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Thank you Harry!

Dear Katherine,

Well, I had my doubts, and I am a skeptic by nature but I decided, as bad a speaker as I was, I had nothing to lose, so I committed to following ALL your advice. As you know both Jin and I totally reworked our talks after our first meeting with you. I practiced all the different techniques you gave us, and practiced, and practiced.

You may remember that my biggest problem was being absolutely petrified to the point of being physically sick and my second biggest problem was only being able to read up there for fear of not knowing what to say. So this time I had to give my talk twice. The first time was at the end of the first day after watching many presentations, some good, some bad. We had a full room of probably 200-250 people. Lights up (except we disabled the bulb over the projection screen), wireless mike (thank you Katherine). Surprise of surprises, Harry is not scared, he is not nervous, he is ready. It goes great. Barely consults his notes. No rush to get through, just coolly conveying the excitement of this new project. Whoa!

The second talk was just before lunch on the last day of the conference. Everyone is hungry, and tired. Watching earlier presentations, I start getting excited. I want to get up there and talk (I can hardly believe this but it is what happened). I am thinking to myself. That guy is not looking at his audience. He is not telling us what he is going to do. His slides are driving the presentation, no one is looking at him... I think (again this is so out of character ... I can do better than that). So I go on and the second time it is even easier. I even improvise some opening comments. I would have to say some part of me actually enjoyed it. Now I don't want to do this for a living or anything but what a night and day difference for me. I know I was so much better. Of course I got lots of positive feedback but my friends will tell me I'm good when I stink. This time, I knew it was better.

So thank you so much. I realize this is what you do and this is probably run of the mill stuff for you but it made such a difference to me. Instead of a conference that revolved around my dread of speaking it was a totally enjoyable time chatting with customers, running equipment around, loading trucks, and of course speaking.

Thanks Katherine,

Harry Smith, Software Developer, OSIsoft, Inc.

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Email us at katherine@abbottcom.com or call 925-484-0195 with questions or requests for more information.

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