I had a presentation recently and I was super nervous. I was scared to make a mistake and everyone laugh or say that I shouldn’t be presenting because I’m just a little kid. Thing is, I made mistakes but no one noticed them. What helped is that Hugo gave me a great piece of advice before my presentation: “When you make a mistake just laugh it off. If you take yourself seriously people will be waiting for you to make a mistake.” This helped tremendously; When I made a mistake I laughed and moved on and nobody pointed it out. It made me think of the presentation in a different light. It wasn’t a make-or-break it was an opportunity for me to share my webpart.

Focus on something else

In the call before it was time for me to present I kept trying to read my script and make sure I was extra prepared but what helped was that I stopped myself. There’s no point in getting worked up and overthinking different ways to say a sentence before you say it- that’s what makes you mess up on the sentence.

Smile

David and Hugo gave me this tip in the Sharing is Caring First Time Presenter call: Even if the person listening can’t see you they can hear and tell that you’re smiling by the way your voice sounds. Try smiling when you’re talking, not only will people hear it and be more friendly but they will relate to you.

Find Support

Also, don’t be scared to say that it’s your first time presenting, the PNP community is highly inclusive, nice, and supporting. No one will make fun of you they’ll all be rooting for you. My dad’s tip? Listen to Eminem before public-speaking. Highly recommend it!

Review and Practice

Review it! Not only should you review you should have someone else review it. Present to them and get their honest feedback so you can improve your presentation. This can help you find tough spots in speech and fix them. This is also super valuable because you get more and more used to presenting and relax more. Obviously, when you know you’re presenting in front of 200 people you’re stressed out, but if you’ve presented it to your parents then just imagine that you’re doing that again.

Look at the camera

Look at the camera. You want to interact with the audience instead of just reading your script. If you’re in-experienced in presenting don’t try to look at the camera the whole time. Just try and look at the camera every now and then and smile. I had memorized a couple sentences of my script because I had said that line so much that I could just look up at the camera and say it when the part came. I suggest that if you’re a first-time presenter instead of trying to memorize everything just memorize a sentence or two so that your presentation will look more natural.

Stick to the script

Stick to the script when presenting. It helps a ton. If you are not experienced in presenting the when you go off-script you will mess-up and say something confusing. The script is meant to guide you. Nobody knows that you’re reading from a script and if they do, don’t sweat it. Nobody is expected to memorize every thing they want to say especially not first-time presenters. Just go with what you know and you’ll be fine!

Be Humble

Nobody is the best and I certainly am not. People have been working with SPFx and SharePoint for 20 or more years and if you go in and say you’re the best, whether you’re joking or not, this will offend people. Don’t be scared of saying you don’t know something, be proud of wanting to know. There will always be someone better than you and it’s important that you’re not measuring your success off of others because you’ll never be contempt.

Conclusion

To summarize, there’s a lot of things to keep in mind when presenting but just remember everyone is rooting for you to do well. Don’t overthink your script, make something up on the spot, or take yourself seriously. Presenting is a way for you to share with the community- have fun and share your passion. Be humble about your work and be kind and have fun when you’re presenting! 😀