I completely froze during a client pitch meeting in Chicago last month
I was in a small conference room with three senior partners from a big firm, pitching our marketing plan. Halfway through my main slide, my mind just went blank. I mean, total silence for what felt like a full minute (it was probably ten seconds, but still). I could see them looking at each other. I took a deep breath, closed my laptop, and said, 'Let me start over, I think I'm making this too complicated.' I walked to the whiteboard and just started drawing the core idea with a marker, talking through it simply. It turned the whole thing into a conversation instead of a presentation. We ended up getting the project. How do you guys handle it when your brain just shuts down at the worst possible time?