Preparation – Not Rehearsal
March 16, 2008 Filed in: General Tips
| Delivery
In a late-February post (yes, that's how far behind I
am), Garr Reynolds shared some presentation tips from Ken
Robinson, one of my favorite speakers to
appear at TED over the last couple of years.
Among his tips is this gem: "Prepare, but don't
rehearse. Think and plan ahead instead."
image by torli on stock.xchng
I used to prepare for my presentations the same way I would prepare for a music recital. I'd go over the material exactly how I wrote it until I could deliver it flawlessly the same way over and over. One French horn performer once told me that I'm not done practicing a passage until I can play it perfectly ten times in a row, and I took this exacting principle over to public speaking.
The problem is that over-rehearsal of a talk can make it sound ... rehearsed. It can sound too perfect, and a certain human element – that element necessary for connecting with audiences – can disappear in the measured recital.
The best musical performances I can think of do not sound rehearsed, even though I know they are. It sounds as if the musician is creating the music spontaneously before the audience. The music is alive at that moment, and that is the way our presentations should be. Our audience should feel as if we are delivering our message for each of them individually and that we are caught up in this moment.
This leads right into another tip from Mr. Robinson: "Leave room for improvisation." He compares the act of public speaking to a good jazz performance, but even a good classical performer demonstrates an ability to take liberties with the given material, making it fully his or her own. When we are presenting, spontaneous points may occur to us. Things might go wrong. Someone might interrupt with a brilliant question, and we should be willing to improvise for a few minutes.
In its purest form, a presentation is a form of conversation, and your best conversations are not completely scripted, over-rehearsed events. Spontaneous creativity is alive and well in the art of conversation. Don't get me wrong. Preparation is exceedingly important, but stay flexible. Stay alive. Don't recite your presentation. Connect it with the people in your audience.
image by torli on stock.xchng
I used to prepare for my presentations the same way I would prepare for a music recital. I'd go over the material exactly how I wrote it until I could deliver it flawlessly the same way over and over. One French horn performer once told me that I'm not done practicing a passage until I can play it perfectly ten times in a row, and I took this exacting principle over to public speaking.
The problem is that over-rehearsal of a talk can make it sound ... rehearsed. It can sound too perfect, and a certain human element – that element necessary for connecting with audiences – can disappear in the measured recital.
The best musical performances I can think of do not sound rehearsed, even though I know they are. It sounds as if the musician is creating the music spontaneously before the audience. The music is alive at that moment, and that is the way our presentations should be. Our audience should feel as if we are delivering our message for each of them individually and that we are caught up in this moment.
This leads right into another tip from Mr. Robinson: "Leave room for improvisation." He compares the act of public speaking to a good jazz performance, but even a good classical performer demonstrates an ability to take liberties with the given material, making it fully his or her own. When we are presenting, spontaneous points may occur to us. Things might go wrong. Someone might interrupt with a brilliant question, and we should be willing to improvise for a few minutes.
In its purest form, a presentation is a form of conversation, and your best conversations are not completely scripted, over-rehearsed events. Spontaneous creativity is alive and well in the art of conversation. Don't get me wrong. Preparation is exceedingly important, but stay flexible. Stay alive. Don't recite your presentation. Connect it with the people in your audience.