There are some presenters you could watch for hours. They are interesting, relevant, funny, insightful, engaging…

Unfortunately, most of us mortals just aren’t like that. We need to work hard to get the audience on our side.

There are many ways to do this, of course. But a great technique is to stimulate interactivity with your audience. The more they are involved, the more they tend to enjoy it and buy into your content. And to you. To trigger interactivity, you could…

• Hold a Q&A session, at the start, during and/or end of your presentation
• Ask questions, to which your audience shouts out their answers
• Ask questions, which they discuss in pairs/groups
• Give them group exercises, maybe adding that they present their findings back to the room
• Give them something to review – as individuals, pairs or groups
•  Host a quiz
•  Ask for their comments
• Ask them to identify their “favourite thing so far” (this works well on workshops)
• Ask them to identify the actions they will take (great for triggering next steps… in fact, if you don’t do this, they often won’t take any)

How many of these should you do? As always, it depends.

But, unless you want to speak for 100% of the time, you will need to do more than none.

Action point

Next presentation, ask yourself if it would enhance the audience’s – and your – experience if there was more interactivity. If so, consider which of the above you should include.

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Getting air-time with senior audiences can be hard.

And then, how often does this happen…

‘The agenda has over-run, so we’re going to have to shrink your thirty minute session down to five. What did you want to say?’

These things happen. It is nobody’s fault. But what can you do about them?

Some options I have seen – but do not endorse – are:

• Deliver the same content ten times more quickly – this just ends up a mess
• Give hand-outs, and say ‘please turn to page 8’ – they don’t: they flick through the pack and don’t listen fully to you
• Offer to come back another day – this might work, but how do you know that things won’t over-run then?

A better option is to present using the four steps: Wallop, Down, Up, Please:

1. Wallop – start witha  big bang which instantly shows the impact of not changing
2. Down – make this impact worse
3. Up – show there is an alternative which will improve the situation
4. Please – ask for the audience to do something

For example…

‘Thanks for your time today.

1. ‘We are potentially wasting £230,000 per month on X.
2. Even worse, this number is going to increase over the next couple of months. Projected needless waste will cost £2.8million this year. This figure will of course increase to over £5.6million in the next couple of years.
3. We can reduce theses costs by over 75% – that’s a potential saving of over £4million – by implementing X [spend 2-3 minutes explaining your proposal]. 
4. Therefore, given the potential savings of over £4million if we successfully implement this, please can I ask you to do Action X’

Will it definitely work? No, nothing always works.

But, it has got a much greater chance of triggering interest than the much more prevalent alternatives above.

Action Point

Next time you are presenting to a senior audience, prepare two presentations – your traditional one, plus a Wallop, Down, Up, Please version. The latter won’t take long to write, but will give you options if you need them.

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You don’t need to watch any of the six Star Wars films. The titles tell you everything you need to know.

To understand what I mean, you only need know that the goodies are called “Jedi” and the baddies are called “Sith”, who work for the “Empire”.

The six films are called:

1. The Phantom Menace
2. Attack of the Clones
3. Revenge of the Sith
4. A New Hope
5. The Empire Strikes Back
6. Return of the Jedi

In other words…

1. A baddie appears
2. There is a fight
3. The baddies win
4. There’s hope for the goodies
5. But the baddies win again
6. And, finally, the goodies win overall

And that’s it. No need to watch any of the films.

Similarly, when you prepare communications, let your titles tell the story. Doing so ensures you flow smoothly from topic to topic. It’s easier for the recipients to follow.

For example, if you were preparing a communication about launching a new initiative, your titles could be…

• Times are getting harder
• And it’s costing us money
• So, we looked at three options
• Option X was too risky
• Option Y was too expensive
• Leaving Option Z as the clear way forward
• So, our next steps are…

Once you have the titles, simply add the relevant content under each, and you have a well-thought out, fluid, persuasive communication.

(Also, don’t forget the final bullet point above. You always need a final title about “next steps”, or there won’t be any…)

Action Point

For your next important communication, work out the titles first. If it helps, use the four P’s as a framework to guide you…

• Position – the current situation is…
• Problem – and it’s bad for us because…
• Possibilities – so our choices are…
• Propose – and I therefore propose our next steps are…

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Are you interesting?

I guess your answer is “yes” or “I hope so!”

And, when you’re making a presentation? Are you interesting then?

What’s your answer now?

To be an interesting presenter – and it is much nicer for both you and your audiences if you are – you only need to…

1. Know the things people find interesting; and
2. Use them

Everyone could come up with a good list in answer to point 1 – interactivity, stories, humour, good visuals, relevance, variety etc.

But – and this is weird, when you think about it – even though people know what audiences find interesting, they don’t always use them.

Logically, if you do not use any “interesting things”, you won’t be interesting. Just using one makes you more interesting. Use a few, and you’re probably one of the best presenters in your team.

Every time I present, after I’ve prepared my content, I use a highlighter pen to highlight the “interesting things” – the interactive bits, stories, humour etc.

Any sections which aren’t highlighted are therefore not interesting, so I can…

• Insert something interesting (this could be as simple as stimulating interactivity by asking “before I go on, are there any questions?”); and/or
• Remove some of the boring content
• Change the order of my presentation, to break up the boring block etc

Action point

For your next presentation, whether it be an informal team briefing or a formal conference keynote, highlight the interesting bits in your content, ensuring you have some at the start, end and sprinkled throughout. Reduce any un-highlighted sections, by using some of the techniques above.

Your audience – and you – will be grateful you did…

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Yesterday, in a restaurant, I sat next to a man eating rabbit.

You can read this sentence in two ways. One will trigger apathy; one, amazement.

So, the same message can mean vastly different things to different people.

For example, when leaders say “Here’s the new strategy”, they might think “Here’s my exciting vision”; whereas their people might think “Is my job going to get worse?”

Or, when managers say “I need this by Friday”, they are thinking “this is urgent”, but the other person might think “I’m sure you do. But I’m busy”.

The sender of an “FYI” might think “this will help you” (or “this is now off my desk”!), whereas the recipient might think “What am I supposed to do with this?”

And, to the hundreds of salespeople out there, when you say “We were founded in 1922; we have got 80 offices and 4,000 staff”, your customers often think “OK, so you’re old, big and fat. But can you help me?”

You can’t second-guess everything that other people will think, but you can do so more often than “not at all”.

Do you think you review your communications from your audiences’ point of view?

Do they think you do?

Action point

When preparing your next communication, review the content, pretending that you’re the audience…

• What will they like/not?
• When will they want you to speed up/slow down?
• What is in there that they wish wasn’t?
• What’s not in there that they wish was?

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Unless you are very lucky, most presentations you see won’t be particularly interesting. You know the type of thing – wordy slides, long introductions, irrelevant content…

But there’s a strange phenomenon with presenting: ‘What we hate, we do’. So…

• as an audience member, you might hate wordy slides; but, when presenting, you use wordy slides to remind yourself what to say
• as an audience member, you hate long introductions; but, when presenting, you think “I’d better give a detailed introduction, to set the scene”

Instead of doing what you hate, why not do what others love? The best presentations have four elements:

1. Content
2. Delivery
3. Visuals
4. Certainty

In other words, your content and delivery must persuade and/or inspire your audiences to do what you want.

Your visuals must be congruent – it’s amazing how often the message of “Our cutting-edge idea” is accompanied by shoddy slides.

And, make sure you’re convinced and confident on the inside, or your outside is unlikely to persuade your audience.

The great news is that, because most presentations aren’t interesting, improving yours should help you stand out amongst your peers.

Action point

Of the four elements listed above, identify the one where it would be easiest for you to improve, and focus on that.

And, once that element is working more effectively, focus on the next…

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According to various pieces of research, making presentations is one of people’s greatest fears.

If this sounds like you, here are some ideas to help boost your confidence …

Ensure your content is interesting

If you know your content will benefit your audience, you know they are more likely to be interested in what you have to say – a real confidence-booster.

So, focus your efforts on ensuring you talk about what they want to hear. And the easiest way to do this? Ask what they want you to cover – their priorities, concerns etc.

Ensure your delivery is interesting

Include at least 1-2 audience-friendly elements – interaction, stories, quizzes, humour etc – to stimulate them … and keep it interesting for you. Again, if you know they’ll enjoy it, it’s great for your confidence.

Focus on the positives

With presentations, you often get what you expect. If, before you speak, your only thought is “I hope I survive this”, the best you can hope for is survival. On the other hand, if you think “I’m looking forward to sharing my ideas with them”, you’re more likely to make a big difference.

Practice

If an actor doesn’t know their lines, they won’t be able to concentrate on their performance. Instead of focusing on the acting, they’re thinking “What’s next?”

It’s the same with presenting. Unless you have practised enough, you are partly focussing on what you’re about to say, rather than giving your main attention to the audience.

And don’t go the other way …

Although confidence is important, some of the worst presentations I have seen were by people who “knew” they were brilliant, and gave the impression the audience was lucky to hear them! So, there’s nothing wrong with butterflies … as long as they’re flying in formation.

Action point

For your next presentation, choose one of the above techniques, and focus on that. If it helps your confidence on the day, keep doing it. If that particular technique doesn’t work for you, focus on another one. Remember, unless your inside is right, your outside probably won’t be.

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Have you ever been to a Conference, looked at the person on stage and thought “Why am I listening to this?”

If so, it will have been very unpleasant for you… and, if the speaker realised the audience was thinking this, even worse for them.

When you are the speaker, you want your audience to think – before you even walk on stage – that….

1.  I need to hear this topic….
2. …. from this person.

So, ask your introducer to cover two things in their introduction….

1.  Why your topic is critical to the audience, and…..
2. … why you and your expertise will help

For example:

1. As we all know, we are about to embark on a new journey. And it’s important we do,  we’re in a difficult climate now. Our competitors continue to raise their game. Our customers are demanding more and more … for no extra money. We have to go up a level.
   
2. I’m delighted to say that our next speaker will help us do just that. She is an acknowledged expert on transformational change. Her book X is the reference book in this area. Her client X said “XXX” about her. Ladies and gentlemen please welcome on stage Mrs X.

Without Sentence One, the audience might think “Why am I listening?”

Without Sentence Two, they might think “Why am I listening to her?”

Action point

At the next Conference you speak at/organise, ensure all speakers’ introductions tick both of the above boxes. The introduction won’t take long, but it allows the speaker to start with the audience on their side.

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I like these – three easy ways to make you look competent, prepared and practised…

1. If you want to jump to Slide 8, press ’8′ and ‘Enter’… much more polished than pressing the ‘up arrow’ countless times!
2. Start your presentation in show mode by pressing the function key ‘F5′… easier than clicking on ‘Slide show’, then ‘View show’
3. My favourite thing about Power Point… ensure your audiences look at you, not the slides, by blanking out the slides – press B (for Black) or W (for White)

Action point

If you don’t use these three techniques, use them! It’s much easier for you, and your audience.

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If the final slide of your presentation says ‘Any questions?’, your audience will ask you questions.

If your final slide says ‘Thank you’, your audience will say ‘You’re welcome’.

But, if you want the audience to take action, your last slide should say so, by using these two simple steps…

1. Give 2-3 options of actions for the audience to take, so they can choose how to proceed (remember: if you say ‘Do you want to do X?’, they might say ‘no’. If you say ‘X or Y’, you’re more likely to get a ‘yes’)
2. A benefits-rich title, so it’s clearly in their interest to choose at least one of the options – ‘To move things forward…’, ‘How to achieve our goal quickly’ etc

One of our customers used to have a credentials presentation ending ‘Thank you’. We re-wrote their last slide to:

• Title – ‘How can we best help you?’
• Options…

o a free audit, to identify potential savings for you
o research how the market perceives you compared to the competition
o we come back and present our formal ideas to your colleagues

Before this change, their presentations triggered zero interest. Now, every one triggers something. The perfect combination of minimal input for maximum output.

Action point

Next presentation, write your last slide first, using the above two steps.

Then, ask yourself ‘what’s the minimum I must say, to ensure the audience chooses one of the options?’

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Have you ever prepared for a conference presentation, and not known where to start?

Have you ever wondered how to trigger total audience engagement in your first sentence?

It isn’t easy to do. But here is one technique that often works…

1. Before your presentation, find the key 2-3 areas that your audience is most concerned about
2. Start your presentation with the phrase “Have you ever”, followed by these 2-3 areas

For example, I recently addressed a conference where a few simple questions beforehand showed me the audience was underperforming because they wasted time and energy attending needless conference calls and meetings, and listening to tedious presentations. So I started my keynote as follows…

“Good morning everyone. I have a question for you..

Have you ever been on a conference call that was terrible? [audience laughter and murmurs of agreement]

Have you ever attended a meeting and thought “Why am I here?” [more laughter and agreement]

Have you ever heard a presentation and thought “Give me a print-out of your wordy slides, and let me go … I
can read them myself” [more laughter and agreement]”

After these few sentences, the audience was already thinking “this guy understands me. He knows my pain. He’s done his research”. And – more importantly – “he could help me. He’s worth listening to”

So, introducing communications with “Have you ever” can be very useful. Did you notice how this email started?

Action point

Next conference presentation – or, indeed any presentation – ask yourself whether “Have you ever” would engage your audience early.

If so, ask questions beforehand, to find their pain-points, and incorporate their answers in Sentence One.

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A relay race can be won or lost at the “baton change”.

After all, runners are great at running … it’s the handover where problems arise.

Similarly, presenting teams often come unstuck at the “speaker change”.

After all, presenters are great at presenting their subject… it’s the handover that’s problematic.

So, just as relay teams repeatedly practise their baton changes, so too must your team practise your handovers.

An effective technique is to “bye-hi”. This is where – at the end of her slot – Presenter One says “Bye” to her subject and “Hi” to Presenter Two’s…

“So, (bye) I’ve shown how this project will positively impact on your workforce. But (hi) it’s important to discuss the financial implications of this, which Jane will now run through.”

And, if you’re presenting on your own, and not in a team? Help your presentation run seamlessly by using the Bye-Hi Principle to link your topics, slides, messages, etc.

Action point

Ensure your next presentation flows by starting your preparation by scripting and practising your bye-his.

After all, like the relay team, if your links are seamless, you’re more likely to win.

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Presenters use PowerPoint in one of two ways:

• As a presenter aid to present alongside; and/or
• To send before/after/instead of their presentation, as a permanent record

This poses a problem re slide content…

… The former requires sparse slides. After all, if your slides contain all the detail, you’re not needed.

… However, the latter requires full slides. Since you’re not there, the slides must contain everything.

Therefore, it is impossible for the same slide-set to satisfy both objectives. How can something tell only a small piece of the story, whilst simultaneously telling the entire story?

People find it hard to create impactful, persuasive, congruent slide-sets containing the right amount of information – I know this because organisations and leaders regularly ask us to create presentations for them. But here’s a quick technique that will significantly improve the impact your slide-sets – and, therefore, you – have…

When you’re both presenting alongside and also emailing a slide-set, prepare two versions: one full; one sparse. This sounds like twice the work, but it isn’t. It just requires the use of the “delete” key, in that you:

1. Create the full slide-set (your permanent record)
2. Delete as many words as possible (to create your presenter aid)

Since both slide-sets now give the two audience-types everything they need, your audiences are more likely to engage and say “yes” more quickly.

So, weird though it sounds, it’s overall much quicker to do two versions, not one.

Action point

Next time you’re required to both present and send a presentation, do the full version first (then send it). Then, delete as many words as you can to leave yourself sparse slides to present alongside.

Don’t fall into the trap of creating a slide set that tries to do both jobs, and thus does neither.

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Think of a time when you’ve had to dress to impress… maybe for a business-critical presentation, a career-defining meeting or interview, a wedding… a court appearance?!

I imagine you chose your clothes by…

1. Thinking “what impression do I want to create?”
2. Identifying the outfit that would create that impression
3. Of this outfit, identifying which clothes you currently owned…
4. … Then where to source the ones you didn’t
5. Trying different combinations of your clothes – what goes with what etc
6. Thinking of things that might go wrong (e.g. it might rain) and finding solutions (an umbrella)
7. Trying everything on, until you were happy you looked as dashing as possible

These seven steps are almost identical to how you should write an important communication, by…

1. Thinking “What do I want the audience to do after this?”
2. Identifying the content that would cause them to do it
3. Of this content, identifying which information you currently have…
4. … Then where to source the content you don’t
5. Trying different combinations of your content – what goes with what, what’s least important (should be removed), what’s most important (should go first) etc
6. Thinking of things that might go wrong (e.g. audience objections) and finding solutions (preparing your responses)
7. Practising everything, until it’s as effective as possible

Doing all seven is better than the more common approach of doing Step 3 only – basing all content round the slides and stories you currently have. At best, this might work. At worst, it will go spectacularly wrong, maybe even leaving your audience feeling offended and disrespected because they can tell you haven’t tailored things to them.

Action point

Of the seven points, hand on heart, which do you do least often? It would improve your effectiveness to include it – it’s worth changing your preparation habits so you do.

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Two phrases you commonly hear…

• ‘I don’t feel comfortable making presentations’
• ‘I use PowerPoint as a comfort blanket’

Which does beg the question … how good a comfort blanket can PowerPoint be, if people feel so uncomfortable using it?

And, even if you like PowerPoint, it’s your audiences – not you – that dictate whether your presentations are a success. So, your slides must be audience aids, not speaker prompts.

Audiences hate sitting through robust, tedious, unvaried slides. Presenters hate delivering alongside them. So, here are five simple guidelines to using PowerPoint more effectively:

1. Start correctly: begin by thinking what you want your audience to do after your presentation – not what your content/slides should be. Let this ‘do’ govern your entire preparation
2. Go to PowerPoint last, not first: PowerPoint should be a tool to convey your thinking, not the way you think
3. Less words: your slides should accompany – not duplicate – you. They must not tell the whole story, or there’s no point you being there. Only put key, simple, digestible words/visuals on your slides, for you to elaborate on
4. Use the visual medium for visuals: PowerPoint is an excellent tool for communicating visual messages – graphics, charts, etc, but is not a good way to communicate full sentences and reasoned arguments. You – the presenter – are better at doing that. Either create visual, text-light presentations; or wordy, text-heavy documents. Don’t create something that tries to be both and, thus, is neither
5. Build your slides: if a slide has six points, your audience will be reading points 2-6 while you discuss point 1. This means they aren’t fully focused on any of them. Stop them reading ahead by clicking to bring up each new point

And the best thing about PowerPoint? When you press ‘B’ on the keyboard, it blacks out the screen – perfect for when you want your audience 100% focused on you, not the slides.

Action Point

Review a recent PowerPoint, and see how well you follow the five guidelines. Use your findings to think of 1-2 simple ways to improve your next slide-set.

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