Media outlets are reporting with some glee the fact that Director Michael Bay walked out of a presentation for Samsung curved televisions after suffering from a terrible case of nerves and stage fright.

Hundreds of journalists and industry professionals were gathered in a Las Vegas hall for the world's biggest gadget show. They watched as Bay took his position in front of a 105 inch television that Samsung were launching.

Who better than the director of the Transformers franchise to convince us of the transformative power of a television designed to wow consumers and help safeguard Samsung's future? Then things started to go wrong. The autocue appeared to malfunction and Bay froze. Cajoling from Joe Stinziano, Samsung's executive vice president, did not work. “The curve? How do you think it's going to impact how viewers experience your movies?”

Bay who directed Armageddon, Transformers and Pearl Harbour, hunched his shoulders and scuttled off stage. “Excuse me. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.”

An excruciating silence descended before Stinziano, marooned, asked for the audience to applaud. A few clapped. Then the executive resumed the presentation solo.

The Hollywood A-lister subsequently posted an explanation on his blog. “Wow! I just embarrassed myself at CES. I rarely lend my name to any products, but this one is just stellar. I got so excited to talk, that I skipped over the Exec VP’s intro line and then the teleprompter got lost. Then the prompter went up and down – then I walked off. I guess live shows aren’t my thing.”

This is a real example of how people suffer from a fear of public speaking. Who would have thought that a man who directs multi million pound films and tells hundreds of people what to do would have a fear of standing up and speaking in front of people.

Good for him that he was honest and wrote about how difficult he found it to stand up and speak in front of people. Let's hope that he seeks some advice and help so that he can stand up and enjoy the experience next time.

I love the fact that I get many opportunities to speak to people about the fact that I am a clinical hypnotherapist and what that actually means. I also often get chances to talk all about the other things that I have done during my career. I was recently lucky enough to be invited to Stratford School to speak to the sixth-form all about what they could expect once they finish their education. They were also kind enough to write a little feature all about it...Here is what they said...

Motivational Speaking from  IBM to Brum

Sixth Form students were treated to the motivational speaking prowess of Mark Powlett recently. The talk was arranged by the school’s Careers Advice and Guidance Manager Mr David Wallace and was part of  the year group’s career development education programme which he coordinates within  school.

The talk was intended to demonstrate the different directions careers can take and that starting out on one path doesn’t exclude other career choices later in life. Mark  Powlett started out his career working for IBM then retrained in Drama and has been an actor (notably the policeman in Brum) radio presenter and a stand-up Comedian. He  is currently working as a qualified hypnotherapist and  motivational speaker. He  certainly had his student audience  gripped with  his enthusiastic description of his life, Mark  even got all the students up and active doing a hand test to see if they would be susceptible to hypnotherapy or not.

Mark said of working with the students “It was a real pleasure to speak to the Sixth-formers about my own experiences in my career and how just being yourself can work  wonders in the world of work, as well as in your  home life. Every time I visit the school I leave smiling at the experience and feeling very  satisfied at the efforts that both the staff  and pupils  put into  their  education.”

David Wallace  explained  further “Mark   Powlett has a  tremendously enthusiastic and  positive character and having changed career direction successfully so many times he is a perfect person to talk  to our  students about the nature of  adapting to an ever-changing work  market. It is very unlikely that a young person will stay in a single job  for life and our students need to learn to accept and drive change in their  lives and  career  paths. Learning is not something that should finish at a government decided time in your  life, instead it can become part of your  life and career and enable you  to pursue a successful, enjoyable but varied career path”

The Sixth Form students have a career education development programme that runs throughout the academic year and introduces them to business professionals and academics as well as preparing them with employability skills like interview techniques and CV writing  skills.