Sometimes people come to me, and I ask them, well, what is your goal in this particular presentation? And they say something like, well, I just have to present, this was a task from the boss. This is just a formality, is just to give an update. And this indicates to me that they don't really have a desire to present. They don't have a goal, they don't want to present. And so, what if you don't want to present? As far as I'm concerned, declining is an option. I actually sometimes try to convince my client to decline this great honor of presenting. If you don't have a goal, if you have nothing to say, what happens if you don't present? What would the audience lose as a result of your refusal to share your wisdom with them? This thing number 1 and thing number 2, I always try to find another motivation with my client. Suppose you're a student, and you've been asked to do a presentation about tobacco smoking. Of course, tobacco smoking is very bad, but a presentation about tobacco smoking is somewhat neutral, it's an informational presentation. You don't want anything from the audience. So okay, here's the goal, to inform about the dangers of smoking. Is it interesting? Well, I don't know, probably not. Probably the audience already knows everything they need to know about the dangers of smoking. [LAUGH] But they smoke anyway! Maybe, here's another goal, maybe you can just do a bit of stand-up comedy about smoking, to entertain the audience with jokes and funny anecdotes about smoking. And they will probably love you as a result, but will you accomplish any goals? And I would argue that to help someone quit smoking is a very ambitious and probably unachievable goal. Very few people quit smoking as a result of people on stage asking them to quit. But still, I would suggest to set this goal for yourself, actually set out to help someone to quit. Give them some valuable piece of advice, give them something, try to be helpful. This is a much better solution than to just informing people that this is bad and this is good. Another example, what is if you have to do a end-of-project report? What if you have to come out and talk about this wonderful project that you did? And of course, many people start with a goal which is formulated like this, to just report about the job done. But maybe there's another way to do it. What if you set out to impress the audience with your achievements? And to me, this is a much better idea, at least you want something, you want to impress. But what if you not only want to impress, but to get some praise that you think you deserve? And this is an active goal, and this, I think, is something worth achieving. But of course, a much better goal would be a shared goal. Okay, you want praise for yourself, but what's in there for the audience? And a much better goal in this situation would be to help others. To use your insights, something you've learned during the project. Something they might use in the course of their next project. Share the insight, help the people do their job. Another example, a status update. This is perhaps one of the most dreaded and dreadful presentation types. People just come and talk for half an hour about all things that happened during the last month or last week, etc. So one way to set a goal is to report about the status. But wait a second, what is the status? What really is the status, is the project going all right? Is it okay, or is it not okay? The problem with most status updates, that I've heard at least in my time was, well, it's all a bit complicated. This was the main idea that the presenter was trying to convey. So what's going on with this project? And why are you telling this to the audience, what do you want from them? What do we all need to do, do you need help? Or do you probably need some attention from the managers? Or do you specifically not need any attention from the managers? Do you need to be left alone? And this is another goal that you might set for yourself to accomplish, and this looks like a worthwhile goal. What do you want the audience to do, or not to do, as a result of your presentation?
