Today, I'm covering the importance of proper room setup and how the room that you present in will either make you more nervous or help you deliver a better presentation. The way that you set up the room before you even say a word has a lot of impact on how well you present. It also will determine how you can interact with your audience.

The main thing, though, is that if your audience is comfortable, they can help you present better. If they are uncomfortable, or worse, if you make them participating in your presentation hard, the audience will not be on your side.

If you ever saw Men in Black with Will Smith, there is a scene where he goes for the MIB interview. All the interviewees are sitting in egg-shaped chairs. They then have to take a test. And for the next couple of minutes, they all try to take the test without a table. It's pretty funny, but it is also a good lesson about how important your room and venue are to the success of your speech.

Proper room setup for a presentation can actually improve your performance in front of a group.

The downside is true as well. Improper conference room setup can actually make you more nervous and make delivering the presentation more difficult.

This post has two parts. Part one is about The Different Conference Room Styles. In that section, I’ll give you different conference room setup options with pros and cons of each. Then, in Part Two, I’ll give you the Best Practices for How to Set Up a Conference Room and how to set up a meeting room. These best practices will help you avoid some of the big mistakes that presenters make when they set up the tables, chairs, and audiovisuals for meetings.