Conrey is for Closers

Hubris – extreme haughtiness or arrogance – wikipedia

This past weekend I was asked to speak at ScottsdaleCamp, put together by Tyler Hurst and D.Patrick Lewis. Asked to speak on Low/No Cost Sales tools and techniques I arrived using a recycled presentation and minimal preparation.  I was so confident in my own ability to wing it that I didn’t prepare hardly at all.  I put forth a weak presentation that took half the time it should have and probably gave even less value than that.

This post is my apology to Tyler and Patrick, as well as those who attended the presentation as I definitely was not giving my best.  Even when doing something like this for a small audience on a volunteer basis, I should have done more preparation.  I did my audience and my personal reputation a disservice by getting on stage and dropping the ball.

Lessons taken away from this:

• As someone who hates those who over-promise and under-deliver, remember that when you agree to speak you are promising to provide good content.
• Just because you have used a slide deck in the past doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t look through it before going on stage with it – refresh yourself and be ready
• Even if your audience doesn’t know that you screwed up they’ll know that something was off.
• Admit when you screwed up and make it happen.