Ok, so it’s the first actual real time I spoke at a conference. I’ve lead round tables before but being responsible for an actual session was a first for me. Here is what I learned:
There is no such thing as being over prepared. I was ready and it showed.
If the session is 1 hour and 15 minutes assume it is going to start late and people will want it to end early. I had about 1 hour of material which turned out to be an hour and 5 minutes during my run through. People asked questions during the session which was great but it knocked me off of my time. I am glad they felt comfortable asking so I must have been approachable so from now on I will only have about 50 minutes of material for an hour and 15 minutes.
Power Point is a great tool and Presentation View is wonderful. It was great seeing my notes on the monitor while everyone saw the slides. The timer and time of day was fantastic. Way to go Microsoft!
Printing and binding my slides allowed me to walk around the room with my notes in hand and the remote control for my laptop allowed me to change the slides from anywhere in the room.
Practicing the presentation out loud helps with timing.
Simple slides allowed me to control how much or how little I needed to talk given the time constraints.
I need to practice my timing more the next time.
My church voice carries so my regular voice was plenty powerful to speak without a microphone.
A good night sleep and no distractions in the morning helped me feel prepared.
And last, the thing I learned that I will carry forward always: I love speaking and hope to have more opportunities to do it and have fun with it.
Until next time!
Jude Russo Caserta
AthleticBudgetCoach.com/blog
Twitter: JudeCaserta Linkedin: Jude Russo Caserta
E-mail: judi_caserta@athleticbudgetcoach.com
