5 Small Things to Try to Immediately Be a Better Presenter
We have worked with hundreds of presenters over the years to help them be more engaging and audience focused. Most presenters focus on themselves and their content, and they often forget about the audience. For many it is a paradigm shift to focus on the needs and issues of their audience while designing and delivering their presentation, but we believe it makes a huge difference if you want to engage and deliver content that is impactful.
In any presentation, there are three components: the presenter, the content, and the audience. The way these elements interact determines the usefulness, involvement, engagement, and fun of the presentation.
Our work focuses on the right side of the Engagement Triangle. Here are 5 small things you can try to keep your relationship with your audience meaningful and engaging.
#1 Create Clear Objectives
What does your audience need to walk out with? When people don’t know the goals of your presentation they focus on their own agenda, lose interest, get distracted, and dream about being anywhere else.
Clear objectives give you permission to stop and redirect conversations that veer off course. Put them up on the wall. Keep going back to them throughout your presentation.
Here is how you can create your clear objectives:
#2 Have a Positive Mantra
How you show up matters. Presentations are a vivid and uncertain event because you never know what your audience will do or say. So how do you choose to approach this uncertainty? From a place of “being attitudinally “unwell” or “fit and well”?
Notice the current voice in your head (mantra) is around an upcoming presentation. If it’s a version of “I don't know what will happen, but it might be a disaster”, then you have chosen a negative mantra.
See if you can flip this. Find a mantra that helps you imagine a better result. There are lots of possibilities: “I can learn something from this audience,” or “they will learn something helpful.” Silently repeat your positive mantra to yourself as you prepare.
#3 See Your Audience
Getting curious about your audience doesn't have to take a ton of time. Sometimes we recommend a short series of pre-interviews, either on the phone or in person (e.g., 15-minute conversations with three participants).
You can also just talk to people as they come into the meeting room to gauge their current reality. You can throw a series of pictures on the floor and ask people to pick up one the represents how they are currently feeling about the project.
The important thing is to not only take the time and attention to understand your audience in relation to the content of your meeting but to tell them what you think you know to make sure your understanding is correct.
#4 Leverage Story
Stories are ingrained into our DNA and we wake up every time we hear one. Using story as an engagement tool in your presentation is an effective way to get your audience to lean forward, focus and learn.
Three tips for telling a better story:
Make it Personal. Audiences want to know how you were affected and changed by new ideas. Tell stories that illustrate this change.
Balance your story with a combination of detail (color) and action (advance).
Use less jargon. Make it relatable.
#5 Create Flow With Your Audience
Creating a back and forth flow with your audience means seeing everything that your audience does as an “offer.” This means noticing their behavior and actions and not being afraid to acknowledge and do something with what you're noticicing.
It’s a very practical attitude, that in effect forces you as a presenter to constantly ask yourself “How can I use this?” Implicit here is letting go of value judgments about what is happening (i.e. whether you like it or not, whether it’s “right” or not, whether you wanted it or not).
Flow with your audience happens when you accept their offer. This doesn’t mean you have to agree with it, it just means that you have to recognize the offer and do something with it.
Remember it only takes small actions to make a difference in your next presentation
