How do you prepare?

Each speaker has her/his own way of preparing for a presentation. I thought it would be fun to hear how some of you prepare. I'll go first:

If it's a speech/keynote, I write out the whole presentation word for word. I work on it a couple of times over a week or so until I get sick of it. If it's an educational workshop, I start with an outline format.

Then about two weeks later, usually about two weeks before the event, I look at it again. More editing, then I take the thing down to an outline/bullet points. I refine some more, then forget about it again until right before the event. During this time, I also collect any props or visual aids I'll need. (This is not a PowerPoint presentation - that's a whole different process.)

About two days before the event, I rehearse the whole thing. I rehearse it three or four times in the last two days, then I'm done. Because the bullet points are there to trigger what's already in my head, it's not necessary to memorize it all.

I prepare the opening and closing carefully and practice those sections for maximum impact, but in order to keep things fresh and spontaneous, I don't practice the outlined sections too much.

How about you? You know I love comments, so come out of hiding and share your preparation ritual!

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Interview with Jeff Lowe from Microsoft

As I mentioned in my previous post, I attended a Microsoft event to demonstrate Vista and Office 2007 last Wednesday. I also mentioned that there was a technical snafu that caused the event to start a half hour late.

This seemed like the perfect opportunity to get the inside scoop from a professional speaker who travels around the country using and demonstrating technology as a core piece of his presentation. I interviewed Jeff Lowe, a Microsoft Solutions Specialist who gave the presentation, and asked him some questions about dealing with technology issues when traveling for speaking engagements.

Do you mind sharing the details of what happened yesterday at the MS presentation in Santa Barbara? It was mentioned that you left your laptop behind, and I'd like to know what steps were taken to get your presentation to you and new equipment hooked up. When did you realize you didn't have it, and what had to happen in order for the presentation to occur?

First all, in all my years of traveling for the technology industry yesterday was the first time I left home without my laptop. I have traveled since 1997. It just so happened that it was for the Santa Barbara event. So what you saw yesterday was the exception and not the norm. I just plain forgot it. Busy day with sick kids, errands, etc. was running late for the airport and failed to put it in my bag.

I realized that I didn’t have my laptop the night before when I got the airport. I picked up my bag and realized it was extremely light. I looked inside and no laptop. I called my wife to bring it to me but she could not make it to the airport in enough time.

After that, I called the guys from [the companies hosting the presentation in Santa Barbara], letting them know I would need a PC to lead the presentation. They had the proper PC and all I had to do was insert my portable hard drive.

The problem occurred when I wasn't allowed to test the laptop that was provided. I didn't insist that they let me check it, which I normally do. The laptop was an IBM widescreen model. The widescreen wasn't compatible with the type of projector provided by the hotel.

Widescreen can provide some big compatibility issues as it requires the projector to communicate at another level of frequency and screen resolution. Tip for presenters – be nice and insist on checking that the projector works with your computer, even if you have get a little testy with the technical folks.

What percentage of your presentations have some sort of snafu like this? What's the most common problem you run into on the road?

Very few of my presentations have snafus like this. Of all the events I have done in the last year, only two, the event yesterday and an event in Raleigh NC had this type of issue.

In Raleigh, we just pulled out another projector and got going right away. I have probably done about 50+ events since March of last year. So this makes the percentage fairly small, 4%. We also contract with a professional AV company that handles most of these things for us for certain events. This really minimizes the risk of yesterday's occurrence.

The most common problem I run into is old hardware, mostly projectors. A lot of places have older equipment. The newer laptops with high resolutions, wider screens and newer software expose the age of the equipment. Also, many of them aren't designed to support the new high resolution graphics capabilities that come with the latest and greatest graphics cards and operating system software.

If you look across 10 years and all the presentations I have ever done, the fraction would be less than 1% because of the 100's of presentations I have done without leaving my laptop at home.

What is your Plan B, Plan C, and so on for when things like this happen?

Plan B was when I arrived. I carry a back-up hard drive that has all the information and data I need to deliver a presentation. I installed all the back up information on the back up PC. Once the back up PC failed, I did the same with the next PC that was provided. Worse case scenario, there were 300 copies of the presentation already copied and ready to be passed out. We never got there.

Do you have any special tips, tricks or advice to offer other speakers when dealing with technology as part of their presentations - especially when traveling for speaking engagements?

The best thing is to NOT tell the crowd what started the problem. It was very unprofessional of the staff yesterday to say I was having a problem without first consulting me.

I always act like I know what I am doing even when things are going wrong. If you don’t have to tell the audience you are having problems, don't – they won't know the difference.

For example, a hard drive had crashed leaving me without a demonstration drive. I delivered the presentation as if everything was working fine. The audience didn't know the difference and thought I provided one of the best presentations they had ever seen.

Confidence is 90%. The last 10% is having all the pieces in place to execute as if it were plan A.

Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions, Jeff!

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Studio Friday: Quoted

This is a little different for me; I usually post my Studio Friday entries on my jewelry blog. But today's topic, "Quoted", seemed more fitting to the public speaking blog this time. And considering I'm usually late or forget altogether, here's my post a day early.

Here's the topic: "Quotes are so inspiring. They give us comfort in rough times or the push we need to overcome our obstacles or fears. They enlighten us and give clarity and "A-ha's". Some we keep around for a life time and let them guide us, others we forget about. We work with them maybe or pass them on to others."
~ Robyn

I've found some great quotes lately that have to do with being who you are and not worrying about what other people think. I guess this is an ongoing theme in my life.

I'm not generally a quote-keeper. I can't ever remember who said what or when, and I've never really had a quote stick with me long enough to make a huge impact. Here are some I've found worth keeping:

Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up. ~Pablo Picasso

I stopped worrying about what people would think about me, when I realized how seldom people think about anyone but themselves. ~Stephen Eggleston

And last, but not least, from "Say Anything":

Diane: "Nobody thought we'd do this. Nobody really thinks it's going to work, do they?"
Lloyd: "You’ve just described every great success story."

View more Studio Friday entries here.

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New research about PowerPoint titles

Cliff Atkinson shares on his Beyond Bullets blog that recent research shows better retention of material when slides are presented with a full sentence as the title rather than a word or short phrase.

An abstract of the journal article is here, and more information about this and related research is here.

If you'd like to explore how to make your PowerPoint presentations more effective, I recommend Cliff's book, Beyond Bullet Points.

I know I'm a bit of a broken record about this, but your PowerPoint should enhance your presentation, not be your presentation. The recent research just adds more support to the assertion that the default design settings in PowerPoint are not the most effective for communicating your message.

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Illustrating a point, connecting with the audience

I attended a presentation yesterday about Microsoft Vista and Office 2007. Jeff Lowe is a Microsoft representative who travels around the country speaking to groups about the company's products.

I hope to have an interview with him posted here soon (there was a classic technical snafu that I'm planning to write about), but for now I'd like to share a couple of Jeff's clever product demonstrations. Please note: I am not promoting Microsoft products in this post; this is about a speaker who happens to work for Microsoft. Please don't give me grief.

First was a video showing how a busy and fast-paced office can be run more efficiently using Microsoft products. A "Devil Wears Prada" mock movie is set at a magazine called "Couture", where split-second decisions and instant communications are facilitated by Microsoft products.

From the moment the "Miranda" editor character arrives in her car (an IM pops up on assistant "Andy's" screen to alert her) and the announcement "She's here!" goes out to every corner of the building, to the design meeting held by video conference, technology is essential to this well-oiled machine.

To those who have seen the movie, the scenes and story were familiar, with the addition of technology used to expedite what Microsoft calls "Unified Communication and Collaboration."

This was an entertaining and effective way of using a popular medium - movies - as part of a presentation to clearly demonstrate a point. This ingenious "movie" will stick with the attendees long after Jeff's PowerPoint presentation has evacuated our memories.

The second demonstration was more about connecting with the audience, cleverly using the technology to do so.

Jeff demonstrated PowerPoint's new features by opening a blank presentation. He titled his slide, "Santa Barbara Rocks." The second slide was titled, "Reasons Why SB is Cool." He asked for input from the audience about why Santa Barbara is cool, and added each answer to the slide as a bullet point. He then went on to show how the design tools in PowerPoint could change the look of his "Santa Barbara is Cool" presentation.

This works for two reasons. First, Jeff endears himself to the crowd by talking about how cool their town is. Who doesn't want to hear that? And second, he gets the audience involved by asking for input about a topic on which everyone is sure to have an opinion.

Sometimes a speaker can be too slick. When he talks about your town, you know he's said this a thousand times before at a thousand other venues. It feels insincere and fake.

It takes skill and practice as a speaker NOT to come across as slick and overly polished, but rather to be perceived as a "down-home" guy who seems like he could be your next-door neighbor. Jeff pulled this off and the crowd ate it up!

You may not have access to resources for filming a mock movie, but you can think creatively about how to get your point across in a way that is new and fresh and gives your audience something memorable to take away with them.

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Looking at the floor

I recently gave a keynote address to a roomful of Toastmasters. Knowing of the expertise in the room, I asked one of the event organizers for some feedback. She said, "Don't look at the floor when you're thinking."

Now that was some specific feedback. And you know what? I didn't even realize I was doing it! Usually I'm presenting a workshop or training, and working off of a page of notes in between group exercises and activities. I don't look at the floor because I'm busy interacting with my audience.

However, the keynote was different. All of my notes were in my head, and there was no flip-chart-writing or group discussion, so I was strictly the center of attention. While mentally working my way through the notes in my head, I would unconsciously look down at the floor while gathering my next thought.

But even if this person hadn't told me this, I would have discovered it anyway, because I videotaped myself. And sure enough, I could see myself looking down at the floor when I was transitioning to a new thought.

Do you videotape yourself when you're speaking? If not, you should. There are so many little quirks that we develop as speakers that we may not be aware of. Even the most seasoned pros have their little quirks. Before I found out about looking at the floor, I had recognized that I tend to hold my hands together in front of my body when I'm not gesturing, rather than letting them hang at my sides. Still working on this one!

Watching yourself on video may not be the easiest thing you've ever done, but it's an excellent tool for discovering your quirks, movements and vocal tics that may be distractions when you're presenting. Scott Ginsberg recommends watching your video at least three ways: at regular speed, muted and fast forward.

At regular speed, you can evaluate yourself at a leisurely pace, your voice, your movements, your interaction with the audience, and confirm which content worked and which didn't by noting audience reaction (and you're already doing this during your presentation, right?).

Watching the video muted allows you to focus on movement without the distraction of voice.

Watching on fast forward will magnify your movement flaws, especially the repetitive ones, so be prepared!

Before you give a presentation, find out if the organizers will be videotaping your talk. If not, bring your own camcorder or borrow one (with a tripod). You will learn so much about yourself as a speaker by viewing your presentations on video, and you get the opportunity to gain awareness of your own issues before someone else has to tell you!

What are your quirks as a speaker?

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Another client story

This isn't so much a story as an illustration. I'm working with a client who has described to me an "irrational fear" of public speaking. He has avoided it as much as possible throughout his entire career, including the years that he's been CEO of an international company. He is now having to speak more to represent his company, and came to me with two days to work on his public speaking before flying to Europe to present at a conference.

We discussed his concerns and the nature of his fear. Most of the fear stemmed from his own certainty that he's boring and that his presentation is no good. He wasn't concerned so much with the external approval of his audience as he was with his own perceptions and judgments of his abilities.

After our discussion, we taped his presentation; he had never seen himself on video. Unfortunately, the LCD projector (that cost a LOT of money to rent) didn't work, and he had to give his presentation to me sans PowerPoint, creating further discomfort. I gave him a few notes on what to look for in the video, and we parted ways. He watched the video later that evening.

His first comment to me when we met to follow up: "I'm not as bad as I thought I would be!"

He commented that he had been so fearful and judgmental of his skills that he was surprised to see that none of his flaws "seemed insurmountable." He wasn't exactly happy with the video, but realized that the problems could be fixed. We then followed up on the previous day's work, refining the details and process of the upcoming presentation.

I gave him a visualization exercise and asked him to keep that positive mindset as he visualized his successful presentation. I encouraged him to start actively replacing the negative thoughts with positive ones - instead of "I'm boring," and "No one will be interested," to say to himself, "People want me to succeed," and "I've got a lot of worthwhile things to say."

In my previous posts about the power of the mind (full article here), I've talked about the fact that many of our fears of public speaking (and other things) are based on thoughts that have little to no basis in reality. I will quote myself here: "If our mind is powerful enough to create fear from 'nothing,' it's also powerful enough to reframe our thoughts to propel us forward in a positive way."

As my client said, "Nothing is insurmountable!"

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My clients are so creative!

Have I told you how great my clients are? I get to work with some of the most creative, interesting people. They inspire me every day.

I just finished working with Tony, who was kind enough to give me a plug on his blog, and I will return the favor.

Tony is a pastor who uses video and PowerPoint to enhance his sermons. He has a great sense of humor that comes across in his words and in his visuals.

I would love to see more people really enjoy giving their presentations - really enjoy interacting with and building a relationship with their audience. Tony does this through humor and humility, and I imagine his congregation feels very connected with him because of his efforts. Tony was a "distance" client, so I reviewed his videotapes and PowerPoints and commmunicated with him by e-mail. He gives a pretty good overview of the process in this post.

A local client, Angela, is a therapist working on a conference presentation on treatment of eating disorders. She has a fabulous and fun idea for props to get the crowd engaged from the first second. I don't want to say too much, because when her presentation is complete, I hope to tell you the full details with pictures. We're still working it all out!

Angela believes in making her presentations fun and engaging - the fact that she speaks on a serious and life-threatening disorder doesn't change the fact that she needs to grab her audience's attention and keep it, as well as share her message of underlying causes and innovative treatment options.

I'm looking forward to sharing more client stories, so stay tuned!

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What can you convey in three minutes?

I read this article about San Bernardino County supervisors choosing to keep their three-minute public comment time limit during meetings.

My first thought was "Lucky!" (as Napoleon Dynamite would say). In some counties, speakers are given only two minutes.

Apparently, some county residents are unhappy with the three-minute rule.

Here's what I think about that: you can say anything you need to say in three minutes. With careful preparation and content that is concise, to the point, and mentions only the most critical points, anyone can speak effectively in three minutes.

Of course, if you go to a supervisors' meeting unprepared and/or intending to share in minute detail why you agree or disagree with an agenda item, you will be disappointed with the time limit.

Make your speech as effective and powerful as you can within the time limit - you can still get your message across, and you will stand out from the other community members who ramble on with no point and run out of time. You will be heard and understood, and that's the biggest reward of public speaking!

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Me and him, him and I

In the same vein as my post "A is a letter," I'd like to talk about the confusion around subjects and objects.

Specifically, when someone is talking about herself and another person as the objects of a sentence, there is confusion about whether to refer to herself as "I" or "me".

We all learned in grade school that the proper way to refer to oneself and another person is to say "she and I."

That is, it's proper when "she" and "I" are the subjects of the sentence, as in "She and I spiked the lemonade at the party." This works because "She spiked the lemonade" and "I spiked the lemonade" both work independently.

"He," "she," "I," and "we," are all subject pronouns - they are the actors in a sentence - the "do-ers" and "be-ers" (according to the Guide to Grammar & Writing). These pronouns change, however, when they become the objects of a sentence.

Object pronouns become "him," "her," "me," "them" and "us" - and a few others. Things happen TO and FOR the object pronouns.

"She and I spiked the lemonade for them."

Here's where the problem comes in - speakers do this all the time. They use "I" instead of "me" as the object pronoun, thinking it's more "proper".

Example: "She spiked the lemonade for Max and I." If you split that sentence up and say, "She spiked the lemonade for Max," and "She spiked the lemonade for I," you see that it doesn't make sense. It should be "She spiked the lemonade for me and Max." (Also, "She spiked the lemonade for us" works here, but not "She spiked the lemonade for we.")

I've heard people say, for example, "Please leave your business card with Janet or I." If you split up the objects, again you see that "leave your business card with Janet" makes sense, but "leave your business card with I" does not! "Please leave your business card with me or Janet" is the way to go.

If you find yourself confused about this rule, split up the two objects of the sentence and see if each one makes sense independently.

And, in addition to the site mentioned above, this site has some good grammar resources if you're unsure of yourself: The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation.

You can spend all the time in the world polishing and practicing your presentation, but as I said in the previous post, you will lose credibility as an expert if your grammar is not up to par.

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Two takes on evaluations

I read two posts within two days of each other on speaker evaluations.

Ross Bowring suggests that written evaluations give speakers valuable feedback, especially when you offer your audience specific and targeted questions. He says, "It makes your audience member feel important as well as letting them know that you care what they think."

Scott Ginsberg thinks it's too easy to dwell on the 10% who have negative comments vs. the 90% who have positive comments. He says, "I used to waste my time with speaker evaluations. (Gosh, what a waste of paper.)"

His final comments on the subject:

"1. Don't try to convert the atheists.
2. Unless the majority says you suck, you probably didn't suck.
3. Screw the 10. Stick with the 90."

I fall somewhere in the middle here. Do I care what the audience thinks? Well, I do want to give them something of value, because what's the point of being there if I don't? So, in that sense, yes. I do care what they think. I want the audience to walk away fired up about public speaking and ready to give it a go - and ready to apply real-life examples that I've given them.

Do I feel the need to change my style, or my speaking philosophy because a few people think what I'm doing is "wrong", or that I'm not following the "rules"? No way! Feedback can be useful, but it can also drag you down into self-doubt and insecurity. And, as Scott mentioned above, even the most overwhelmingly positive audience response can be reduced to the opinion of one negative person. 90/10 rule? How about 99/1 rule?!

If you choose to use evaluations, it's important to distinguish between constructive feedback that you hear over and over, or from many people, and negative feedback from one or two people who just don't like the way you do things. Nothing you do is going to change their minds, so why bother worrying about it?

"Don't let individuality get you down!" I wrote this to myself in my journal my freshman year of college and I still stand by it today (along with some of my other New Year's resolutions that year: "guard against frivolous spending" and "finish what I start.") Good advice all around!

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Protect your voice this winter

Ellen Dunnigan has written an excellent article on how to protect your voice when the weather turns cold and dry. If you're someone who does a lot of speaking or singing, read this article - it will save your voice!

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Make the most of your toast. . .

The Santa Barbara News-Press "Weddings" magazine is online now. To find my article "Making the Most of Your Toast", go here and click over to page 7.

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PowerTalk - public speaking extravaganza!

If you're ever in town during the weekend of PowerTalk, I highly recommend attending. This conference was chock-full of excellent speakers providing FREE training on various aspects of public speaking.

The sessions I attended were "Conquering the Fear of Public Speaking," presented by Grace Rachow, "PowerPoint Dos and Don'ts" by Frank Newton (and you know how I feel about PowerPoint), and "Audience Grabbers! Get Their Attention From the Start," presented by Keith Connes.

Each presenter brought her/his own unique style to the sessions as well as useful and practical content.

Grace has a natural and relaxed manner, working lots of audience interaction and dry humor into her presentation. She introduced an effective exercise for relaxing your body before a presentation, a very simple eyes-closed clenching and unclenching of the hands and/or feet that can be done anywhere while you're waiting in the wings to give your presentation.

Frank has an understated and gentle presentation style and voice, with a sly sense of humor that does not overpower his message. His approach to PowerPoint was in alignment with mine, so of course, he was brilliant. :-) The key point of Frank's presentation: brevity. The other key point: check your equipment before you begin! Mentioned twice for emphasis! He made the concept of PowerPoint simplicity easy to understand and appreciate.

Keith Connes brought a silly touch to his presentation that was perfectly in line with his topic of audience grabbers. At one point, he gave an example of a previous presentation of a tall tale, and as he spoke, he donned water wings and a rubber duckie to illustrate the ridiculous nature of the story. As I listened to his presentation, I reprimanded myself for deciding against bringing my angst-filled teen journals to illustrate part of my keynote. Oh well, next time! Keith's guidance on how to use humor, props, and surprise in a presentation was well-demonstrated. He joked about having written his speech right before it was delivered, and if this is true, he's my new hero!

I think this conference would be especially beneficial to people who are beginning to intermediate speakers, but I believe even the advanced speakers in the room benefited from all the workshops. I know I did.

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Speaking of PowerPoint. . .

After writing this post about bad PowerPoint, I read Seth Godin's post about really bad PowerPoint. Enjoy.

By the way, I'm speaking at a conference this summer where all the presenters are required to use PowerPoint. This seems like a bad idea, but it's an even worse idea when the presenters are not professional speakers. It's a trade show in the food industry and, while these people know their stuff about their industry, many of them are not seasoned presenters.

I don't know why this conference requires PowerPoint (maybe I should ask). Maybe it's because of the size of the room and the number of attendees. Perhaps they fear smaller visuals like flip charts getting lost in the space.

Whatever the reason, it's dangerous to require speakers to use a medium that most are probably not comfortable with. I expect lots of bullet points, dense paragraphs of text, and obscure charts and tables.

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Women in Charge, Part III - Maureen Kelly

My favorite speaker of the day was Maureen Kelly, founder of Tarte Cosmetics, and winner of the 2006 Woman of the Year award, given during the luncheon.

Not only is Maureen a role model in business for her vision, frugality, persistence, life balance, and philanthropy, but she is a charming and candid speaker. The best kind, in my opinion!

When she received her award, she spoke for a few minutes about her business' early days (making products in her one-bedroom apartment - a lot of us know what that's like!) and her current achievements (sales of $15 million in 2006). She also took questions from the floor.

She is the kind of speaker whose enthusiasm and energy is contagious, and her honesty, humor, easy smile and authenticity were refreshing. And I'm a sucker for any speaker who remembers to repeat back the questions from the audience!

Her key message: "Make yourself matter." She certainly knows how.

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Women in Charge, Part II

I attended a couple of useful seminars (and one not so useful, with a speaker whose monotone was just slightly less boring than her topic). I don't want to name names here, but while most of the speakers were experienced and had most of the right skills, I found some key elements of an effective presentation missing.

There was some great information conveyed, and I gained some new ideas for my business. But I can't help watching a presentation and imagining how it could be improved. People pay me to do this. :-)

Let's start with PowerPoint. Two of the three speakers I saw used PowerPoint presentations. And both of those PowerPoints were riddled with bullets and numbingly sleep-inducing. One had text so small that I couldn't have read it even if I were in the front of the room, but since I was in the BACK of the room, it looked like tiny ants on the screen. The other had so much text that I didn't bother trying to read it. I hope I didn't miss something important.

One of the PowerPoints used a background with a color gradation that caused the text to disappear into parts of it on some slides. One had the company logo on every single slide. Are people so afraid you're going to forget the name of their company? It was distracting, felt like an advertisement, and took away from the message that I believe the speaker was trying to convey.

At this point in my post, I would like to direct you to the book "Beyond Bullet Points," by Cliff Atkinson. If you find that you are creating PowerPoint presentations like the ones mentioned above, I strongly encourage you to read this book. It will give you a fresh new approach to presentations. It's a somewhat strenuous exercise to create the initial story template, but it will be worth it when you see what a superior presentation this allows you to build.

Better yet, give me a call (especially if you're a technophobe) and I will personally work with you to develop a more effective PowerPoint presentation.

Moving on. . .

I found that, while each speaker had a full hour and a half for her session, rarely did anyone take the opportunity to make her session interactive.

Speakers could have broken us into smaller groups for some discussion. Speakers could have invited sharing of personal experiences with the topic throughout the presentation. At minimum, they could have asked us what we already knew, so as not to repeat information that was basic or common knowledge.

I have a pet peeve about speakers who lecture rather than interact or converse. I believe that some speakers think that, because they're the expert, there's nothing they can learn from their audience. That is just so wrong! And it's the absolute best way to alienate your audience and prevent their learning.

Lots of good info at the conference. I just wish the speakers had been better trained.

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Women in Charge conference

As I mentioned in the previous post, I attended the Women in Charge conference this past week.

It's such a pleasure to be surrounded by fellow women entrepreneurs: strong, confident women going out and getting what they want out of life. It was truly a "charged" environment.

The keynote speaker was Kim Kiyosaki, author of "Rich Woman" (and yes, wife of Robert Kiyosaki, author of "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" - quite a dynasty going on there!).

It's always hard to envision successful people as having struggled. Even when I know their stories, it takes some work to imagine that they were once like me, doing what they had to do to get by.

The Kiyosakis' struggle included a period of time when she and her husband were homeless and living in their car. Wow. That's the kind of story that makes me think, "If they can do it, so can I!" And that was the intention of the story - and the keynote.

Kim stated at the beginning of her speech that in 2003 more women declared bankruptcy than graduated from college. I don't know how many women graduated from college in 2003, but I bet it was a lot. She promotes financial self-sufficiency for women, and I can use more than a few of her tips.

I think my favorite story was the one about asking a friend with a car wash if they could try selling 18 copies of "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" (when first self-published) in his shop. You might think that selling books at a car wash makes no sense, but it was a strategy that panned out and set them on their path to eventual success.

A key message from her speech was "Make a lot of mistakes, so you can learn from them." The more mistakes the better, according to Kim. It's very freeing to give yourself permission to make mistakes, especially when you are running your own business and there's no one else to blame when things go wrong.

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On The Everything Page you'll find everything you need to build visibility, credibility and influence through engaging presentations that move your participants into action: freebies, low-cost products and courses, and 1:1 coaching!

Busy week

Whew!

Sorry I haven't been around much. In the middle of the week, I went out of town to a great conference for women entrepreneurs, sponsored by Entrepreneur magazine and American Express.

The highlight of the day was the opportunity to pitch my business to an editor of Entrepreneur magazine - for five minutes! Talk about a concise presentation. It was a little frustrating that we didn't get pitching guidelines until we were lined up in front of the room - maybe sending out something by e-mail would have allowed people to prepare better.

Still, I love nothing more than to talk about my business and how public speaking training benefits just about everyone, so you have to imagine that the pitch was not too scary for me. I did spend more hours than I will admit to working on my press kit, and that took up the early part of the week.

Today, I had the great honor of giving the keynote address, as well as presenting a seminar, at the annual PowerTalk conference, hosted by Toastmaster Clubs and Santa Barbara City College. I had been working on this keynote for months, but as I like to save the serious prep for the last day or two (want to keep things fresh!), I didn't get down to the nitty gritty until this week. And I didn't really finish the keynote and give it some serious rehearsal time until after I came back from the conference - Thursday/Friday.

So it's been a fabulous and exhausting week. I enjoyed meeting so many new people and sharing the love of public speaking! More on both of these events in posts to follow.

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On The Everything Page you'll find everything you need to build visibility, credibility and influence through engaging presentations that move your participants into action: freebies, low-cost products and courses, and 1:1 coaching!