Presentation, Interviews and Stagefright. It’s Manageable.

Whether you’re the interviewer or the interviewee, or presenting your project to an audience, there are a multitude of skills you need to be effective. Let’s look at some of the core values for presenting. While we’re at it, let’s also address the invisible elephant in the room: stage fright and anxiety, the arch nemeses of confident speech.

What Helps Build Confidence

Being the key skill for speaking, confidence is essential for both presentations and interviews. But how does one build it?

Confidence can be a byproduct

Confidence is not a standalone skill. It can be developed through simple acts of kindness and taking responsibility.

Simple things like helping someone cross the road, looking after siblings or even maintaining a disciplined schedule can all help with the subconscious development of confidence. Reaching personal goals or achieving simple milestones, such as improving in a hobby or academics, can give a sense of accomplishment and in turn, help build confidence too.

Presenting and Interviewing

For both interviews and presentations, eye contact, confidence and hand gestures all work together with clear, precise speech. Before moving on to the topic of interviews, let’s see how these come into play in presentations.

Interviews: Simialar Yet Different

Let’s now move to the topic of interviews. As far as similarities go, an interview is also a form of presentation, especially if you are the interviewee. What helps make a good presentation also helps make a good interview.

In the shoes of an interviewee, you may rely on the same exercises used for presentations to ground yourself. Apart from having your material prepared in advance, you also need to be confident, maintain good eye contact and use appropriate hand gestures.

As an interviewer, you may be in a slightly more comfortable position since you are the one asking questions. However, there are things to take note of here as well. Besides maintaining eye contact and confidence, you must ensure your questions are relevant and precise to the topic at hand.

When Losing Confidence

When presenting, you need to capture your audience’s attention by speaking fluently and confidently. However, confidence can be fleeting, especially in the spur of the moment.

How about some exercises that can help you catch that fleeting confidence and resynchronise with yourself to fight stage fright?

Of course, rehearsals and having clarity about your topic help. However, during the actual presentation, the energy of a live audience is completely different from that of an empty room. It may get hard to focus and, in some cases, even hard to breathe.

In times like these, it is important to ground yourself through deep breathing. Let’s learn how.

Exercises to Help with Anxiety and Stage Fright

Inhale to the count of three, hold to the count of three, and exhale to the count of three. Close your eyes to block out the audience for a few seconds and recalibrate with yourself.

Once your breathing is in order, the next step is to recall your knowledge about your presentation. It is your topic; no amount of audience can change that. Trust that you remember what you prepared and learned, and break down the presentation into steps:

Step 1: Introduction. Your name and what you are presenting.
Step 2: Eye contact. No need to stare at anyone; just a quick glance around the room is enough to keep their attention.
Step 3: Tell them what your topic is about. If you have a slideshow, glance towards it to recall information.
Step 4: Repeat Steps 2 and 3 while adding hand gestures. Using hand gestures not only helps keep the audience engaged, but can also ground you through movement rather than standing anxiously.

Preparation is an Armour

Many times, hesitation and failure come from a lack of preparation. Complete preparation beforehand can not only help you be more confident but also help ground you during moments of anxiety by acting as internal support.

Having your speech and script properly memorised to the point where you do not need to look at your notes tremendously boosts your confidence in front of a crowd.

If memorising proves difficult, carry cards with keywords that help you recall your next point while presenting. A quick look at these cards can help you stabilise when you fumble.

Frightening in the Start, but Doable

Like many things in life, presenting can feel like a daunting task and more often than not, it is. However, that is only until you get used to it. First presentations can be the hardest, but overcoming this challenge will help you break through and evolve. Practice, preparation, confidence and engaging with the audience. Also, remember to breathe.

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