Murphy's Law states: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong." This is especially true and especially painful when there is an audience involved.
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Gub doo gia bee? (Language Log)
[This post is chock full of all sorts of wonderful things going wrong during a series of presentations at an academic conference. This brief passage represents just a sliver of a very entertaining story]
And the other problem was that, impelled by some irresistible psychological imperative (I saw this later with several other speakers), he instinctively pointed the remote projection controller at the screen, desperately trying to get it to respond. But the computer he should have been pointing the remote at was ten or fifteen yards away on a table in a totally different direction. It was just too counterintuitive to turn 180 degrees away from the screen, so his back was toward it, in order to change the screen image. We humans are simple mammals, and we imagine that what we are focusing on is where the action is. So his clicking away with the remote was not being detected by the computer, and even if it had been detected, he would have had no idea whether anything had happened to the screen as a result.
Presentation Tip: First Impressions Matter (Professionally Speaking…)
Be prepared, with AV equipment checked, handouts sorted and slides ready. If you seem disorganized and rattled over logistics, your audience may assume that your presentation will be equally disorganized.
How to recognize someone for their service to an organization when they can’t be present in person (Conferences That Work)
- A week before the event, Nancy and I set up a test call with me calling from the laptop I would be using at the conference. It was good we did this, because it took a while to get Nancy’s camera working. We arranged for her to start Skype when she arrived at work, thirty minutes before we would start the recognition ceremony.
…
- About twenty minutes before the call, Nancy was not showing up as connected on Skype. I called her from my cell and she assured me Skype was running. I restarted Skype on my machine & this time she appeared. Phew! During the next few minutes, I muted our audio while the audience assembled.
 MUST READ: MPA Political, LLCÂ — Unconventional Wisdom: Events
As I looked back on 2010 and saw the great big failures, they troubled me. Messaging failures, generally unprepared or unqualified campaign staff, candidates unwilling to learn, listen and/or improve, and of course strategies that were designed to fail from the start… But then there was a feeling of downright anger. How the hell can Democratic campaigns fail so often at the very basics of setting up an event? Does no one teach this stuff anymore? Do people not learn from event to event? Do they not see the big greasy piles of fail due to some form of rose colored glasses?
. . .
You should visit and walk the venue, take pictures. Think about where attendees with enter, where they will gather, will there be food/drinks somewhere drawing the mingling crowd? How many chairs will there be, how will they be arranged, where will the walkways be? Are there tables? Sketch these things out as best you can.
Where will the candidate enter the room? Will the candidate have access to a “green roomâ€, or a restroom, prior to entering the venue? When they enter, will they be overwhelmed with the crowd as they enter? Who will walk the candidate in, meet the candidate at the car/bus? Will someone be introducing the candidate to the attendees as they mingle? Will the candidate be going straight to the “stage†upon entering to speak, and straight out after speaking? How will they enter and exit?
The Eloquent Woman — 5 things speakers should ask the meeting planner
Identify room setup. You should ask questions about the room setup, for instance, will you will be behind a podium, or on a panel? If on a panel, will there be seating behind a table or in separate chairs? If chairs, what kind? This may sound rather anal; however, I’ve seen many presenters on panels who did not know they would be sitting in director’s chairs. If you’re a female in a skirt that happens to be too short or doesn’t easily move when you sit down, this could be rather uncomfortable and potentially give the audience a bit too much to see. Or if your preference is to appear behind a podium and organizers expect you to roam the stage in delivering your remarks, it’s probably best to know that before you arrive.
To allow AV or No AV…that’s an important question. Have you ever showed up with PowerPoint in hand only to learn that there’s no equipment for such use? It may happen more often than you think. Finding out the overall format of the presentation is critical as well as allowances for audio visual equipment, including internet access. Sometimes lack of AV could be a budgetary consideration. At other times, it simply may not suit the program. Make sure to ask about it.
The Official join.me Blog — Darth Vader Was Not Invited To The Conference Call
Your dog is not invited.
Sure, I like dogs. Who doesn’t? But we did not invite your dog to the conference call. So if you’re taking this call from home, then make sure your dog isn’t in the room. Because dogs are unpredictable, and before you know it they are barking and the call is ruined. Don’t make your dog my problem.
 Ellen Finkelstein — Outstanding Presentations Workshop
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Phil Presents — Presentation Pitfalls #7: Slide synch (or lack of)
While the speaker was fiddling with his envelope, someone else advanced the slides too quickly, and revealed the winner’s name to all but the speaker before the envelope had even been opened. Doh! Not only did this make the speaker look silly, it made everyone think less of the organization of the event, both for the Powerpoint slip-up and for even using ceremonial envelopes when the winners were already on the slides.
Webinar Crusher — What If I Screw Up A Live Webinar And How Do I Recover?
If you think that your first webinar is going to run perfectly, you’re wrong. If you think that your first 20 webinars are going to run without any problems, you’re also wrong. Things are going to happen. Maybe your Internet connection will die or Go To Webinar will not display your screen correctly. Maybe your PowerPoint won’t show up or you will lose your PowerPoint. You might be all ready to demonstrate a site for your viewers only to find out that the site is down for maintenance.
Instead of crossing your fingers, hoping nothing will ever go wrong, no, that things will go wrong. When these things do go wrong, what do you do? Always have some kind of a backup plan.
No Sweat Presentations! — When You Speak, Don’t Jingle or Deliver Other Distractions!
Other personal distractions could have to do with your appearance
- A stained shirt or jacket
- Food on your face or in your teeth (I’m not kidding.)
- Too flashy jewelry that sparkles too much.
- Outrageous clothing that ’sends its own message’
There are some preventative measures that can be taken to avoid delivering distractions.
- Empty your pockets before speaking. No coins or keys = No Jingle!
- Have a friend in the audience quietly ’signal’ you if you start swaying or rocking.
- Put a Post Note on the lectern or on top of your notes or mind map with a reminder
- Get a good night’s sleep the night before a presentation.
- Practice – Practice – Practice
- In front of a mirror.
- In front of friends and family.
- In front of a camera.
- Look in a full length mirror before coming to the lectern.
- Check:
- Clothing – zippers, buttons, for lint & hair
- Self – hair, face
 GIZMODO: Blue Screen of Death Strikes Bird’s Nest During Opening Ceremonies Torch Lighting.
Perform Marketing Solutions: The audience doesn’t care about you — “At an important presentation, the wireless microphone’s batteries go ‘flat’ & you wait for ages while the technical crew looks for new batteries. The laptop doesn’t open the Powerpoint presentation; the speaker arrives late; a guitar string breaks right in the middle of a solo. What do all of these have in common? Who cares?! The audience doesn’t care what caused the problem, they don’t care that it can’t be helped, they don’t have empathy for you at all, ever.”
USA Today: Chilly rooms anger people at conferences, social events — “If two or three weeks later they’re still thinking about the temperature, then that’s an issue.” He hates cold rooms. It’s so frustrating “to plan a fabulous program, with a speaker you paid $100,000 for, and all you hear from people leaving is ‘Brrr, it was freezing in there!’ ” (via face2face).
Manage Smarter: Conference Call Cacophony: Top Five Mistakes –“Your training teleconference is going great, until you hear the screaming baby in the background, and the static of a bad connection sets in.”
My Toastmasters Blog: Epic Failure: How to Not Connect with the Audience — “Yesterday I sat though an hour long presentation. Today, I cannot recall any of the main points. I can’t remember anything because the speaker did not care enough about the material to connect with the audience and make a point. Epic Failure for a presenter.”
joeyhagedorn.com: Home-built Blu-Ray Laser Pointer — “In a completely dark room it is even possible to see the beam in air…” You definitely don’t want to give one of these to one of the Jedi Knights I wrote about last week.
Businesss Presentations: Unhitch the Technical Glitch — A teleseminar goes wrong. Five suggestions for dealing.
PittWatch:Video Clip of Brad Pitt on Idol Gives Back — Skip to about 0:50 to catch the stage manager’s amazing grace under pressure as she deals with Brad’s microphone malfunction.
Six Minutes: Stop Rehearsing! 3 Critical Things to Do Before Your Speech — Activity 1, “Study the Venue Logistics”, covers some especially important stuff.
..ALex’s Site: Award presentation Mistake — Whoops. (video)
gathering: stuck at registration? — “What do you do as a meeting planner when you’re the only staff member onsite and you get stuck at the registration desk?”
The Sisyphus Chronicles: The Room that Eats Speakers — Looks at ways that a room’s layout can inhibit the speaker’s ability to connect with an audience.
The Projector Blog: 3 Projector Rental Tips — “There are a few things to keep in mind when renting a projector.”
World of Chig: The Show Must Go On — “…if that had happened in an office, you wouldn’t expect the employee to carry on working.” I’m thinking it might have been best to call it a night.
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