If you are worried about giving presentations and pitches – and, let’s face it, very few people don’t feel at least some nerves – then here is a bit of advice which has come  from a piece of research.  According to a study published in the journal Science, writing down worries before a stressful situation greatly boosts your performance. Just jotting down what your concerns are appears to help you focus on the job in hand.

The research was carried out among students about to sit exams. The technique was shown to be so powerful that students had a 20 per cent improvement in exam marks if they used the method just before sitting down.

New as the research is I believe it is just reaffirming what we have always said: prepare, prepare, prepare – including writing down your fears and anxieties – and you are more likely to succeed.

Prof Sian Beilock of the University of Chicago, who is responsible for this research, put it succinctly. “People are in a stressful situation and worry about it and the consequences. These worries are taking up resources that should be dedicated to the task. Putting pen to paper appears to offload these worries.”

At Quicklearn, we run workshops on helping people with their presentation skills which will give the ‘worried presenter’ several techniques on how to present, as well as how to handle nerves.
The workshops include games and practical activities, concentrating on ‘learning by doing’ in a safe environment.

You can download our Useful Guide to Public Speaking published by Pansophix – It is a step by step workbook to enable new presenters to prepare a speech or a presentation from scratch and deliver it with style.