If you’re planning a business presentation or any sales interview with a large company during the hurricane season you may find yourself being postponed and you may want to cancel and reschedule the appointment for the business presentation until everything is back to normal.

This is because the decision-makers and the Board of Directors of the Corporation in which you are giving your sales presentation or business presentation pitch to, will have on their minds many other things that affect their supply chain, sales teams and business outlets, which may have been destroyed during the hurricane or even injury of workers. With all this all their minds the chances of you pulling off a really good presentation and making the sale are much lessened.

During the 2005 Atlantic tropical hurricane season many professionals and sales teams found themselves in a region, which was not interested in anything they had to say unless in fact they were part of the relief and rescue efforts. It is best to reschedule business presentations whether they are about sales or future negotiations until later date after a major catastrophic mother nature event. This is proper business etiquette and the most professional thing to do as well. So, I hope you will consider all this in 2006.

You know that improved presentation skills lead to better leadership and greater success. And you do want improved leadership and success, right?

Then, like most people, you probably find the barriers can be forbidding and intimidating. Here are 3 barriers, and strategies to overcome them.

Barrier #1: The amorphous nature of presentation skills. It’s not something that most people are good at, and even if they were, it’s not like sitting down with someone and spending a few hours going over the basics.

Improvement requires a structured, disciplined approach. Mentoring by good public speakers in your organization won’t work. Nor will self-study.

Strategy for Overcoming Barrier #1: Look for a solution that has a smaller number of participants that usual. I suggest something that has a maximum of 7-10 participants, because this allows participants to delve deep into the skills and concepts necessary for rapid improvement.

Barrier #2: The Time Factor. Some solutions are over a time frame that’s too short. Most training firms do this in 2 or 3 continuous days. With today’s fast and furious hectic pace, requiring people to take this much time off at once just isn’t practical or productive.

And, improvement in presentation skills just doesn’t lend itself to such a short time.

Other solutions take too long. Joining Toastmasters is great, but it does take a long time to really learn everything. The same applies to enrolling in a public speaking skills class at your local college.

Strategy for Overcoming Barrier #2: Search for a solution that is provides training/coaching over a shorter period, perhaps 8-10 weeks. The accelerated nature of this solution addresses the too long/too short barrier.

For example, 6 half-days every other week is much more manageable than 3, 2, or even 1 full day away from work.

A more spread out format (bi-weekly or every 3 weeks) allows participants to adequately prepare for the speeches in the next session, and lets them try out newly learned techniques in the real world of their jobs.

Barrier #3: Lack of metrics for success. In a sense, this barrier is related to Barrier #1 (the amorphous nature of presentation skills), but it really is a separate barrier. Most training programs don’t really measure improvement.

In my coaching and consulting, I emphasize the importance of metrics. I often say, “If you’re not measuring this, how will you know if you’re improving?”

Strategy for Overcoming Barrier #3: Two ways. First, participants should take some sort of self-assessment before and after the training or coaching. This gives them a clear understanding of how much they’ve improved.

The other way of overcoming this barrier uses an evaluation form during the training, so that participants use the form to evaluate others’ speeches.

After the training or coaching, you can use this form when doing a presentation; give it to someone in the audience so that person can evaluate your speech. This way you’re continually improving after the training or coaching.

So, yes, the barriers can seem overwhelming, but the right strategies will get you over the top, and on the way to improved public speaking.

It’s not every day that someone close to you gets engaged, so when they do, a congratulations card doesn’t always cut it. That being the case, give some thought to personalised engagement gifts. They’re not your bog-standard engagement presents, based on the fact that yep, you guessed it, they can be personalised with the details of your choice – typically a name and message. Here, we give you a rundown on five of the most popular engagement presents. Just don’t be fooled into thinking this list is anything close to extensive – it’s far from it.

Engagement wine and champagne

Nothing says congrats quite like popping open a bottle of champers. If it sounds like your cup of tea, too, you can buy personalised champagne that includes a label of your choice that can be customised to include the couple’s names and a message. If you’d rather not plump for bubbles, meanwhile, personalised red, white and rosé wine come with exactly the same personalisation options.

Engraved crystal

If you fancy supplementing your champagne or wine, the obvious thing to do is engrave a pair of crystal glasses for the happy couple. There’s the option of champagne flutes or wine glasses, each of which can be personalised to include your couple’s names, date and a brief message. After that, we’ll pack the glasses into a swish satin-lined box. Very posh.

Engagement personalised newspaper

For a light-hearted engagement present, a spoof newspaper from the Daily Mirror is a safe bet. With this, you can personalise the front page of the paper to include the couple’s full names, where they live, the date and even the ‘writer’ of the piece. They’ll then be incorporated into the front page’s leading story. To top it all of you can also upload a photo of them to feature next to the ‘article’.

Love and Romance Personalised Diaries and Calendars

As personalised engagement gifts go, they don’t come much more handy, or personal, than the ‘Love and Romance’ calendars. Not only can you include names and a message, but if you buy the largest version, you’ll also get to include 20 specific dates relevant to the couple. What’s more, both the calendar and the diary can begin from a month of your choosing, not just January.

London Eye Cruise for Two

This cruise will allow the happy couple to enjoy a leisurely sightseeing cruise down the Thames over the course of a day. They can hop on and off as much as they like, so not only will they get a real insight into the capital’s history, but it’s really convenient, too. To round things off in style, they’ll also get a ‘flight’ on the London Eye. Happy days.