Most comedians record their performances and study them carefully afterwards.
They’re not shy about it – and they get results.
Yet outside of comedy, many presenters avoid it completely.
They cringe at the idea of watching themselves back.
But here’s the truth.
Reviewing yourself on video is one of the fastest ways to refine your delivery, spot what works, and fix what doesn’t.
The value of this hit home again recently when I reviewed one of my comedy performances.
There is a punchline I have used a lot and it has always been one of my favourites.
It normally gets the biggest laugh of the set.
This time, though, it got a smaller laugh.
I wanted to know why.
The video provided the answer.
In all the previous sets I had looked directly at the audience when I delivered the line.
For some unknown reason, this time I was looking to the left side of the room when I said the words.
My facial expression was missed by the audience and the connection was simply not as effective.
Next time I used the line I looked directly at the audience and the result was as I hoped.
A simple fix.
So what do I invite you to take from this?
Clearly, you are not going to invest time in reviewing the video of every single speech.
But I encourage you to leave the comfort zone and do a video review from time to time.
You will spot things you hadn’t noticed.
You will come up with fixes to problems.
And you will understand why some parts worked even better than you planned.
Step out of the comfort zone. Review yourself. Refine your impact.
For more presentation tips – why not check out the following article and presentation lessons from Skipper the penguin in the film Madagascar…
