How to Give a Pretty Good Presentation: A Speaking Survival Guide for the Rest of Us

Chapter 12. Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don't

SHOULD I READ OR MEMORIZE MY PRESENTATION?

Reading a presentation versus memorizing a presentation—talk about a scenario where you are damned if you do and damned if you don't! Both options are horrible.

Let's take a look at the reading option. At first blush, reading seems easy. After all, you've been reading your whole life. If you get nervous, all of your words are in front of you, so it seems like this is the safest route, right? Wrong!

Reading a presentation in front of people is the absolute dumbest thing you could ever do if your goal is to give a pretty good presentation because, unless you have been a news anchor and reading a script for three hours a day for the last 20 years, you are going to be terrible. Why? When you read, you break your eye contact with your audience; you become flat, monotone, and boring; and you speak at the same speed.

Please keep in mind that reading a speech is really hard work. Even a master like former President Ronald Reagan would practice his State of the Union speech three hours a night for a week, and then still spend an entire day doing videotaped rehearsal, all so he didn't seem like he was reading a speech! I really don't think you want to spend the time it takes to get good at reading a speech. And if you don't spend all of that time, you will be awful and fall way short of your goal of being pretty good. So what's the next option?

You could try to memorize your speech. Yea, right. In case ...