Either you are a business or academic presenter, presentation is always crucial. Sometimes, a good presentation can help you to capture big projects i.e. earning as well as sometimes good research presentations can create a good impression on the capacity of the person. And these expectations often create extra pressure on our body and mind, which leads to stress before and during a presentation.
Crashing the stress of presentation is not easy. It is as tough as breaking the steel bar by bare hand. But believe me, following the next steps can help you to reduce the stresses of presentation.
1. Study your audience
You should know who will keep an eye on your presentation. Moreover, you should know how much this presentation worth to you and your audience. Try to know the skills your audience has on the presentation topic. If they are very skilled, like a professor, try to know their strengths and weakness. This will help you to sort what you should say and what not. If they are not so skilled, try to deliver in such a way that satisfies the mind.
When you will get a brief idea about your audience, it will relieve you from the stresses of not knowing your audience. Presenters often feel stress to talk in front of a large gathering. A short but effective research on audience type, audience headcount can help to know your surroundings and will keep you mentally fit for the presentation day.
2. List of Probable Questions
Make a list!! Yes, we often think in our minds and forget about the next moment. So, it is better to make a list of questions you may face. This will help you to know in the depth of that topic and will help you manage the stress during the question-answering session. You can collect such questions from many sources. You can find a related forum or you can also use Quora.
Having a list of questions will boost your confidence and will help you to be mentally strong to face the questions.
3. Start in an Unconventional Way
Everyone says, Good morning/evening/afternoon or I am happy to be here, etc. Why start in a way that everyone knows? If it's a friendly environment, there is no reason to make the environment gloomy. For example, you can start like this- I am not feeling good coming here because I am a bit nervous. This will make your audience laugh and will ease the environment. This easy environment will relieve you from extra stress. But do not try this method on very academic or very formal presentation.
4. Proper Planning
Without planning no one can cross the hurdles. As you feel stresses during the presentation, you should have a mindblowing plan. You should know about what topic and what details are you going to focus on in front of your audience so that you can grab their mind. These details can be known only through proper planning.
There are various ways you can plan your presentation. For example, taking short notes, writing some descriptions in PowerPoint speaker view, or using any mind mapping software.
If you have proper planning, you will be sure that you are not missing any key info and as a result, you will feel nervous during the presentation.
5. Take Short Breaks but Deep breaths
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