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Nemi 6 days ago

These are all great tips, and mirror my admittedly few attempts at public speaking. But one thing that really must be internalized is that, for an hour presentation, you should spend many many hours preparing. If you do this, you will be engaging, cool and calm, and can easily add in humor. Without the preparation you will be stressed and your audience will be bored, or worse, embarrassed for you.

parpfish 6 days ago | parent [-]

i've found that something even better than excessive preparation (excessive prep is great -- specially pay attention to transitions and segues!) is letting yourself be honest about the content.

my most stressful talks were the times i was early in my career and i had to present the results from some analysis or experiment that i knew was kind of weak or relied on some iffy assumptions. i felt like i had to blow everybody away and i was always dreading some sharp-eyed audience member asking a pointed question that would make the whole thing blow up. my imposter syndrome didn't help, but i felt like i was some sort of slick salesman that had a pull a con and then sneak out without getting caught.

instead, be willing to say i don't know. be upfront with things that make you uneasy. it disarms your sharpest critics and makes it less about an antagonistic you-vs-the-audience and turns it into more of a collaborative you-working-with-the-audience.

hodgesrm 6 days ago | parent [-]

> i've found that something even better than excessive preparation ... is letting yourself be honest about the content.

This is so true. It's a lemma to the famous quote "Always tell the truth; it's the easiest thing to remember." [0]

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/7711.David_Mamet