It’s an NFL playoff game.  It’s a win or go home situation. A player limps off the field after getting hurt. In many cases, it’s no big deal and he can walk the injury off before he needs to be back on the field. Sometimes, it’s obvious that he needs to go to the locker room for further evaluation and may be injured so severely that returning to the game is out of the question.

What happens when the injured player is still able to perform at some level but that level isn’t quite what it should be? How does an ill or injured athlete determine if he or she is hurting the team more by staying in the game than by leaving it?

I came across an interesting blog post comment the other day:

I sliced the tip of my finger off while in Architecture school 2 days before my final review, and had to give my presentation while all doped up. I kept pointing with my heavily bandaged finger, cracking ridiculous jokes, and fortunately don’t remember a second of it other than my prof telling me to go home and go to bed after vomitting in the garbage can. … I really wish someone had videotaped this! To this day, I still have no idea if I actually spoke about the building that I designed or not.

Stories like this beg the question: How does an ill or injured presenter determine if presenting while impaired will cause more damage than canceling, postponing or calling in an understudy?

Some presenters are so fragile that they shouldn’t be put in front of an audience when they have the sniffles. They are so distracted they make mistake after mistake and so miserable they threaten to draw down the energy level of the entire room.

On the other hand, I’ve had the privilege of working with speakers with Olympic-level strength and commitment.

One had been fighting a serious respiratory infection for the last couple weeks leading up to a high-stakes presentation. As he progressed through the PowerPoint, I expected each slide to be his last as his voice got rougher and harder to hear. Toward the end, it seemed to almost give out just before each slide transition. He made it through the talk weakly but flawlessly and then went back to his hotel room and slept for 24 hours straight.

Another co-worker was able to perform at the highest level two days after being hospitalized with a burst ovarian cyst. I’m told that this is something like the presenter’s version of a hockey player coming out of the locker room to finish the game after getting 20 or 30 stitches.

Both of these presenters insisted in fulfilling their responsibilities and, fortunately, everything turned out okay in both for both of them.

Would it have been better if they had taken themselves out of the game?

If you’re working in a team situation, is there someone designated to make the call when it seems like an understudy should fill in for an ill or injured presenter? Someone with enough juice in the organization to bench anyone? Someone who can consider each presenter’s health status objectively and who will be willing to take the decision out of the presenter’s hands if necessary?

Have you ever given a presentation when not at your best and wished you hadn’t? How did that work out for you?