The key to snappy presentations
Presentations can be daunting if you’re not a great public speaker - but these tips will make you a hit with the audience.
|||Johannesburg - Many areas of work require you, at some stage, to make presentations to others, internally to colleagues or externally to clients, and being effective in doing this is an important ingredient in being successful.
So says Vanessa Bluen of Consultant Powerhouse, an organisation that offers training designed to increase the impact you have in your workplace interactions with others.
“It’s all about getting your message across, which means communicating effectively,” she says. “That’s not a new concept, but what has changed in the modern, technologically driven world of work and the attention span of your audience.
“You are now competing with a host of distractions, many of them electronic. The information you want to convey is important, but it may well be readily available online, and already known, so it goes way beyond the content.”
The key, Bluen believes, is in saying only things that are relevant to your listener, and saying them in a manner that captures their attention.
“Relevancy is relative – different people decide on what they want to hear differently – so you need to have a ‘relevancy radar’, able to pick up the signs when the audience is getting bored,” she says.
While everyone is different, Bluen believes great presenters have certain things in common in the way they work. The trick is to recognise them and emulate their style.
“In the first instance, they are authorities,” she says. “They exude an air of greatness that comes from knowing their subject inside out.”
But it’s not just having the information at your fingertips. “You have to show that you have knowledge, and you do that by bringing the information to life, making it relevant to the lives of the audience. The great presenters display wisdom, which is a higher-level activity, helping the audience to make sense of the information you are giving them.”
At the same time, Bluen stresses that you have to make the correct impact. “This involves your presentation style, which has to be an extension of your own personality,” she says.
“That’s what the great presenters do, they find their natural style, and they deliver in that style.”
What you have to do, she advises, is to make the correct visual impression and find the right tone of voice. “Ask yourself the question: Would I buy something from myself?”
The structure of the presentation is vital. Many presenters make the mistake of trying to fit too much in. “Your introduction and conclusion have to be powerful, and in between, make three or four points, told in a narrative style, by painting word pictures,” Bluen says.
And when it comes to question time, respond to the entire audience, not just the questioner, use positive language – and if you can’t answer, don’t be afraid to says so, but promise to find out.
* Contact Vanessa Bluen at vanessab@theconsultantpower house.co.za.
THE STAR