Mistake Recovery (When Presenting Online)
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“If you’re not making mistakes then you’re not doing anything. I’m positive that a doer makes mistakes.”
—John Wooden, coach
It’s not if you make a mistake, it’s when you make a mistake. All presenters make mistakes. Great presenters take these in stride and do not make more of the mistake. Doing so only highlights your anxiety, your inadequacies, and/or the mistake itself (which many in the audience may miss). And emphasizing or backtracking to address a mistake only makes your audience feel uncomfortable.
When you make a mistake (e.g., choose the wrong word, provide the wrong statistic, temporarily lose your spot, forget a point you wanted to make, or say something before it appears on the slide), you have several options. First, you could “ask the audience” for help with the word or phrase you are stumbling on. This is a wonderful opportunity to get the word/phrase and then use self-deprecating humor and an opportunity for a laugh. In the past, Scott has made statements like, “Someone unmute and say the word I am trying to find!” Another option is the strategic pause with a sip of water while you buy some time and gather your thoughts. You can also ignore the mistake and restate the correct number or phrase: “I just said 32 seconds; I misspoke, it’s 56. So, 56 seconds…”. As previously mentioned, if you have good comedic timing, you can also make light of the miscue and get a laugh and proceed in a confident manner. One of Maria’s strategies if she stumbled over a word while teaching was to make light of the time of day. If it’s in the morning, she would joke, “Wow, I guess I need more coffee!” In the afternoon or early evening, she would say, “Gosh, it’s been a long day I guess!” Rarely is it appropriate to say “I’m sorry” or make a bigger deal of the misstep—drawing additional attention to it communicates nervousness, insecurity, or a lack of confidence.
As much as you will want it to be, your presentation will not be perfect (and that’s ok!). For us, what is important is how you respond to the imperfection, and to do so with grace and humility. Watch the news or your favorite late-night show and pay close attention to how often the anchors or hosts make mistakes—to not only notice that they do happen, but also to see how they acknowledge (or simply move on from) the mistake. Do you even notice that a mistake was made? Most people do not, because those trained presenters are skilled at moving past them.
In short, with this week’s blog post, we want to prepare you for the fact that mistakes will happen, and to assure you that you are not the first person to experience one. During your design process and your practice sessions, think about what could go wrong, and plan out how you might handle it. Then, if and when something happens during your presentation, you will be ready to handle it with grace and professionalism!
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We explore this topic and others in our new book Captovation: Online Presentations by Design.