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..I'd expect my presentation-coach to follow his own advice!

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So my first "Ship" at Microsoft is in 2 wks - hence my relative absence from blogging. In 2 wks - The Microsoft Risk Assessment Program for Security will have been "SKU-ed" and released to the field. Enough of random rambling - on to the topic - my presentation-coach is does not follow his own advice.

These 2 days I am in internal-training for Presentation here at Redmond. The trainer a self-professed communication star who waxed poetic about his experience for over 12 yrs coaching Microsoft Executives consuming 95% of his total work time in 1:1s for about 40 different events every year to get credibility got nothing more than a raised eyebrow from me.

The first 10mins of the class started with listing with all the presentation faux-pas that the participants in the class hated:

  • Rambling
  • Talking to the slide
  • Trying to act super smart - when you are super duh
  • Showing scant respect to the audience
  • Being too casual
  • Not knowing the content
  • Trivializing the content or being shocked by content (someone else's slides)
  • Reading from the projector/laptop
  • Talking in a monotone
  • Fiddling with the clicker like it was a cat that required some attention
  • Making facial expressions that makes KingKong seem like a young Kevin Costner in comparison.... etc etc.

The trainer made every single mistake on this list always. Did he also follow any of the directions he gave on the "Should Dos" for good presentation? Nope. Not a single one. Makes you wonder... I can understand coaches neednt be players - but this is ridiculous! Arent Preachers supposed to practise?

The WORST presentation-training class I have ever taken in my life, yet. Yuck