didn't come to read slides, they came to hear you. Practice, practice practice your presentation so that you could deliver it, even if the lights went out.

Here is some more great advice for when Murphy shows up.

What are some of your best [worst??] visits from Murphy?

 

5 TIPS TO MANAGING PRESENTATION NERVES (Part 2)

Zig Ziglar, longtime motivational speaker, defines fear as False Evidence Appearing Real. Fear is your body's physical response to something you perceive as stressful...in other words, it's totally subjective. You and I could look at the same situation and one of us could find it exhilarating while the other found it nerve wracking.

Yet for any of us who have been in the throes of presentation anxiety, it sure seems real! Palms sweat, breathing gets shallow, mouth gets dry and words pile up like a chain reaction accident on the Beltway. Here's a brilliantly funny video showing some of the things we worry about.

WHAT TO DO

Just prior to a presentation use these techniques to manage the physical manifestations of your nervousness:

1. BREATHE...it increases oxygen to your brain and minimizes the light-headed, shaky feeling. To see if you're breathing deeply from the diaphragm, do this diagnostic: Put your hand on your chest and breathe. If your chest moves up and down, you are breathing too shallowly. Now put your hand on your abdomen and breathe from there. Your chest shouldn't move.
2. Move around to release nervous energy. Walk up and down some stairs, walk around the block a couple of times, march in place.
3. Open your mouth widely and then close to relax your jaw. Do this several times.
4. If you suffer from a dry mouth, create saliva by lightly biting the inside of your cheek (be sure to do it lightly!), visualize biting into a lemon or press the tip of your tongue into the top of your mouth.
5. Limit caffeine, replace sugar with protein to keep your energy high (ditch the candy bar and substitute some nuts or cheese) and eat at least a couple hours ahead of your presentation to give yourself time to digest.

5 TIPS TO MANAGING PRESENTATION NERVES (Part 1)

A certain amount of nervousness before a presentation is normal...and even positive. Most every professional who gets up before an audience -- whether it's a sports figure, a musician or the CEO of a Fortune 500 company -- experiences it to some degree. Nervousness keeps you alert and focused.

[Note: the wonderful story about the musician is compliments of Laura Athavale Fitton's blog Great Presentations Mean Business]

But mind-numbing, knee-buckling, butterflies-on-a-roller-coaster-in-your-stomach nervousness isn't positive. It negatively impacts your success.

THE GREMLIN ON YOUR SHOULDER

Nervousness is a mindset, pure and simple. Sure it has physical manifestations (more on that in Part 2), but it starts in your head. That little gremlin who constantly sits on your shoulder and whispers things in your ear...otherwise known as your self-talk...works overtime when you are getting ready for a presentation. It whispers self-defeating things like..."you'll forget what you wanted to say", "you won't know the answers to the questions they ask", "you'll sound stupid", "everyone will know more than you do", "everyone will be bored".

WHAT TO DO

Coach (or threaten) the gremlin to replace the negative self-talk with these positives:

1. The audience wants you to succeed. They don't want to come to the conclusion that they are wasting their time, so they're pulling for you to be great.
2. You have the knowledge that your audience needs.
3. Your audience doesn't know you're nervous. And short of you collapsing in a shaking mass, they won't.
4. Visualize yourself, while preparing and particularly just before starting the presentation, as a calm, competent speaker ready to meet and exceed your audience's expectations.
5. Focus on the audience and what they need, not on yourself and how you're feeling. The more you can embrace the fact that it's not about you, it's all about them, the less nervous you will be.