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How many times have you sat through a technically competent but ultimately dreadful presentation?

There was nothing wrong per se, but you were completely and utterly bored! That’s how most presentations appear to me. Now am I being a little unfair?

Well maybe but I believe that is due to the fact we have grown use to poor quality presentations. In addition, the modern business world has become so focused upon measures, reports, facts, and KPI’s that we have become accepting of dullness. Dullness in our conversations, meetings, and interactions!

One of the key reasons that presentations go badly; by badly i mean there are no technical errors but the presenter has no impact upon the audience; is that the speaker learns lines and/or just reads out slides. This is not presenting! Perhaps we need to understand why this low-risk method is utilized so heavily yet has so little impact or pay-off.

Well first off the speaker is unlikely to ever make a technical mistake. The irony is that even if they did, it is unlikely, unless we are talking about an audience of complete experts on the topic, that anyone would notice. Therefore, people feel comfortable either memorizing their lines or alternatively reading straight from slides but take no risks and achieve little.

The problem is that the speaker never really engages with their subject matter using this method (which only uses the logical side of the brain). And if you are not passionate about your topic, how the hell do you expect your audience to enjoy it?

As a speaker or presenter, you need to engage the emotional side of your brain which has nothing to do with facts and figures. When you’re subject starts to come alive, so will your audience in response to the more engaging You!

Great keynote speakers practise and practise, using techniques such as visualization to prepare. They also will use stories and anecdotes to capture the audience’s imagination even if the topic is really dry.Try to make your audience “feel”, “see”, “imagine”, “smell”, “taste” where appropriate to engage their senses. Any presentation is not really about the speaker or even the topic, its about the audience and getting them ‘alive’.

Don’t worry about the specifics too much. Your audience will not know the order you had planned. This is not to say that facts and figures are not important. indeed, the best speakers use both emotion and logic, and often in that order.Also don’t be afraid to get some presentation skills training. You can often find coaches in your area that can deliver significant improvements by just assessing your current level of performance and giving feedback on how you can improve.

Also watch politicians on debate shows. The most successful in my experience, play to emotions and needs, and then answer questions and objections with “facts”. The best sales people do this as well.

So in summary, practise your speech again and again. Know the key facts but don’t learn everyth last number. By all means think of difficult questions that may be raised and rehearse answering them but don’t learn lines.

Tags: presentations | powerpoint | powerpoint | presenters | presenters | boardroom | boardroom | training | training | business | speakers | emotions | emotions | speeches | speeches

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This entry was posted on Monday, October 20th, 2008 at 12:33 pm and is filed under Professional services. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.