Unit 3
Technical Presentation: Strategies and Techniques
Presentations can typically be categorized into four basic forms depending upon their purpose:
2. Instructive: Instructional presentations exist to provide directions or orders to a specific audience for teaching audience members new skills or presenting key information. This type of presentation typically runs longer than other types of presentations depending on how complex the subject is. An instructional presentation from a builder, for instance, might detail all the steps needed to plan construction, install water and electrical systems, fire escape, blueprints and more.
3. Persuasive: Persuasive presentations are those in which the speaker works to convince members of the audience to accept a proposal or the speaker is trying to make a sale. For instance, a city councilperson may use a persuasive speech to urge the rest of the council to allot more tax money for a brand-new park.
4. Decision-Making: Decision-making presentations are useful for professionals when their company has to choose specific policies or to make decisions about the company’s organizational structure. These types of presentations are generally highly interactive because the presenter introduces an idea or set of concepts that the entire group in attendance will work together on.
Depending upon the requirement, presentations can be classified into eight main forms:
1. Visual Presentation
A visual presentation involves the use of visual elements such as PowerPoint slides, videos, images, graphs and charts etc. for presenting an idea. This visual presentation technique is efficient for individuals who have many important talking points. This form of presentation includes a visual of what the speaker is talking about in the presentation.
2. Coach Presentation
The coach presentation style is typically employed by energetic and charismatic speakers. This presentation style is a great style to use with an audience who needs to be sold on an idea. Coach presentation is oral and does not involve too much detail in the presentation of ideas.
3. Instructor Presentation
The instructor presentation method is used to inform or educate the audience regarding a complex subject. With this form of presentation high impact visuals are used to get the point across to the audience. This presentation style is appropriate for speakers who are well-versed at presenting and are comfortable with their subject.
4. Freeform Presentation
The freeform presentation method doesn't employ the use of visual methods. This style of speaking is very impromptu and colloquial. This presentation style is useful for a speaker who has a short speech and knows their presentation points well.
5. Storytelling Presentation
The storytelling type of presentation relies on stories and examples to make points in their presentation. This style is suitable if only if the speaker has a lot of time to get their point across. This type of presentation may also appropriate for networking events and conferences. This presentation technique often has a question and answer session at the end of the presentation.
6. Connector Presentation
Connector presentations highly encourage audience feedback. The speaker will try to connect to the audience through their similarities. Sales and marketing presentations are often connector presentations.
7. Interactive Presentation
The interactive presentation method requires interaction between the speaker and the audience. The presenter can connect with the audience by passing out speaker notes or an outline before the presentation. The speaker could also interact with the audience by using a whiteboard or host a webinar. This style helps keep the audience engaged with what the speaker is saying.
8. Educational Presentation
The educational type of presentation is for a speaker who is teaching the audience. Educational presentations are useful for launching new products or informing the audience regarding a new technology. The audience can also be taught about the new product while the speaker is selling or offering it.
Interpersonal communication skills are the skills one uses while communication with individuals or groups in their everyday lives. People with good interpersonal communication skills often tend to be more successful than people who lack them. Interpersonal communication skills are vital in all areas of one’s life. People with good interpersonal communication skills are able to work well with other people and are also good with social interactions.
Though they are more targeted towards communication, interpersonal skills also include understanding body language, active listening, using gestures to express thoughts and feelings, and also dealing with different attitudes. They also include the skills and attributes associated with emotional intelligence, or being able to understand and manage your own as well as others’ emotions.
Interpersonal skills are extensively useful in work environments, they help maintain good social relationships among colleagues and also help mitigate employer-employee affairs.
Some of the most common interpersonal skills are:
Interpersonal communication skills determine how far one can go not only in their career but also in their social life, therefore it is essential to hone one’s skills to perfection.
People often assume that communication is a simple and natural thing but it is in fact a very complex process that involves a lot of learning. Hence it is said that there is a difference between communication and effective communication.
The development of interpersonal communication skills requires dedication and effort. The following are some of the ways in which one can improve their interpersonal communication skills:
Key Takeaways
A Class Room Presentation is a formal talk given on a specific set of topics to inform and educate. They may be short or long, include slides or other visual aids, and be done individually or in a group.
Planning and structuring a presentation is similar to the process of writing an essay, except the speaker needs to be conscious of a live audience and use spoken language instead of written.
Below are the four basic skills required to create a successful presentation:
Step 1: Planning:
While planning a presentation, the following questions should be kept in mind:
The presentation must be planned in such a way that it answers all these questions first before moving on to the structuring stage.
Step 2: Structuring the Presentation:
Like an essay, a presentation needs an introduction, body and a conclusion. The introduction may consist of an anecdote or provocative question to engage the audience right from the start. A question that includes your audience will make them want to follow through with you to find out the implications as they relate to them directly. The body will contain the main theme of the presentation where the ideas introduced earlier are explored thoroughly. The concluding statement should be a clear summary of what has been said in the main part of the presentation. It should also point toward further research or conclusive results if possible.
There are a lot of differences in speech and writing, and they must be kept in mind while preparing a presentation.
One of the most obvious ways in which to achieve natural speech is to speak sometimes in the first person - you can refer to yourself in a presentation, for example, "I'd like to start by..." or "Let me give you an example...", whereas in written projects it is best to keep the use of the first person to a minimum.
While preparing for a presentation, visual aids such as PowerPoint presentations could be very useful to illustrate one’s ideas more clearly. It can be very purposeful to employ such visual aids while discussing the central themes of the topic.
Step 3: Preparation:
Preparedness helps in easing nerves nous and boosts confidence. The following considerations should be kept in mind while preparing for presentations.
Time limits:
The presentation must be practiced a number of times to get the pacing right and to ensure the information can be contained in the time provided. Finishing too early might make the audience think that you lack proper material or understanding of the topic whereas finishing too late might make them feel boredom.
Speak from notes:
It's preferable to reduce the original paper to bullet points while presenting so as to not lose eye contact, intonation and good posture.
Body language:
Use of gestures and good posture combined with a smile keeps the audience engaged and interested.
Voice:
Loudness should be ample so that the audience can hear you clearly and the pace should be perfect so they can follow your arguments. Use silence and pauses effectively when making particular points, also speaking in monotone should be avoided.
Step 4: Presentation:
If all of the previous steps are followed carefully, one should be able to present easily and effectively. Questions should be welcomed and special attention should be given to the audience’s reactions and one’s own body language.
It should always be kept in mind what the purpose of the presentation is and all improvisations should be done in accordance to that purpose. The presentation should be ended with a polite “thank you” and all questions from the audience should be answered as clearly as possible.
Key Takeaways
The supervisor is expected to facilitate the participants to relate theory with practice, and monitor their progress in terms of accomplishment of field work tasks and objectives and improvement in quality of reporting. It provides the participants, an opportunity to reflect on their own strengths and weaknesses and work on them for the betterment. All participants are mandatorily required to attend all such Supervisory conferences. Field work without IC is considered as unsupervised field work and stands a chance of being cancelled.
Individual conferencing gives each participant personal face time with the supervisor in a designated space. In case of a student-teacher conference, individual conferences allow teachers to assess the abilities of students more efficiently while also allowing them to focus on strength and weaknesses of each individual student. Conferencing is an efficient technique to promote and develop relationships and gather important and specific data.
The essentials of individual conferencing are as follows:
There are certain advantages to individual conferences which are listed below:
Public speaking can be defined as a presentation which is given in front of a live audience. It is a performance-based art. The goal of public speaking may be to educate, influence or entertain the audience.
Public speaking is different to an online presentation is the sense that an online presentation is made as per the viewer’s discretion whereas public speaking is performed at a specific time and place.
Public speaking consists of five main elements:
It is significant to note that one of the most important rules of public speaking is to know one’s audience. In other words, the speaker must know how to talk to and influence his audience, to know which words will carry more effect, how his audience will react to a certain idea, what is the knowledge base or background of his audience etc.
Methods for effective public speaking:
Watching other efficient public speakers is a good way to learn and practice but everybody is different. That means that there aren't any rules for what makes an efficient orator. Part of being an authentic orator is knowing the way to be yourself when underneath the spotlight. Acting like yourself instead of trying to imitate somebody else allows you to behave more organically, which may be a boon when attempting to connect with an audience.
2. Knowing the Purpose of the Speech:
One should always know whether they want to influence, educate or inspire the audience and depending upon that one should decide how to formulate their speech.
3. Expanding Knowledge Base, Presentation tools and Vocabulary:
Reading about various topics is a great way to expand one’s horizons. ‘Always keep learning’ should be the motto of every public speaker. The speaker should be updated with current affairs and should have a vast vocabulary to incorporate within his speeches. One should also learn how to use electronic slideshows and other presentation tools as they provide an edge to the speech.
4. Playing to One’s Strengths:
Some people are good at storytelling others are good at using information to influence people. One should find out his strengths and practice them time and time again. The most efficient speakers are ready to effectively identify their strengths and use those strengths as tools to make a presence that's authentic and relatable.
5. Improvisation:
While speaking it is rare that things go exactly as planned. Therefore one should practice how to improvise when he fumbles or goes blank. Sometimes the presentation tool may malfunction, a listener may ask a question that the speaker is not prepared to answer or the speaker may simply forget one of their points, in situations like these, improvisation helps to get back on track and prevents the audience from losing interest.
6. Audience is the Center
The speaker is not the focus of the event, the audience is. All good orates cares more about the audience than themselves. This can be difficult if one has speech anxiety, which tends to fill them with bursts of anxiety and self-consciousness. However, focusing fully on the audience lifts a tremendous burden from your shoulders in terms of worrying about your performance.
One should practice taking the audience’s reactions into notice.
7. Using Body Language and Gestures:
Body language and gestures say as much as the words themselves. One should practice employing gestures as much as possible while speaking. Smiling and being active in general is useful for keeping the attention of the audience on the speaker.
8. Recording and Reviewing:
One of the most effective public speaking practice techniques is to record oneself while speaking, preferably video recording. Although few people like their own voice, the audience’s viewpoint is more important. Are you gesturing with your hands too much? Is the intro too long? Should you include a story in the middle, so you hold the audience’s attention? All of these questions are important to answer, and it can be easiest to do so by seeing yourself.
9. Practicing in front of Friends and Family:
Asking family or friends to be practice audience members is a good way to know where one is going right or going wrong. In most cases, these two groups of people know you better than anyone else in your life. That means that, although you may not want to hear it, they know your bad habits better than anyone.
In addition to your bad habits, your family and friends will also be able to tell you if you don’t quite sound like yourself.
Importance of Humour in Public Speaking
When used properly, humour is a powerful tool in any speaker’s arsenal and it can have tremendous benefits:
It creates a bond with the audience
A speaker who uses humour well comes across as more human, more likeable. This puts an audience at ease and makes people more receptive to your ideas. As British comedian John Cleese has said, “If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you more open to my ideas.”
It energizes people and keeps them engaged
When we laugh, there is a lot that goes on inside our body. Our heart rate increases and that keeps us stimulated and alert.
It can provide emotional relief for the audience
Many talks are serious and many talks are emotionally challenging for an audience. Well-placed humour can give your audience some much-needed relief in an otherwise serious talk.
It helps the audience remember your points
Laughter has been shown to improve memory and cognitive function. This helps the audience remember your ideas.
It leaves the audience with a good impression of the speaker
American poet, Maya Angelou, said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
Importance of Emotions
Emotions make humans different from the rest. Having emotions distinguish us from robots. Having emotions is what makes us humans. Feelings make us feel alive. Having emotions helps us to know one another. Having an emotional impact on the audience will allow the following:
Emotions help the speaker to relate to the audience and make the audience understand the message.
The main reason for giving a speech is to induce the message across to your listeners; whether you want to educate, persuade or inspire them. When a speaker shares a true-life experience, a speaker tells a story. By telling the story with feelings, the audience will understand what the speaker went through and also the points that the speaker is trying to make. The speech message will get across to the listeners faster and more practical. Through understanding, the questions of why, how and what are often answered.
Emotions helps speaker to connect with the audience.
Every time you hear a speech, you're always trying to find something or someone who you'll be able to relate too. what's the purpose of listening to someone who that does not understand you? A speaker who speaks with feelings can connect easily with the audience.
Emotions move the audience.
The use of emotions is vital especially when you try to inspire and motivate your audience. you need to deliver your speech with enthusiasm and dynamism. The audience will be inspired and motivated by you. you'll be able to convince them, to move them and drive them towards changing their life and their mind-set. History has proven that powerful speeches changed the planet and the greatest speakers in history delivered their speeches with passion, intensity and filled with heart.
Emotions make the speech more interesting.
The audience will not be interested in the speech of a speaker who does not show emotions while speaking. These expressions allow the audience to relate to what is being said and develops a sense of empathy in them towards the speaker.
The extemporaneous presentation is a type of presentation which is prepared, but not memorized. In an extemporaneous presentation, you do not write down your whole presentation word for word but instead use bullet points, key words and key phrases to trigger the next thought. Note cards or sheets of paper encased in plastic covers are the most efficient methods of delivering this presentation.
In this type of presentation, the contact with the audience is the maximum. The content and length of the presentation can be altered even while the presentation is in progress. Even though you are carefully prepared, you should not sound memorized or that you are reading your notes to the audience during an extemporaneous presentation.
Here are some steps you can take to assure you that you are preparing an extemporaneous presentation.
Step 1. The first step is to think about the topic, not writing, just thinking. The topic should be pondered upon and ideas surrounding the topic should be focused on. Writing can be perilous at this point as it will slow down the thinking process.
Step 2. Once you have spent a few hours thinking about the topic, write notes down on paper. The organisation or structure of these thoughts don't matter at this stage. You should write in bullet points instead of complete sentences as it will help you trigger new thoughts instead of formulating a full speech.
Step 3. Now all the ideas and thoughts written down earlier should be organised so as to form a rough outline, again, you should only group together similar thoughts instead of writing a complete speech. Based on this organisation, mark key ideas and jot down supporting ideas for these central ones. Which part would be the best way to start and where are you going to place the strongest argument?
Step 4. After writing down all your thoughts regarding the subject, you are now prepared to practice your speech. Don't think about articulation or organisation of ideas while speaking. Practicing will provide you the best ways to transition between ideas, which words you should use for key concepts and when to use non-verbal cues.
Step 5. Practice aloud in front of friends or family members as they can provide you with appropriate feedback. While practicing use the notes you are going to use in the actual presentation.
Step 6. To increase comfort level and build confidence on the day of the presentation, look through the points you wrote and practice elaborating one of those points, such as one of your stories and the introductory points.
Manuscript Presentation
A manuscript presentation is type of speech given by reading directly, word for word, from a previously prepared written message. This type of presentation involves verbatim reading of a speech and is most commonly used when there are no time constraints or the speech may be telecast.
An advantage to manuscript presentation is familiarity as one has to repeat the exact same words they see before them. However, one major downside is that it can be quite mechanical and monotonous and therefore uninteresting to the audience.
In your career you will probably deliver fewer than 20% of your presentations using a manuscript. These presentations will require you to be well prepared in advance. These speeches will usually be presented to large audiences in a meeting room or auditorium type facility and will be delivered from a lectern.
Below are some techniques that may be useful while presenting a manuscript presentation:
1. The manuscript is still a speech. Sight and sound are still the media. This is not to be confused with an essay standing on two legs. You are not a talking head.
2. Maintain your energy. It is very easy to become lethargic and thereby come off as dull and boring to your audience. Your passion for your presentation must come through by maintaining your energy at a high level.
Try this: Record yourself re-iterating an article from a newspaper or magazine out loud. Then, summarize the article in your own words, with as much passion and energy as you would do during an actual presentation. Notice the difference. You can quickly see the real challenges to maintaining your energy level so that you are able to support, and are not overpowered by, the multi-media presentation.
3. Use your own wording if possible. If at all possible, you should use your own words and phrases. This will happen, of course, if you write your own speech.
On the other hand, if your speech will be written for you, be sure to read it out loud several times before presenting it to make sure the words and phrases come easily to you. If they do not, examine ways to change the wording to suit your style.
4. Use spoken rather than written language. Try to avoid writing the speech out longhand or on your computer. Instead, dictate your speech into a tape recorder and have it transcribed.
You will find it is much easier to speak the spoken word than it is to speak the written word.
5. Use short, simple sentences. When delivering a manuscript speech, it is important to avoid using convoluted phrases and dependent clauses that may blur the clarity of your thoughts. Short, simple sentences will give you an opportunity to pause, look at your audience, and comfortably return to your presentation.
6. Prepare the manuscript in large print using both upper and lower case. The large print on the page should be triple spaced with wide margins. Divide the paper from top to bottom in thirds. Your prepared speech will then look like this: one-third left margin, one-third text, one-third right margin.
Be sure to divide this speech up into paragraphs and use bold letters to set up each of your key points.
7. "Score" the speech. Scoring the speech means underlining the keywords and phrases that are to be emphasized during the presentation. You also may draw arrows at particular areas where you may wish to raise or lower your voice. Avoid using a yellow highlighter . . . in many situations the lectern lighting will cause the highlighted sentences to blend in with the rest of the presentation.
In places where you think a natural pause or inflection would occur, insert a single slash. Use this to remember where to pause while reading that sentence.
Double slash at the end of a sentence and a triple slash at the end of a paragraph are a must.
8. Practice the speech. Practicing the speech is important but should not be done to such an extent that you start sounding monotonous. Practice glancing down and picking up the words and phrases you wish to use and then looking at your listeners to deliver them.
There is no more powerful way to emphasize your passion and to drive your points home than by pausing at the end of a strong paragraph or section. This must be rehearsed in order that you will be able to look in the eyes of your listeners as you deliver those last 12 - 15 words. Pause for a three or four count, then look down, grasp your next point, look at your listeners, and continue your speech.
9. Pace yourself. Do not read the presentation too quickly or you may find yourself wandering during the speech. Slow down if you feel you are going too fast.
If you tend to deliver a manuscript speech too rapidly. To help yourself remember to speak slower, you can write the word "slow" in the upper right hand corner of each page. Then as you turn each page you will be continually reminded to slow down.
10. Maintain eye contact. The typical representation of a manuscript presentation goes as follows. The speaker reads the speech, occasionally glances up for a brief second, and then comes back to the page. Several seconds later, when the speaker feels the need to give more eye contact, once again the quick glance is given.
Actually, the speaker sees nothing but the speech and is largely ineffective. While it is very difficult in a manuscript speech, try to look down to read and up to talk.
Since your speech is scored such that you only use the centre one-third of the page, it is therefore not necessary for your eyes to go from one side to the other.
You should be able to glance at your thought quickly by looking down, and then look at your audience. See people in the audience, look to the front, the sides, the back, and let people know you care about them and are willing to show it by giving them good eye contact.
Impromptu Presentation
An impromptu presentation is type of speech which you have to give in public without any preparation whatsoever. It is a presentation that one can be asked to provide with no prior notice. It can be one of the most terrifying speeches you’ll ever do; standing up in front of a crowd and having to speak for a few minutes without preparation is daunting even for the most seasons speakers. It’s not likely to happen often, however when it does, you don’t want to be caught completely off-guard.
Here are a few things to bear in mind if you’re asked to speak at short notice.
Make some quick notes
The first thing you should do when asked to speak, is to grab a pen and a piece of paper. Write down a few key words or phrases that can be used as ideas to expand upon during the presentation. If you don’t write anything else, make sure you’ve written down your starting and ending sentences as these are the most important.
Decide on the tone
Next, think about what tone to speak in. This will depend on the type of event you’re at. For example, at a wedding you would speak informally and you can have fun with the speech, whereas at a business conference you would speak more formally and stick to a professional tone.
Giving an impromptu talk to a group of people
Impromptu speech frameworks
This is when it gets easy. Below are some frameworks that will serve as structures to your presentation, pick any one of these whichever feels most convenient to you. They’re easy to remember so you won’t have to write them down, and instead can just write down keywords for each point.
1. The 5 Ws
If speaking about a particular person or a specific event, the 5 Ws framework could be helpful.
Following the 5 Ws provides instant structure to your speech and you’ll be able to organise your thoughts in an easy-to-follow way. You don’t even need to change the order - starting with ‘who’ gives context to the speech and ending with ‘why’ leaves the audience with the most important, relatable point.
Who - who is involved in the event or who is attending
What - what event are you at and what are the common goals?
Where - where is the event, how did the initiative the event revolves around start?
When - is the timing of the event important? What does the future hold?
Why - why is everyone there? Why are you there?
For example, if you have to give a presentation on a great scientific discovery, you can elaborate on when it was made, who were the key people involved in it, how has it affected modern life what are its future prospects.
2. Diplomatic framework
This framework is especially useful in formal setting such as business conventions or company meetings.
For this impromptu presentation, start by giving a one or two line introduction of the topic, then talk about the pros and cons of the subject and finally end with an appropriate conclusion. This framework provides you with more material to talk about then the 5 Ws all the while making your content more informative.
Silence is a key feature in this framework which can be used to your advantage. Given that there is less room for creativity, you may find you need to pause to think about what you’re going to say next. The time you spend thinking can be used to make the audience think you are letting your point settle, to do this walk a little on the stage, ask if there are any questions, or ask for a glass of water. These techniques all buy you more time if your mind goes blank and save you (and your audience) from feeling awkward about a prolonged silence.
3. Storytelling
Although this framework is more useful for informal events such as product launches and weddings, it can also be used in formal settings to make a point.
Storytelling is a powerful method of relating with the audience. When having to present when you aren’t prepared, you can start speaking in a story format with a small beginning and a larger than life conclusion. This process basically involves starting a topic from your own perspective and then extending it to global levels.
For example, if you’re asked to give a speech at a wedding, you could start from the time you first met the groom/bride and how they became a couple and your experiences with them (small), what their relationship and marriage means to the other people present and their families (medium), and end with the importance of matrimony and love (Big).
Being able to deliver an impromptu presentation is an important skill to possess and will help you get rid of last-minute panic when you're asked to speak without prior notice. It is essential to practice impromptu speeches on a variety of topics in order to nurture the mind to learn quick thinking and how to organise ideas.
Visual Presentation/ Power Point Presentation
PowerPoint presentations are an excellent way to present information visually and highlight key points. It’s important to make an efficient PowerPoint that highlights key elements, communicates ideas and increases the audience’s retention on the subject matter. Learning what to incorporate and how to format PowerPoint slides can make your presentation more visually appealing.
What is a PowerPoint Presentation?
A PowerPoint presentation may be a collection of slides curated to inform an audience on a specific topic. PowerPoint is a part of various software designed for office use be Microsoft called Microsoft Office. PowerPoint presentations are often used for business or educational purposes. Slides within the PowerPoint include but are not limited to text, images, graphics and other elements that help illustrate the subject matter. It’s important to make an efficient PowerPoint so as to take care of your audience’s attention throughout your presentation.
You can use a PowerPoint presentation:
How to Create a PowerPoint Presentation
You can create a PowerPoint presentation in Microsoft Office- PowerPoint. Below are the steps to be followed to create a PowerPoint Presentation:
2. After opening the application, click “Blank Presentation” on the opening screen and edit it to your liking. You can also create a brand-new PowerPoint by clicking “File” to change to “Backstage View” then “New.” this will offer you the choice to settle on a blank presentation, choose a template or search templates.
3. On the “Home” tab, click the “New Slide” button in the Slides group to create as many as needed for your presentation.
4. To select a unique layout for subsequent slides, click the “Layout” button within the “Home” tab to display the gallery of slide layouts and choose the layout of your choosing.
5. You can then add text, images and graphics to every layout using the toolbar.
6. Once you’re ready to give your presentation, click on the “Slide Show” tab and click “From Beginning.”
7. To go to the next slide, click anywhere on the slide or press the right arrow key.
8. Once you’re finished with your PowerPoint, you can save it on your computer by pressing ‘Ctrl + s’ keys or clicking save under the file menu.
Techniques for creating a great PowerPoint presentation
When preparing a PowerPoint presentation, it’s a good idea to create with intention, cohesion and purpose. A slideshow should include a clean design and key visual elements to assist audience engagement. Here are several things to think about in your approach and an in-depth check out each of them:
The purpose of a PowerPoint is to focus on key information. Start by making an overview of what you’d like your presentation to appear like. Minimize the number of slides so as to take care of a clear message. Creating an outline before time will assist you in staying focused on what to present to your audience.
2. Create an Easy Template
Once you have got an idea of what you’d like your presentation to incorporate, consider the visual elements that might correspond to your talking points. A well-designed presentation is vital for keeping your audience captivated.
Make your presentation stand out from the remainder by creating one of your own that's simple, refined and professional. Consistent backgrounds and slide formats will present your message with more transparency, as well. The content within each slide may vary, but the design elements should remain the same.
3. Consistency with Fonts and Colours
Your audience’s interest and comprehension can be increased with a sleek template paired with consistent design elements. Choose fonts and colours that correspond with your subject material and make the data easily readable.
Fonts
Colours
4. Focus on Your Key Points
When writing the text for your presentation, concentrate on the most essential material you want to cover. Your PowerPoint must guide the flow of your speech. Keeping your points simple will allow your audience to better comprehend your message. Make sure each sentence holds a purpose. Consider adding short and precise sentences to keep your presentation concise.
Many times, words can hinder more than they help when explaining a point. It’s also significant to keep in mind that visual elements such as photos, graphics, graphs and charts must be utilized in PowerPoint presentations in conjunction with the text.
5. Utilize the Right Type of Chart When Necessary
Charts and graphs are a great way to display a statistical data set and add another visual element to a PowerPoint presentation. Choose a chart type that best explains your data. The following are suitable choices:
6. Use Transitions with Caution
if you use too many transitions between slides, it may easily distract your audience and make it more challenging to understand your message. If you’re using transitions, use no more than two types of effects, choose simple transitions and don’t use them between every slide.
7. Avoid Sound Effects
Sound effects can obstruct your presentation and distract others from your message. Your audience can easily lose focus with sound effects that are unrelated to your presentation. Use music only when extremely necessary to highlight a point and try to avoid irrelevant sound effects altogether.
8. Use Audio and Video if Necessary
Audio-visual aids are a great way to gain the audience’s attention and will make the subject matter simpler to comprehend. These multimedia elements can often state your thoughts more easily and will separate any string of text-filled slides. Try to use audio and video that adds value to your presentation and does not digress from your overall message.
9. Use Quality Images
Images are a great way to separate the monotony of text and statistical content in a presentation. When adding photographs or graphics to your presentation, make sure the resolution is large enough to fit within the confines of your layout and not be blurry at the same time. If needed, use open-source websites such as Gettyimages.com for high-quality images to add to your presentation.
10. Review Your Presentation upon Completion
Once you think you have completed your presentation and covered every topic, review your slides from the beginning.
A well-edited PowerPoint will add credibility and value to your work. Read through every slide as if you’re seeing it for the first time, check for redundancy and remove anything that doesn’t add value. Simplify your wording and proofread for spelling and grammar.
A PowerPoint’s purpose is to highlight key points in your message. Rehearse your presentation, time yourself and use the slides to navigate through your speech. Know your subject material and when you feel ready to present, do so confidently.
Stage fright and performance anxiety are perfectly normal phenomena that occur in the majority of people before a public speech or presentation (to some varying degree). It can manifest as anxious jitters before a performance, or, for some people, it may be so debilitating that it actually prevents you from speaking, performing, presenting, and so on.
First of all, it's important to know what stage fright or performance anxiety is, because it's very hard to overcome something that you don’t fully understand. Anxiety, as outlined by Kaplan and Saddock’s introduction to psychiatry, usually consists of excessive worry which is accompanied by either motor tension or restlessness. In performance anxiety when a person is performing in front of an audience, this worry takes your focus off of your presentation, speech, or whatever else you wish to do before of an audience, and drives your attention instead to your fears and worries. The speaker or performer is now no longer interested in how they are going to communicate the message, but are only interested in the fact that they are really scared of that communication, which only further exacerbates the anxiety.
Causes of Stage Fright
Many people are unaware of the underlying causes of their performance anxiety. There are several factors that may be involved and each individual’s causes and experience with this fear may be different. Here are the most widely identified causes for the fear of public speaking:
The benefits of reducing your fear of speaking publicly will sharpen your speaking skills in the workplace and may help you to:
Techniques for Overcoming Stage Fear
When you identify what causes your stage fright and the effects of it, then you may be more aware of what you need to do to overcome your fear of public speaking. Below are some effective techniques for overcoming stage fear:
When you organize yourself, you're more likely to possess a clear mind so you'll be able to better concentrate on your key points. You may get organized by:
2. Practice
Your nervousness will dissipate after you practice and practice often. Before you write out cue cards, it can be helpful to jot down out a script that you can read over a few of times to memorize certain details that support your key points. It’s hard to understand what you're doing right once you practice on your own.
Once you complete any or all of these tasks, you'll be able to change your presentation accordingly.
3. Visualize a positive outcome
Think about what a positive outcome appears like, feels like and sounds like to you. Write down these outcomes and identify any probable alternative outcomes. Scratch a line through any outcome you would not want to happen and circle the outcomes that you would like to happen. You may also practice the audience reaction with a person that listens to your speech before you perform it to a big or small group.
4. Get support
It is easier to beat a fear if you have people to encourage you who have experienced similar things as you. There are several ways you can get support before you speak publicly.
Here are a few ways you may want to take advantage of:
5. Start small
There are steps you can take before you overcome your fear of oral presentation and master the art of giving speeches. Start small by:
Starting with small events will likely provide you with the confidence and expertise you need to feel to be able to speak in front of larger audiences.
- Self-consciousness in front of large audiences
- Fear of judgment
- Fear of appearing nervous
- Past failures
- Lack of preparedness
3.8.1 Audience Analysis
A thorough understanding of your audience is important for an effective presentation. Never overestimate an audience’s knowledge, never underestimate their intelligence. The following questions regarding the audience should be kept in mind before designing a presentation:
These questions will help you determine the perfect strategy to create and present your presentation. Remember your audience can be: friends, colleagues, clients, unknown people or a combination of all of these.
3.8.2 Retention of Audience Interest
Below are some useful methods for keeping the audience interested in a presentation:
Key Takeaways
- Who are they?
- How many will be there?
- Why are they coming?
- What do they know about the subject?
- Why are they interested in the subject?
- What is their relationship to you?
Interpersonal methods are dependent on the speaker/presenter’s interactions with his audience. But there may be many hindrances which may not allow the speaker to be as efficient as possible. Are you aware of your strengths and weaknesses as a presenter? You may have some ideas already. For example, if you are very soft-spoken, you may consider that to be a weakness if you’re on a stage, especially without a microphone. Soft-spoken people also sometimes keep low-key in other ways; maybe they’re plainer in the way they dress or have less expressive mannerisms. Many people think that to be effective on stage you must be a rip-roaring extrovert. This is not true. No matter who you are, if you are aware of the qualities that make you a unique individual and you spend time getting to know your audience, you can convert perceived weaknesses into potential strengths. Conversely, if you are so overconfident about your abilities that it shows itself in poor preparation and lack of concern for your audience or environment, your strengths can quite quickly become weaknesses.
Your first step in helping define what makes you yourself is to look at what you’re good at and what you enjoy doing. At the same time, this helps you distinguish what you’re not so good at and what you don’t enjoy. Make a list as you go through the next sections on your verbal and non-verbal communication techniques to get a reasonable prediction about how to focus your strategy as a presenter.
There are 5 basic steps to the interpersonal presentation method:
Self-awareness implies being aware of one’s own thoughts, feelings and emotions. This activity helps in gaining emotional intelligence which in turn helps in effective communication. Every individual is projecting subconscious messages throughout the day that might affect other people around them, therefore it is essential that one is mindful of their thoughts and only share what they want to.
2. Being Respectful and Empathetic Towards Others
Everyone is entitled to their own opinions no matter how different or abstract they may be. To be a good presenter one must always respect another’s opinion with no judgment or condemnation. Empathy is a quality every great thinker and communicator throughout history, if one cannot be empathetic towards others one cannot understand how they feel or what they think in any given situation, therefore it is necessary that one should be compassionate and empathetic towards others.
3. Actively Listening to others
Listening is probably the most underrated skill among the 4 basic communication skills. But much like the other skills it has to be honed and developed. Only when one listens clearly can one respond to a given message. It is easy to passively keep on hearing the speaker but it is difficult to actively listen as it requires total attention on the receiver’s part.
4. Avoiding Talking Over Others
While listening one tends to convey his thoughts as soon as he thinks of them without considering whether the speaker has finished speaking or not, this leads to being perceived as rude and hasty. To avoid this one must let the speaker finish first and then convey their thoughts as clearly as possible.
5. Saying “Yes” Before Saying “No”
It is essential to not outright reject new ideas and thoughts without listening to them or acting upon them. If one does not hear a topic that appeals to his own ideals or opinions, he tends to reject the new without even listening to it. This process inhabits one’s ability to expand one’s horizons and should not be continued.
Impersonal Presentation methods require the speaker to use a form of language which does not address the audience and themselves directly. It involves communication in the form of impersonal pronouns. This type of language is useful when the presentation is to be performed in front of an unknown audience or in formal situations where the audience is not very familiar to the speaker. There are several ways in which Impersonal methods may be used for effective presentations, they include:
Most presentations are followed up with a quiz or a question and answer period. To some people this could be one of the most exciting parts of the presentation, whereas to others it can be their worst nightmare. In fact, there are some presenters who purposely avoid the question and answer period altogether. Below are some techniques on handling questions during and after a presentation:
2. Pause and permit yourself time to value the question and listener. Repeat the question out load therefore the entire audience can hear it. It is important that everybody "hears" the question or the solution you provide might not add up to a number of the people. Repeating the question may allow you some overtime to gauge the question and formulate a response.
3. Credit the Person for asking the question. You may say something like, "That was an excellent question" or, "Glad you asked that question" or maybe, "I get asked that question a lot". One word of caution. If you credit one person with raising an issue, make certain to credit everyone for raising an issue. You don't want people to feel their question wasn't as important.
4. Respond to the Question honestly and the best you can. If you are do not know a solution to an issue, don't attempt to fake it. Be honest, and tell them you are doing not know but do promise to research the solution for them and do revisit to them.
5. Bridge to subsequent question by asking them a question. "Does that answer your question?", "Is that the type of data you were looking for?". this is often critical. Once they answer you, "yes" you now have permission to travel on to subsequent person. This also gives them another opportunity to mention, "No" and permit them to clarify their question more by asking it again.
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