On Tuesday, we gave our (3 minutes) pitch to a panel, and gathered some advice, suggestions, feedback, and comments. Unfortunately, almost majority of us went over the 3 minute mark and those with first names starts with letters towards the end of the alphabet, had to, well…stick to our 3 minutes plan, and receive our comments in the form of an email instead of face-to-face. Which isn’t really bad thing, as it could be a little intimidating to some.
I’m not sure about my studio mates, but I tried timing myself to keep my pitch 3 minutes short. What I did was to play a song roughly 3 minutes long and started talking to the computer with my notes in front of me. Once the song hits its last chorus, I would wrap it up, and try to finish it before the song ends. Out of all the attempts, I didn’t manage to finish my pitch before the song ended, however, I would say I managed to keep it under the 4 minute mark?
More often than not, most of us tend to digress and go off topic while presenting to an opened audience. Others, try to rush through everything just to get it done and over with, getting rid of that built up anxiety leading up to the actual presentation. While some, could just wing it through having ample experience talking in front of a crowd or just plain God given talent.
I know this blog post has nothing related to my experiments or film related for that matter, but I believe that how you portray yourself and conduct presentations, whether to multi-national companies or to little focus groups, really affects the results of your initial intend of why you’re giving the presentation in the first place. Spacing out, using pause fillers, large unnecessary hand movements, are tell tales or little barometers of your level of preparedness, as you start to assemble your one man army against the crowd of 3 or 3000.
Since my name starts with the letter ‘S’, and so happen ‘S’ is somewhat close to the end of the alphabet, I was the second last to present, and hence I got the email treatment oppose to the face-to-face comments. Looking forward to what the panel has to say, and more so, to the much needed easter break, and what’s to come ahead after that. Happy holidays.
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