Haters gonna hate sang Miss Swift. And she’s right, haters gonna hate. Whether that is about your lifestyle choices, musical tastes or indeed presentation style, haters gonna hate. The most important thing to remember is that the hate is about the hater, not about your lifestyle choice, your musical taste or your presentation style.
Change in presentation style is always difficult and reaction to that change reflects opinion of the hater, not about the change itself. Comments such as “I need more text”, “it’s not professional” or “you were too theatrical” seldom reflect generally accepted facts and are often a poorly expressed disquiet related to change itself or the confrontation that previously used approaches may not have been as effective as desired.
“I need more text” is a reflection of an audience member who probably has a lot of experience of bad presentations. Their response to such is to filter out one channel of conflicting information, usually the speaker. Consequently the supportive media becomes pre-eminent and effectively the only thing that is processed. “More text” will deliver more clarity and more information, lack of text challenges such an approach. Haters gonna hate if supportive media is minimalist.
A presentation that differs from an established and accepted standard may be regarded by some as “unprofessional.” Different is not necessarily wrong in many facets of life but the criticism may bite deeply. One should consider the facts however: was the presentation effective; did it convey the message; was the media supportive to the message and did the presenter engage the audience? If these are true, then surely the presentation was professional and the haters gonna hate the difference more than the result itself.
Sometime haters gonna just say stuff because they aren’t happy and the facts of that may not even be important. “Too theatrical” reflects a view that the criticiser would hold for themself. That need not apply to the individual presenter if, once again, the presentation is effective. This point must be clarified though, haters gonna hate if a presentation is purely style over form, if the message is lost in allegory, if the supportive media is purely sunsets and visual cliches or if the engaging presenter delivers nothing more than laughs. Just because you’ve got, “this music in my mind sayin’ it’s gonna be alright” doesn’t make it a great presentation.