Don’t be afraid to break the rules!
I was giving a talk recently and one of the audience members shared with us the story of how he was part of a “dragons den” type even where a number of potential inventors were pitching to venture capitalists.The event was organised by Business Link and all the participants had been coached on how to put their presentation together professionally . The only problem was that every presentation was sounding the same! So, when it came to his turn, my presenter took a gamble and threw away his notes, turned off his PowerPoint and pitched from the heart.The result was that he got more enquiries from potential funders
than anyone else!Now I’m not saying that you shouldn’t spend time preparing and putting together a professional presentation however, there may be times when you need to “break The Rules” and do
something different. As he said – The investors were more interested in the character of the presenter than the content!
Of course all the preparation he had done in advance was not wasted because he had all the facts at his fingertips, it was just the delivery that changed and as a result he stood out from the crowd.
When could you take a risk like this and allow your authentic self to shine through?
