Hacker News Reader

In the (un)luckily case you have to speak... I memorize word by word the first 2 minutes of the speech, which is usually who am I, the table of contents, and the begin of the first slide (it may seem trivial, but it's often where people judge and classify you as someone to be listen to or a dumb).

This makes me confident that I won't say weird things and completely loose everybody. At the same time, this is enough to get the body relax and used to the audience.

View on HN

I tend to write out an entire presentation like a script, and then try and come up with one keyword that would remind me on how to speak on that topic.

Once I have the keywords I then try and incorporate that word into the slide somehow as a memory trigger.

I never expect to recite the script, but having written it out in full allows me to make sure I've hit all the key talking points.

(This technique tends to work for me because I try and reduce the number of words on the slides I use as much as possible)

I do this too, but then my confidence takes a dive shortly after that point, and recovers only when I'm making the closing statements.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com