Excelling at Presentations

Dr. Joe SaviakPublic Administration Program

Excelling at PresentationsWhy does being to able to make an effective professional presentation matter?   It’s not enough to have good information – it must be effectively presented Many public sector professionals do not develop this skill – the result is they are

stunned when their supervisor or others in their division or department or the senior staff or the BCC or the public are uninterested in their proposal – they never heard it or they never heard the one the you intended for them to hear

Or they believe that the standard is mediocrity – everyone is lackluster so I should be too – I would not want to stand out – this must be the way that they want it presented since others are doing it that way

A poor presentation can kill a good idea – presenting persuasively is part of your job

During your career, you will end up presenting many times in different situations even when you don’t think it’s presenting - both formally and informally - internal & external – to your co-workers, supervisor & senior staff, those you manage, funding authorities, other agencies, community groups, & citizens Presenting is key to your academic and professional success – good grades &

presenting makes a person a lot more promotable

Excelling at Presentations3 ironclad rules for success:  Don’t ever read – present! Reading breaks your relationship with your

audience – your voice goes monotone, you lose eye contact with your audience, hand gestures stop, and your audience tunes out.

Stick to the time limit – in both the classroom and the real world, it will be strictly enforced! A great way to stick to the time limit is to practice!

Practice twice before you present – you will find that it dramatically improves your performance – when a student never practices a single time before presenting, guess what we get in class?  We see his or her practice instead of their presentation and it’s obvious! How does practice help? Keeps you within the required time limit. Allows you to resolve any operational issues before you present (e.g. change wording, ensure correct pronunciation, practice using presentation tools like your PPT, etc.). It builds confidence, comfort, and poise. Helps you catch any mistakes before you present (remember – it’s not a mistake if you catch it).    

Excelling at Presentations

Key Questions to Ask and Answer before every Presentation What’s my purpose with this presentation? To inform, persuade,

ensure the audience takes a specific action? Who’s my audience? What’s my content? How can I best deliver this presentation? Are there are any rules – is there a format – to which I need to

adhere? What’s the time limit – there’s always a time limit!

Excelling at PresentationsPurposeGenerally, it is picked for you – by your instructor, employer, the needs/demands of your audience, or the requirements of the situationPurpose will influence content and delivery Is the purpose to inform, persuade, inspire to action?

Excelling at PresentationsAudience Build and sustain a strong, genuine, and positive rapport with your audience

from start to finish – it is a relationship you must create and manage – be enthusiastic - don’t oversell and hurt your credibility – stay likable – project confidence - maintain trust & credibility

It’s all about your audience! (not about you). When you start, explain why this topic matters to your audience – what will they learn – how they will benefit - what’s in it for them? Get their buy in! Secondly, talk to your audience in the way which works best for them not you (e.g. don’t be overly technical with a citizen audience)

Audience influences communications objectives, strategies, and tactics - am I preaching to the converted or am I engaging a potentially hostile audience – is my audience uninformed or apathetic about this issue? Research your audience in advance – research identifies objectives, objectives select strategy, strategy drives tactics, we implement and evaluate

Know your audience – how do they think – how do they talk – what are their values – what do they know now on this issue - what is their self interest relating to this topic?

Excelling at PresentationsAudience It may or may not be the perfect audience or the audience you want but it’s the

audience you’ve got so work with them! Know your audience – appeal to their interests with your points/arguments Know your audience – how informed are they at the start of your presentation?

Make sure you don’t assume a knowledge base – explain key concepts and terms as needed - people are unlikely to embrace a position they did not truly understand

Know your audience – what attitudes, beliefs, and values might they be bringing to this presentation and how should you structure and deliver your points/arguments accordingly? If persuading is the objective, craft and deliver arguments which factor in audience perceptions and beliefs – utilize and build upon them when you can – never ignore them hoping they will just go away.

Given your audience, can you identify the barriers to successful communication and do you have a strategy to defeat them?

Excelling at PresentationsAudience Whether our aim is informing or persuading, we may find ourselves in a

communications situation where the audience did not arrive truly neutral – they are already predisposed not to believe us or our agency or support our position – they may arrive with perceptions and beliefs which will get in the way of accepting and acting upon our message as we would like them to do – Can we still win? Yes!

Generally speaking, human beings do not seek out opportunities to be told they are wrong – it produces discomfort (it’s an emotional tax/a psychic penalty we want to avoid) but communicators often find themselves in this situation

There are ways to assist your audience in letting go of incorrect assumptions (defeating cognitive dissonance – Festinger) – do it in ways that make them feel it is OK to change positions - 1) Make the audience aware that circumstances have changed 2) Provide information about new developments 3) Use of an unexpected spokesperson

Now, no one ever succeeded by spending their entire time blasting their audience as “dead wrong” – this approach fails to make the sale and offends the customer in the process too! That’s not the way to do this.

Excelling at PresentationsAudience People often want to be validated not educated – affirmed not corrected – so its

challenging to reverse audience beliefs/perceptions - it’s challenging to make people come to feel it was OK about initially being wrong but it can be done – know your audience – just ignoring the influence of audience assumptions/perceptions/ideology which can undermine your message will likely cause your communication to fail

Identify and defeat incorrect assumptions/narratives/ideology or you will not be successful & do it in ways which will work!

Communicate in ways which recognizes these potential obstacles and makes it acceptable and easier for your audience to discard incorrect assumptions and accept your message – content and delivery they can accept!

Identify and defeat objections to make the sale. Pay attention to the audience during the debate – you can’t conduct a survey on the

spot and you are not a mind reader but are they buying what you are selling or do you need to shift gears?

Excelling at PresentationsContent What’s my communications objective? Inform an uninformed audience,

obtain a favorable audience attitude towards a specific position, and inspire them to action (AAB)? Am I winning over a neutral audience? Protecting and preserving already favorable audience opinion? Dealing with a potentially hostile audience?

Objective influences selection of message, strategy and tactics Each specific section of the presentation serves a specific purpose –

make sure that objective is achieved at that time – for example, Introduction establishes your rapport with the audience, gets their interest and attention, & sets the stage & provides a roadmap to your audience (here’s where we are going), the Body presents main points with accompanying logic and evidence, and with our Conclusion, we summarize key points, reinforce, & make the sale/close the deal!

Excelling at PresentationsContent Your major points must be fully developed and fully explained at the

appropriate time – start, explain, and finish each key point - no backing up and starting over again on the same argument 3 minutes later (finish it the first time) – don’t conceal or hide major points with insufficient treatment, time, and development (no drive-bys) - bring clarity not visit confusion upon your audience – don’t make them work or fight to find and understand your point - make sure the audience learns what they need to know – make sure the issue is given sufficient treatment and properly articulated and explained

Research Matters – a professional presentation involves logic applied to evidence! Make full use of available evidence/statistics/research to support your points/arguments – be correct about your facts! Although you do not verbally read a list of all citations/references, use multiple sources of research to support each major point (as opposed to continually using a single source to support all your points)

Excelling at PresentationsContent Less can be more – identify and advance your best points/arguments – the

clock is ticking & time goes by quickly – you won’t have time to make 20 different points/arguments nor would you want to do so – prioritize your points for maximum impact

Use both head and heart arguments – logic and emotion – evidence and examples – numbers and narrative – statistics plus a story to humanize the issue – policy arguments plus a personal story (Kellerman)

Make sure your presentation is structured and organized – easy to mentally follow – there is a nice logical flow – points are sequenced – your audience can follow along where you are taking them - create patterns of thought – use mental scaffolding - make it easy for them to process the information as you deliver it.

Excelling at PresentationsDelivery Work on your delivery – a good presentation poorly delivered is not an effective

presentation.   Dress professionally – dress to impress. Make eye contact, use hand gestures, pay attention to your speaking pace, your

volume, tone and inflection & any other body language to connect with your audience and sustain their attention and interest.  These are all valuable and necessary communication tools. Properly utilized, they add to the effectiveness of your presentation. All of these tools enable you to build and sustain a relationship with your audience and more effectively explain and reinforce your key points. How you say what you are saying can help or hurt your presentation. These tools must be coordinated with the content of your presentation (e.g. it makes sense to use that hand gesture when you are saying something specific).

Voice matters - pay attention and optimize the impact of your tone, pace, and volume. Inflection for emphasis (with a monotone voice, everything sounds equally important when that’s not the case).

Excelling at PresentationsDelivery Reading breaks the relationship with your audience – ends eye contact,

voice goes flat, hand gestures decline, and audience interest decreases. Talk in sentences not paragraphs – run-on sentences do not work well

with writing – they do not help with presentations either! Active voice not passive increases interest and optimizes time. Know the venue prior to delivery – will that affect your delivery? (e.g.

large lecture hall versus a smaller setting) Know your audience – will that influence your delivery?

Excelling at PresentationsDelivery - AVOID self inflicted injuries! Avoid hands in pockets (you lose your ability to use hand gestures) Avoid the “oscillating fan” with head swinging from side to side Avoid speaking too quickly - don’t rush – timing matters – strategic pauses can

help (underscore a key point, transition to a new point) Avoid technical jargon that a group of citizens or audience outside your

profession might not understand.  Catch and correct verbal tics – using the same word 15 times in the same 20

minute presentation Avoid shifting weight from foot to foot (high seas effect) or rocking the podium

(speaking of the podium, use it correctly – don’t let it become a barrier – use all the tools of effective communication while using the podium)

You must be understood in real time (there’s no video rewind) – don’t let your audience miss your point – make sure your arguments and evidence are readily and easily understood by your audience when you say them

Don’t read your notes word for word.  Don’t do anything which subtracts or distracts from your presentation – if it

adds to the presentation, we do it – if it does not, we do not do it!

Excelling at PresentationsDelivery If allowed and when properly utilized, visual aids (PPT, chart, graph, flip chart,

etc.) can definitely help If using a visual aid, make sure you need it and it helps achieve your specific

objective – strengths & limitations to visual devices – they are often situation and topic-specific – make sure your visual display of data actually helps you – your audience needs to be able to understand the chart or graph and be able to find and see the point you are making from it

Visual must match the verbal – any visual aid you use or visual image you create in the minds of your audience must match your words – they cannot compete or conflict – they must complement and support each other

If you are going to physically handle anything during a presentation – a visual aid or note cards – practice using them before the presentation – get comfortable and confident – work out technical/operational issues prior to the presentation (maybe I have too many papers on the podium with me – need to make sure chart can be seen by audience or it’s within the camera shot) – you don’t want to have technical problems during a debate or do something distracting or waste time!

Excelling at PresentationsDelivery    Questions can be friend or your enemy – be prepared – you can anticipate 90% of

them in advance and have ready to go answers - You may be asked a question or two by the instructor or a student at the end of your presentation - questions are part of the presentation package.  Questions offer a good opportunity to provide greater explanation of a key point, reinforce an important lesson learned, solidify your relationship with the audience, & close the sale!

If persuasion is your communications objective then remember that persuasion is a process – repeat and reinforce key points to ensure audience understanding and acceptance

Transition between topics smoothly. Be enthusiastic and confident in your presentation.  Know the rules and follow the format – adhere to time limits – they won’t be

changing the rules for you! Be disciplined – stay on message Mistakes are allowed if you handle them right - if you miss a certain word or make

some other minor mistake, push forward – don’t draw attention to it – it’s likely your audience won’t catch it or remember it within the context of an overall successful presentation

Excelling at PresentationsIn Closing Do NOT violate the time tested rules/proven principles of effective

communication - the rules are relatively simple to follow but it never ceases to amaze how they are violated by people who should know better but stopped believing that the rules apply to them (e.g. reading instead of presenting)

Practice, practice, and practice! Practice both individually and as a group in advance of the real deal (when presenting with others as a group, practice becomes even more important to integrate/synchronize – become a symphony). Can improve content & delivery. First practice will produce significant improvement – second will refine and strengthen – if it happens during practice, it’s not a mistake – will build confidence and make for a stronger and more crisp and effective delivery .

When you practice, have others honestly and objectively critique you – ID strengths & areas for improvement – make changes before you present

Use the specific comments from your instructors to improve each time – retain strengths and implement specific improvements – use the lessons learned for your next presentation

With practice, everyone can become an effective presenter!!! Questions?