Only Liars Say 'There Is No time to Rehearse the PowerPoint Presentation'

Deejay we love to rehearse our PowerPoint presentations.

It’s a great idea.

We endorse it completely.

Absolutely.

Next time there is no time now.

We didn’t finish the PowerPoint deck at 1:00 a.m. And now it’s a 8:00 a.m. presentation.

It’s now seven fifty five.

That’s something I hear constantly.

Guess what.

You’re lying to yourself if you tell yourself there’s no time to rehearse your PowerPoint presentation you’re just lying to yourself.

There’s always time for anything that’s important.

But here’s the real problem.

Human beings left to their own devices are going to procrastinate.

They’re going to want to avoid doing what’s unpleasant.

It’s much easier to sit at your desk or sit in a hotel room in front of a laptop type rearrange bullet points take e-mail from colleagues adding bullet points rearrange the font size change the color move the logo it feels productive feels like you’re working are boy I’m burning the midnight oil my boss is going to be impressed and yet it’s often a waste of time if you haven’t rehearsed your PowerPoint presentation you’re going in unprepared now how many of you would dictate an entire powerpoint presentation tell someone OK send it out as is email it to all of our clients customers prospects the media don’t spell check it edit it or review it you’re probably they’ll teach you that’s crazy I’d never do that if I did I’d be fired there’d be so many errors.

Well why would there be errors in it.

There’s errors because it’s your first draft you’re winging it you haven’t taken it through a review process.

Well guess what.

Your PowerPoint presentation the part people are will experience is you speaking.

So if you haven’t spoken in advance then you’re delivering your rough draft to the audience with rough drafts.

By definition or rough they’re usually garbage they’re bad.

The second third fourth draft.

Usually they’re much much better so that’s the real problem people have is they tell themselves they’re working hard by adding adding changing reviewing edit Change Review ad and they simply squeeze out time on the calendar to rehearse if you want to be an effective presenter at some point you’re gonna have to have some discipline.

Now I would urge you to do what some famous American political presidents who are great communicators do.

Ronald Reagan had a rule with his speech writing team really important speech like the State of the Union.

It’s got to be finished a week in advance because he rehearsed every day for a week and even did videotape rehearsals for a full day before a major speech maybe you don’t try to finish a week in advance but you could decide at least 24 hours preferably 48 hours in advance so that you now have time to actually rehearse refine get comfortable with it and get to the point where you can deliver it effectively.

If you decide you’re going to do it it will happen.

If you tell yourself that rehearsal is somehow a luxury but you’re going to keep getting input from people change this font size change this purple to a darker purple.

I’ve seen people practically changing their powerpoint as they’re walking up to the stage.

You’ll never ever ever have any time to rehearse if you just give yourself the option of infinite number of revisions and you don’t give yourself a deadline.

So my advice give yourself a deadline where unless an attorney says you’ve got to change that particular slider we all go to prison.

You’re not gonna change the slides anymore you’re going to focus your energies on practicing getting better and more comfortable delivering an interesting engaging way and you’re gonna be practicing on video.