I see a lot of professionals who confuse the purpose of proposals and presentations. Proposals are for laying out all the details, getting everything perfect. Presentations are not. Presentations—whether they are in person, remote, one to one or one to many— are about connection, not perfection.

True influence begins with an emotional connection, not intellectual perfection. If you go for perfection you will miss the emotional connection every time. Perfection has its place—in proposals. But presentations have a different function and a different focus.

Put your focus on connecting with your audience. Focus on helping them to feel that you understand where they are coming from. When you make that connection, then you open up the pathway to having intellectual influence and sharing your excellence.

If you find that your presentations are flat and you aren’t connecting, ask yourself if you are going for perfection or for connection? When people go for perfection, all of their energy shifts to their thoughts, and their tone of voice and body language tend to go flat. It’s almost impossible to connect with an audience with a flat tone of voice and no body language.

Shift your focus. Shift your results. And lose the weight of dragging the need to be perfect to the front of the room or the front of the Zoom.