What are the Top 5 mistakes that cause people to walk out, ask for their money back, send letters of complaint, and in other ways torpedo your speaking, presenting and training efforts?
Over the years, I've asked audiences for their list of deadly sins that cause them to tune out the presentations that they have attended. Here are the top five that have come up repeatedly:
1. Appearing Unprepared - This does not mean that you are unprepared; it simply means that you seem to be.
2. Starting Late - Whether everyone is there or not, start on time. Otherwise, we penalize those who are on time and reward those that are late.
3. Handling Questions Improperly - This means putting off question, perhaps abruptly, by saying something like : I'll be covering that in a little while. Please wait until then." Or combining questions and deciding to give one answer to two slightly different question.
4. Apologizing for Yourself or the Organization - If there is a problem, in all likelihood 80% of your participants will not be aware of it. Take care of the people for whom there is a problem on an individual basis.
5. Being unfamiliar with Knowable Information - Example of this would be not knowing the names of the key executives who are sitting in on an executive briefing or not knowing the name of the organization to which you are making your presentation. I am sure most of you will see this coming, I once heard someone say "I really appreciate being invited to make this presentation to the American Society for Training Directors." Yep, you guessed it was supposed to be American Society for Training and Development.
