When a person gives presentations over a long enough time, there will be mistakes. If mistakes happen frequently, they  can begin to impact a person’s reputation. And your ability to make money.

We’ll discuss five common presentations mistakes, their impacts, and ways to recover (if possible) when they happen.

There is another reason to be aware of and be ready for mistakes when doing a presentation. How a person responds to a mistake or failure can actually be an opportunity to impress people more so than the presentation itself would have done. Being able to handle adversity can demonstrate professionalism, calmness, and that you are a person that can be relied on in a crisis. This can result in a stronger reputation and more money.

Mistake #1 Skipped content

When a presentation is given, it’s not uncommon to leave out parts. This could be by design due to a time constraint or because you forgot it.

Unless people have seen your presentation before or somehow read your script, they will not know you skipped content that is not as important to your main message. And if they do, and that content is inconsequential, it doesn’t matter.

Proactive steps and recovery

These notes will you prepare if you forget some content when speaking.

• Don’t have an expectation of perfection. When you give the same presentation, it shouldn’t be delivered exactly the same way each time. That gets boring for you and will that will show to your audience.

• Work from an outline of content that is critical for your presentation. If it’s not important, can it be dropped? If a block of content is less significant, it may be easier to forget. Get rid of it if possible and focus on content that really matters to your audience.

• An option to help prevent skipping  content is to use a slide deck that will prompt parts of your presentation.