Presenting can be nerve-wracking, especially when the outcome of the presentation is important to your career. However, connecting with an audience, communicating your expertise on the subject matter and persuading or educating your peers can be a rewarding experience. Giving a good presentation is a great way to positively impact your career and grow as a professional.
Follow these tips for delivering a great presentation:
- Create a pitch that starts with the main point and has several takeaways for your audience. Build your presentation around this structure and reserve only a few minutes for each takeaway, keeping it relatively brief.
- Always focus on your audience when creating the content for your presentation. Your material should be generated with their goals, interests and attitudes in mind—remember that what is most interesting and important to you may not be to your audience.
- Deliver an icebreaker (a humorous anecdote, video, music or some combination of these). Keep icebreakers relevant to the subject you are discussing and ensure that they are appropriate for your audience.
- When delivering your speech, tell the audience what you will cover, deliver your message and then recap so no questions go unanswered.
- Avoid text-heavy slides and presentation boards; the audience will pay more attention to you if they are not busy reading the materials.
- Do not read your slides or presentation boards word-for-word. You should know the presentation well enough to only use these tools as cues.
- Engage your audience by asking questions—this will make them feel like a part of your presentation, and will encourage active listening.
- Be accessible to your audience by moving around in the room, and by using a wireless microphone, if necessary.
- Pause from time to time for emphasis, but only for a few seconds. Avoid using filler words such as “um,” “ah” and “like,” as they will distract from your overall message.
- Make eye contact with your audience members and avoid bouncing your eyes around the room constantly.
- Use hand gestures to emphasize points, and when they are not necessary, keep your hands rested at your sides.
- Avoid blocking the audience’s view of your presentation materials. Gesture with your hand to refer to specific materials.
- Do not expect your audience to be instantly moved or motivated by your presentation. Allow them time to digest the information, and give them the opportunity to follow up at a later date or time by providing contact information.
Before giving a big presentation, try videotaping yourself practicing in an empty conference room and ask a co-worker to watch you practice, and provide advice and constructive criticism. Most importantly, be patient with yourself and your abilities as a speaker. Presenting may become less stressful with practice, preparation and perseverance.