Don’t Let a Bully Ruin Your Presentation

By The Newman Group Inc. — 1 comment

If you make a lot of presentations, you’re lucky if you haven’t already encountered a bully in the audience. That’s the know-it-all who interrupts your presentation whenever s/he feels like it or challenges your authority in the Q&A.

It might happen to you one day, and you’ll need to take off your “white gloves” and be prepared to regain control – in a nice way, of course. You don’t want to make your audience even more uncomfortable by getting into a shouting match with the bully.

Defining a Bully

A bully is someone who is grandstanding to show that s/he knows more than you do. Don’t let a bully unnerve you and remember the organization invited you to speak and people came to hear what you have to say

A bully can suck the air out of the room and create a lot of unnecessary tension. It’s up to the speaker …Read more…

Bully in the audience, Presentation Skills

How to Make a Presentation When the Equipment Fails !%!!#!

By The Newman Group, Inc. — Leave a comment


Remember that sick feeling you had as a kid when the teacher said, “Be prepared for a test tomorrow.” You hadn’t even opened the textbook yet!

That’s how it feels when you’re about to make a presentation and your laptop freezes or something equally awful happens.

Be Prepared

When you’re scheduled to present, be prepared. You don’t want to experience that sick feeling again when something goes wrong. Make a checklist of what you need to be at your best.

Being prepared saved the day recently …Read more…

Presentation disaster, Presentation Skills

Don’t Faint When You Flub a Presentation – Laugh at Yourself

By The Newman Group Inc. — Leave a comment

No doubt presentation training will help you to improve your delivery when you’re in front of an audience. But you’re only human, so sometimes things can go wrong – very wrong.

If that ever happens, laughing at yourself can be the best medicine.

Turn Off Your Microphone

Unless you’re made of stone, you will be nervous before a presentation. We advise clients to use the restroom just before speaking but be sure to turn off their wireless microphones. One of our clients took the first piece of advice but forgot the second and 200 people heard him in the restroom. …Read more…

Presentation Skills

Are You Using the Wrong Fork? A Business Primer on Table Manners and Etiquette

By The Newman Group Inc. — Leave a comment

Client lunches, dinners and holiday parties are trying enough – but you can really embarrass yourself with poor table manners and etiquette.

This is more important than you think. Do you enjoy watching someone talk and eat at the same time? Would you want to be on the receiving end of a hard-sell pitch over dinner with someone who chews with his mouth open?

What Goes Where?

Elegant place setting

What Goes Where?

We’re assuming that you’re not eating at a coffee shop/diner, where they require you to keep your one fork and one knife for each course. These tips are for the restaurants where you sit down to a lineup of knives and forks of varying shapes and sizes surrounding your plate – not to mention, is that a wine or water glass?

We often get called in by major organizations to coach executives on their table manners, as well as what they say over dinner. …Read more…

Presentation Skills, Table Manners and Etiquette
 
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