Top Ten Presentation Tips
When your career is on the line, your presentation skills must be at the same high level as your business skills. Following are some tips that will help you be perceived as a confident and effective presenter when it matters:
1. Relate to your AUDIENCE, not to your handouts or visuals.
Maintain steady eye contact. It connects you to your audience and personalizes your presentation. Think of S-T-O-P or Single Thought One Person (3-6 seconds per look)
Don t turn your back and talk to the screen.
2. Control your BODY LANGUAGE
Think of the three S’s — Use GESTURES that are:
...repetitive. Try if you can to keep the main issues in your presentation to fewer than five, no matter how long your speech is. If you can't actually put it together as a traditional story, what you must do is ...
o SUSTAINED (for longer than you would in one-on-one conversation)
o SPECIFIC to the message
STAND centered with your weight evenly distributed on both feet.
Don t fiddle with pen, change in your pocket, laser pointer or glasses.
3. Be CONVERSATIONAL
Slow down. No machine gun delivery.
In conversation we talk in word bursts and sentence fragments and then PAUSE to think of what to say next. It helps your audience, as well.
Keep your eyes out of your notes or you will sound stilted.
4. Be vocally CRISP. This will help you sound dynamic, and will eliminate a droning
monotone.
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Intersperse short punchy sentences among your longer ones.
Purge the connectors and and so , which cause your sentences to go on and on.
5. Use POSITIVE LANGUAGE.
Take a stand. Here s what I think, and here s why. Avoid:
o TENTATIVE language — “I think this might work.
o APOLOGIES — Correct me if I m wrong.
o REPEATED FILLERS — basically , um , okay?
6. Organize a FOCUSED MESSAGE
Think strategically about the big picture and the business impact of your presentation.
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Focus on the relevance or benefit of a product or service, not on how it works.
Don t talk too long or say too much.
7. Have a STRONG ENDING.
Don t overrun the meter.
Ask for action instead of the most common and least effective well, that s it, I guess , close.
8. REHEARSE. Like golf, improving your skills takes real work, not repetition.
Memorize your opening and your close.
Transitions are the key to a smooth and polished presentation. Use one rehearsal to practice only your transitions from one point to the next.
9. LIGHTEN UP
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A light touch does not mean telling jokes. It means having a sense of humor.
10. Anticipate challenging QUESTIONS and practice your answers.
Prepare succinct answers with examples
Talk your answers into a tape recorder. Check to see whether they are too detailed / too defensive.
Perception often IS reality. These tips will ensure that when you give a presentation, the perception of you is positive and matches your ability.
Roberta Prescott
Roberta Prescott heads The Prescott Group, a communication firm specializing in Executive Development. Visit our web site (http://www.theprescottgroup.com) for more information about our seminars — “Speaking Made Easy”,
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