Friday, September 28, 2012

It’s all about presentation


It’s your worst nightmare.

There you are, updating your Facebook status during yet another boring committee meeting. (“My brain cells are now officially unemployed. There is nothing for them to do here.”) Suddenly people are congratulating you, and you realise you’ve just been volunteered (or rather, “voluntold”) to give a presentation to some potential clients.

(This is the only reason people go to meetings: to make sure they don’t get dobbed into actually doing anything.)

So you spend the next few days creating the obligatory PowerPoint slideshow and ignoring the “advice” of your co-workers:

“There’s not enough information on the slides.”

“You need some funny sound effects. You know, like on Funniest Home Video.”

“Are you sure you can’t make all the text flash on and off?”

“Maybe you should… ow!”

At last it’s ready, and you email it to your boss for final approval, asking her when you should book the meeting room for the presentation.

And that’s when she drops the bombshell. They’re not coming to your office.

You’re going to theirs.

Your heart starts racing, and not just because of what you had for lunch. These people are technological luddites. They still use overhead transparencies, for goodness sake. And you can’t take any of your equipment because it’s hard-wired into the walls and ceiling.

Luckily you’ve got Home Appliance Rentals to help you out. They can supply you with not only the data projector and the screen, but also a set of speakers if your boss insisted on having those sound effects. And they know you won’t be presenting for weeks (it will only seem that long), so they offer very reasonable short-term rates.

Of course, you might want to hang onto it all for a while, just in case they want you to do another presentation.

And in the meantime, it’ll be perfect for watching all those funny videos on YouTube.