{"id":3783,"date":"2012-04-03T12:00:48","date_gmt":"2012-04-03T11:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.markwilson.co.uk\/blog\/?p=3783"},"modified":"2012-04-02T23:14:32","modified_gmt":"2012-04-02T22:14:32","slug":"improving-presentation-content-and-style","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.markwilson.co.uk\/blog\/2012\/04\/improving-presentation-content-and-style.htm","title":{"rendered":"Improving presentation content and style"},"content":{"rendered":"

A few weeks ago now, I attended a webcast as part of a series run by Citrix to promote GoToMeeting. Rather than saying “hey, look at our product it does x, y and z”, Citrix used the product to host others giving advice on presentation techniques.<\/p>\n

Ironically, some of the presentations were awful – I dropped out of one on “presenting with impact” as (in my opinion) it lacked any kind of impact; suffered from poor audio on the main presenter’s line; started out with irrelevant facts (which were later suggested as an approach to make a session memorable); and then launched into a poll before even getting going. \u00a0I did later return to the recording of this session and \u00a0around presenting with passion, preparation, body language and the need for\u00a0practice\/preparation –\u00a0but the fact remains that it initially turned me right off… (and I was\u00a0surprised\u00a0to find a\u00a0professional\u00a0communicator who hadn’t seen Prezi<\/a>\u00a0– although I’m not really a fan of that tool). Sadly, those first impressions stuck with me for the same presenter’s follow-up session on “communicating with impact”, which really failed to keep my attention (if I was being charitable, I might say that was perhaps as much an indictment of the delivery method as of the content).<\/p>\n

Thankfully, another webcast was more useful – Roger Courville<\/a> from\u00a01080 Group<\/a>\u00a0spoke about “eight things we can do to improve virtual presentations” and, by and large, they were good tips (for face to face presentations too) so I’m sharing my notes here:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Put a complete idea in the slide title – and keep slides visual for “picture superiority” (although the brain does see a few words as an image).<\/li>\n
  2. Create a sense of presence – paint a vision to demonstrate 1:1 attention\/facilitate a common connection.<\/li>\n
  3. Draw the audience’s eyes to your slide’s main point – direct attention visually (additive) or reduce and simplify (subtractive) – make sure the audience doesn’t have to guess what the main point is!<\/li>\n
  4. Keep “wholes” whole… and<\/em>\u00a0then build it out if you want to – i.e. show the big picture and then drill down into details.<\/li>\n
  5. Analyse (who, what, where, when, why and how), synthesise (action or relationship), visualise (consider how things might look visually or spatially).\u00a0It’s possible to\u00a0get a tutorial (and template)<\/a>\u00a0for this tip by subscribing to the 1080 Group newsletter.<\/li>\n
  6. Pause for power – in\u00a0advance of a key point\u00a0for a sense of anticipation or afterwards to allow the brain time to process. Pause for\u00a0effect\u00a0and pause for interactions. And, to add some insight from the communicating with impact presentation,\u00a0allow silence, to give time to digest information and to add gravitas.<\/li>\n
  7. Ask your audience what or when is best. Improve things based on feedback – either “on the fly” during the presentation, or by building an understanding over time. \u00a0And, although this wasn’t one of Roger’s tips, it seems like a good point to take another cue from the communicating with impact presentation: consider\u00a0the\u00a0audience’s DNA (demographic, needs, and attitude) – and be ready to flex your style.<\/li>\n
  8. Start you next presentation by “storyboarding” (see the comments on “beyond bullet points” below) – think about the flow of the presentation (content), before filling in details (think how PowerPoint leads us to step straight in and start creating bullets!) – and “design in” interactions (demo, poll, etc.). \u00a0By way of illustration,\u00a0Roger also referred to\u00a0Cliff Atkinson’s Beyond Bullet Points<\/a>\u00a0book which I confess I haven’t read but is structured around three core themes:\n
      \n
    1. Tell a story – you only have a few seconds to create an emotional impact.<\/li>\n
    2. Distil\u00a0your ideas – instead of throwing everything into the presentation, go into the minds of the audience and figure out what to communicate (with an effective structure).<\/li>\n
    3. Create visual prompts – not just pretty slides but building out the\u00a0storyboard\u00a0to take the audience on a journey to an effective presentation.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Two more points I picked up that I though were worthy of note:<\/p>\n