When should you start preparing for a presentation?
Earlier than feels necessary. Fifteen minutes a few days ahead gives your brain time to keep working on the talk in the background.
What I say in the video
You're presenting Thursday. It matters. You know you should prep now. You don't. You'll do it Wednesday night. You always do it Wednesday night.
But rushing locks you into your first draft. The ideas you panic-write Wednesday are the ideas you give Thursday. No time to question them, no time to cut what isn't working.
Start Monday instead. Even 15 minutes, then let it sit. Your brain keeps working on it in the shower, on your commute, halfway through dinner.
Same talk, way more time for your best ideas to show up.
What I didn’t say in the video
Cramming feels productive because the pressure makes you fast. But fast isn't the same as good. When you write the whole talk Wednesday night, you're not really choosing your ideas. You're taking the first ones that show up, because they're the only ones you have time for. Whatever you panic-write at 9pm is what you deliver at 9am. There's no gap to look at it again and ask, "is this actually the point I want to make?"
That gap is where the good stuff lives. When you start early and let an idea sit, your mind keeps turning it over in the background without you. This is why the sharper line, the cleaner structure, the story you forgot you had, tends to arrive when you're doing something else entirely. You can't force that. You can only give it time.
The 15 minutes on Monday isn't about finishing early. It's about loading the question into your head so your brain can chew on it all week for free. Then Wednesday night stops being the moment you invent the talk and becomes the moment you polish one that's mostly already there.
Try it today
The 15 minutes only works if you actually stop after. The sitting is the part that does the work.
Bill Smartt is a New York executive presence and public speaking coach and the founder of Smartt Talk. He works with leaders in financial services, tech, advertising and startups.
