Presenting 101, by Richard H. Truitt

I apologize to Mr. Truitt for the soap box that I am about to get on. It has nothing to do with him, except that it happened in his session. People of the world, i.e. the middle-aged women who I assume is a principle of her own firm by now, please do not talk during the session. Do not talk to your colleague or friend during a session. At least wisper. As quiet as your voice is and as important as you think you are, you are not quiet and not any more important than anyone else in the world. Please shut up and listen or leave the session. If you are not happy, don’t sit their and fill out your evaluation while others are trying to get as much out of a session as they can. Please don’t yawn and raise your hands like you just got out of bed. Don’t do distracting things the entire time and then grace us all by leaving ONLY ten minutes before it is all over. Leave much sooner next time. You maam are very rude and distracting and I would compare your manners to that of a naughty three-year-old who crawls under the church bench when the pastor starts speaking.

Now on to the session that I had such a hard time paying attention to. Richard Truitt was a story teller. He wasn’t a vibrant, vocal, inspirational speaker, but he told a good story. He wasn’t the most exciting (or excitable) person in the world, but he has experience and the content was there. I don’t have a ton of experience so this is all great information for me. Only implementing some of the ideas will tell how much good information I gained from this session. I am sure that even though this wasn’t the most exciting session (although he had some very funny stories) I will go away with some very tangible guidelines.

Here are a few things that I gathered from his presentation:

Good Presenters . . .
- build a personal trust
- Sell the relationship
- Are true to themselves

Six thing you can do
1. focus on winning the business (not a time to solve the problem)
- they aren’t ready to trust you
- give them cases instead of solutions

2. Win in the first six minutes

3. Learn what the client really wants (i.e. What did they mean by quality?)

4. Show them it will help them. What can it can do for them.
- not as much process, but results

5. Put your work in perspective. (put it as something bigger) You will be viewed as a consultant not a vendor.

6. Explain what client service means to you.
- It really matters if they like you as a person

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