10 Quick Lessons From Speaking at 200+ Events with Tom Krcha

Tom Krcha is the Head of Product at Around. Having spoken at over 200+ conferences worldwide while building a community as the Co-Founder of Adobe XD, he shared his best ten tips from experience.

Here is the list of his best ten lessons. 

1. Understand Your Audience 

First, you need to understand the demographics of your conference audience. Who is going to be there? Look at some of the attendees' profiles if you can get them. This helps tweak the content to suit the level of the audience. 

2. Be Authentic

Being yourself can be a tricky thing when you're presenting to people. However, understanding who you are, why you are there, and what you want to share helps calm you down and be yourself.

3. Start With an Outline

An outline helps you to refine the ideas you want to share. Ideally, our brains keep working on the background, so jotting down ideas can help you refine them over time as you keep revisiting them.

4. You Are the Expert

Getting nervous happens to most of us, and Tom maintains that it's very much okay as it helps you to remain sharp. However, nervousness also has a dark side – it can fog your brain and slow you down. To overcome anxiety, you should remember that you are the expert and have been invited to share your knowledge with others.

5. Keep It Short and Sweet

Keeping the presentation short can be a challenge. Often, you may find yourself rambling and going deeper into things you did not expect to say. That's why it's essential to make the presentation as short as possible.

6. Breathe

Slowing down is essential. It makes the speech legible and gives the audience a break to react to it. Moreover, it gives you time to think about the following sentence you want to say.

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"Slowing down makes the speech more legible and gives you time to think about your next point." – Tom Krcha

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7. Pick a Few People in the Audience (that are somewhat reacting to what you're saying)

You can draw your motivation from the audience by singling out and paying attention to a few people in the audience who seem to enjoy your presentation. 

8. Hide Desktop Icons, Turn on DND Mode

Hiding your desktop icons is essential, as you don't want to overshare, e.g., revealing work that you have been doing that could be secretive. Moreover, showing the icons can confuse people seeing too much content. Thus, you should aim to keep it super lightweight and simple.

9. Publish Your Speech as Twitter Thread

When you're summarizing everything, it's good to publish your speech with a bit of flap.

10. Make Connections

Spend some time with the people after the talk. This allows you to learn about them and get feedback on your shared content.

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Key Takeaways

• Understand your audience and tweak the content according to their level
• Avoid rambling and keep your content short and sweet
• It's essential to connect with the community after the event to know them better and receive their feedback