JOHN ROCKLEY

In a recent and completely fictional survey 98% of all business people said that they would prefer to have their eye-lids stapled to their desk rather than give a presentation, and in the same fictional survey, that I just made up, 97% of fictional respondents said that they would sell their hair to a rogue wig making syndicate for the ability to present just a little bit better. I think you’ll agree that those entirely fictional figures are quite startling. The thing is, you

It's every presenters stickiest moment; the 'any questions' when people start to ask the things you don't know how to answer. I was training one senior manager who asked me "why don't people ever ask about my presentation?" and the answer is simple; if you've prepared properly they won't need to ask questions. The problem then becomes one of answering ancillary questions, and they weren't ready for those. A good presentation should cover the subject well enough to not need qu

I have a friend who has a problem... It's not me, and it's not that sort of 'problem'. She's been asked to present at a popular business breakfast meeting. She's been asked to present for 40 minutes including Q&A. She's been told that there is no room for a screen and therefore there won't be any slides. No slides... Many of us who present or train regularly rely on our slides. We only present without slides when the technology fails. My most recent technical failure happened

You walk up to the dais, you know why you’re there; you’re there to give a presentation. You’ve edited, pared down and you’ve prepared and prepared and prepared. You know what you’re going to say and you say it… And yet, everyone still looks bored. How can this be? Do you lack charisma? Is there something about you that’s just dull? No, you’ve made one of the most common mistakes in presentation; you forgot to think about the audience. Why are the audience there? Here are a f

I am British, I don’t know the name of the person who lives next door, I don’t like to be touched, I am reserved and polite. I have been introduced to people on my first day at work, forgotten their name, and been too British to ask again. When I left that job, I still wasn’t sure what their names were. However, one thing that sets me apart from most of the British is that I’m really good at eye contact. When someone is speaking I look them in the eye and I listen, when I’m t

In 2005 a poll was conducted and its results stated that the top 5 fears in America were Terrorist Attacks, Spiders, Death, Failure and War. Unless your latest intern is a psychotic extremist arachnid, with access to weapons grade plutonium, and a working knowledge of the geopolitical situation, you’re not going to see these things at work. You ARE going to have to deal with the fear of failure, especially when doing something you haven’t been trained to do – Presenting. Most