Years ago, my Association Executive, Francie, informed me that as the newly elected President of the local Association of Realtors, I was automatically slated to give a speech to the Homebuilders Association. Accurately reading the “nobody told me about this part” look in my eyes, she proffered a book that she said was written for people like me. Two simultaneous thoughts entered my head: 1. How odd that someone would write a book for “Self-Inflicted Signer-Uppers”  2. I now understand at least one reason why I ran unopposed for this office.

Next, my mind is conjuring up possible titles for this yet to be seen book. It was a rather long list all ending with “…for Dummies”.Finally, I shake loose my inner-thoughts long enough to accept her offer of help. It was a book designed to help speakers overcome nervousness and prepare for a successful presentation. Opening the book, the first page I read says, “No matter what you do, 2% of the audience will hate you.”

Oh, that’s just great. Thanks for the help! My “self-doubt” tank usually sits on about 3/4 full anyway. Let’s just go ahead and fill ‘er up! Before that moment, I wasn’t thinking about anyone hating me. Now, I have the calculator out running some sample probabilities. (I no longer need a calculator. After much practice through many years of teaching, I can tell you what 2% of any number is quicker than your Hewlett Packard. I’m like “Rain Man” except I can only do 2%.)

Suddenly, there is a bright light and a whoosh of cool air fills the room…and finally, I hear a voice say, “It’s not about you.” What? Who said that? “It’s not about you….It’s about the Homebuilders. What do you want them to know?”

Once I got over the initial shock and disappointment that it wasn’t about me, I found deep comfort in those words. If it’s not about me, it must be about the audience. Moving from speech-giving to classroom instruction, it’s about the student. Ultimately, it’s about the learning. If I have a well-conceived objective, and a thoughtful plan that promotes student involvement toward reaching that objective, there is little for me to worry about while up in front of the group.

I have found that there is an inverse relationship between preparation time and anxiety level. The more energy that I put into planning and preparation, the less anxious I am about the delivery. On a good day, I can actually enjoy and observe the process. How much time is enough time? There is no science in my response but I would say that I think in terms of a minimum of four hours of preparation for every one hour of presentation. That 4:1 ratio would be for a topic that I already fully understand. (Off hand, I can’t think of any examples.) For a new topic on which I may lack total “subject matter expertise” (translation: every topic that I teach), it may take 12-20 hours of preparation for each classroom hour of delivery. While, I don’t have a real process for tracking all of the hours of preparation, keeping these rules of thumb in mind helps me budget my efforts to some degree.

Occasionally, I can time invest heavily on the front end and still come up short on quality course content. When this occurs, I find that I usually lacked or strayed from clear learning objectives-and that is a topic for another day.