TJ Walker (host/speaker) recounts a personal anecdote about a training session around 2000 when his primary VHS camera failed mid-session and his backup camera was incompatible due to a different cable. He takes responsibility for not double-checking equipment, describes the negative consequences (lost repeat business and endorsements), and gives practical advice: assume nothing about venues, arrive early, bring multiple backup recording options (camcorders, iPad, cell phones, laptops), and verify compatibility before presenting.
Chapters
When it comes to the technology that you're going to be using in your presentation, you can never be too prepared. You need to check it, double check it, triple check it, and then quadruple check it. A couple of decades ago, I was doing a training, very successful entrepreneur. This guy had invented the Defosit Sky Vodka. Very successful entrepreneur. And, and I'm doing a media training with him. He's introducing a new liqueur into the marketplace that day comes in, sits down, very charming, everything's great. I go to hook up my camera and the day had come. The camera died. Now, this was around the year 2000. I was still using a VHS camera. The camera was probably 12 years old. So it's a late 1980s camera and it had the big old clunky VHS tape in it and it just froze, broke, died. That's it. I thought, okay, no problem. I am prepared. I had a second camera. I take the first camera down, set the second camera up. I'm so proud of myself for planning, for doing my due diligence. I've got on the tripod. The light's fine, the camera's fine, the tripod's fine, the TV's fine, everything's great, except the cable from the camera to the TV is different than the one from the old camera. Well, guess what? When it comes to technology, audio, video, technology, you're only as strong as your weakest link. And I was completely missing a link. There was no time to go to Radio Shack or Best Buy or any store like that. It was at simple half day training. And we're now 50 minutes into it. So what happened? And this was before the days of video cameras on cell phones, the year 2000. There were no iPads back then. There were no other cameras around. So I had to talk about what to do with the media. Now, I like to think I'm a good talker. I'm talking here now, but. But that's not a training. It really didn't go very well. This client never hired me again. The PR firm that hired me never hired me again. I didn't get any great testimonials. I didn't get any great endorsements from that. It was a complete bust. So who's to blame here? Just, well, stuff happens, you know, that's life. No, it was my fault. I didn't do my due diligence. I should have double checked to make sure I had every single piece before I went to that training. I should have imagined the first camera breaking and then setting up the second training the second camera from scratch for the training and verifying to make sure it works. So it was my fold. These days I don't do any training unless I've got about four or five options for recording a client. I bring a regular camcorder, another regular camcorder, an iPad, where in an emergency I do a training. Cell phones obviously have it, a laptop has it. So these days I've got a lot of different ways of covering myself from a technology standpoint, and. And I would urge you to cover yourself as well. Okay, so what's the lesson here? The lesson is you're going to use any av, audio, visual tools for your presentation. You've got to prepare. I use this point when I'm coaching people on if they're going to use PowerPoint. Don't assume the place you're going is going to have a projector or a remote control or the laptop that's compatible with any programs you have. Assume nothing, get there early, take everything you need, take extra versions of what you need. Only then are you prepared.
