Gerry Sandusky's Blog, page 12

How One Movie Star Manages Stage Fright

Movie star Ethan Hawke co-stars with  Johnny Simmons and Paul Giamatti in an upcoming movie called “The Phenom,” about a young baseball player, a thoughtful mentor and a troubled father. In discussing the movie, Hawke admitted to suffering at times in his career from near-dibhlitating stage fright. To push his way through it, Hawke says he turned to a concert pianist Seymour Bernstein for advice.  In an interview in the Huffington Post, Hawke says the big thing he learned from Bernstein was stage fright taught him to prepare more.

“If you can say, this anxiety, I’m up all night and I’m going to work on my lines and I’ll be better prepared, or, I’m going to take that voice class and I’ll study this extra thing and I’m going to be prepared because then I’ve taken responsibility for myself. And if it doesn’t go well, that’s up to fate. I’m not in charge of the size of my gift, and I’m not in charge of my talent. I’m in charge of my effort. And then you can relax.”

Take-aways:

There’s a few powerful take-aways for anyone who suffers from stage fright:

Use it as a prompt to do more homework, more practice, more preparation.
Agree with yourself that once you’ve done everything you can to get ready, you have to let go of everything you can’t control.
Each time you get through a situation of stage fright becomes proof that you can get through it.

Hawke touches on something of vital importance on the topic of stage fright: Some times it comes from us trying to control what we can’t control. And you don’t have to be a movie star to reap the benefits of Hawke’s experience:

You can’t control the audience.
You can’t control how much talent we have.
You can’t control anything that happened in the past.

You have total  can control how much effort you put into preparation and practice—whether you’re preparing for a presentation, a speech, a media interview, or even a job interview. And the more you do that combined with letting go of the things you can’t control, the more you can learn to use stage fright as a healthy reminder to get ready—even if you aren’t preparing for the role of a movie star. Then it’s a matter of ready, set, let go.

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How to Communicate Better in a Video Conference

Video conference or tele-conferencing is no longer the way of the future. Thanks to Skype, Go-to-Meeting, and other services, it has evolved into one of the ways we communicate in business. But for too many people it remains awkward at best, avoided at worst. It doesn’t have to be.

No matter how many people you have watching on the video conference, treat it as a one-on-one conversation. Too many business people approach a tele-conference as if they are suddenly broadcasting. Guess what? Broadcasters—at least the good ones—treat every broadcast as a one-on-one conversation with the viewer. Sure there might be 25, 50, 100 thousand viewers, but a good broadcaster connects with them one-on-one simultaneously. The same principle holds for a tele-conference. You don’t have to take on a broadcaster voice, start talking much louder, or change your vocabulary. Just talk, act, move the way you would in a professional one-on-one meeting.

And when you are talking, look at the camera, not the laptop or phone screen. If you look at the screen when you’re talking you will look like you are looking off camera at something other than the person or people on the other end. That gets distracting and undermines your communication. Look at the screen when they are talking; look at the camera when you are talking.

It takes a little discipline to get used to looking at the tiny camera on your laptop or phone when you’re talking, but that one thing has a huge impact on the difference of the communication. You wouldn’t avoid eye contact in an in-person, one-on-one conversation unless you had something to hide or feel embarrassed about. When you accidentally avoid eye contact on a tele-conference by looking at the screen instead of the camera you create the perception that you’re hiding something.

Stop hiding, start connecting—one person at a time.

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Where to Find Great Stories for Your Presentations

Last week I shared with you the three parts of a great story in a presentation or speech. This week I’ll show you where to find great stories in your own life experience. Here’s the quick recap of storytelling essentials:

1. Set up—the details that puts the listener into the story.

2. Struggle—the difficulties faced.

3. Solution—how things worked out and what you learned from the entire process.

Once I share that formula with people who attend our seminars, they invariable say, “but I don’t have any great stories like that to use.” Yes you do. We all do. The key is just learning how to recognize them. And you don’t have to look that hard. You just have to know where to look.

You’ll find plenty of great stories if you start your search with step two, the struggle. Think to different times in your life when you struggled. We’ve all had them, plenty of them.

Here are some prompt questions to help jog your memory:

Who was the first relationship you had that ended in a break up?
Did you ever think you were going to lose your job?
Did you ever struggle to pay your rent or your mortgage?
Did you ever have a time when you thought my might flunk out of college or fall into academic suspension?
When was the first time you had a major blow up with neighbor?
Ever get into a fist fight and lose?
Who was the first teacher or coach who yelled out you in front of others?
Ever lose a significant amount of money in an investment?

 

You get the idea. We’ve all had struggles throughout our lives. That’s one of the things that connects people. Once you identify the struggle then go back and retro fit in the details surrounding it.

When did it happen?
What time of the year?
Where were you?
What was the weather like?
What were you wearing?
Who else was involved?
Any significant sights or sounds around when it happened.

 

You want to use just enough details to paint the picture, build context, and help the listeners feel like they are right there with you as the story begins to unfold. Here’s an example: It was 1988, I had just gotten married and my wife, Lee Ann and I, had a little yellow townhouse with a tiny office in the front of the house. I put the first computer I ever bought in that office, an IBM System Two. And while Lee Ann looked over my shoulder, I turned that computer on for the first time and saw…

That’s what the details do. They put the audience into the story with you.

Then flesh out the struggle. Why did you think you were going to lose your job? What was at stake? Why couldn’t you pay the mortgage? Again, use enough detail to put the audience into the story without bogging the story down with meaningless detail.

It took a second for anything to come on the screen and when it did, my heart sank. The only thing on the black screen was C:/>. Lee Ann looked at me with a burning stare. I had spent our only $2500 in savings on a computer and the only thing on the computer was C:/>. She raised her eyebrows, her way of letting me know she was pretty sure I didn’t know what I was doing and her way of reminding me that she had wanted to buy an Apple. I wanted to climb into a hole.

After the struggle, bring in the solution:

After I returned to the store where I bought the computer, the salesman told me I had to learn how Microsoft Digital Operating System worked. I had to learn how to use MS-DOS to tell the computer what to do. I wanted to tell the salesman what to do. Instead, I bought a book, learned how to use DOS and eventually got that computer to work, but the process taught me that all new technology ventures always take more time and always have a steeper learning curve than what salesman want you to believe. And in my case, they usually led to added stress on my marriage!

Just like that, you can have a story that you can use to make a point about relationships, about technology, about dealing with sales people, or about learning curves. And like all good stories, I found it just by thinking back on my struggles.

So now it’s your turn. Write up a list of ten struggles you have had in your life. Then follow the process I just laid out:

Retrofit the details for the set up
Flesh out the struggle
Identify the solution and what you learned from the solution.

The more often you walk through the process, the more you will start recognizing good stories when they happen to you.

The post Where to Find Great Stories for Your Presentations appeared first on Presentation Skills Training | Gerry Sandusky.

The Secret Formula Behind All Great Stories in Presentations

What are your favorite stories from childhood? If you have kids, what’s their favorite story that you read to them when they were young? My daughter loved Charlotte’s Web. My son loved Cars and Trucks and Things that Go. My daughter is 25. My son is 21. They still remember those stories. That’s the power of stories. They stay with us. You still remember your favorite story from childhood. Think about how long ago you first encountered that story.

Audience members won’t, for the most part, remember the bullet points on your PowerPoint slide. They won’t remember more than 90 percent of what you say—especially numbers, facts, and data. They will remember your stories if you tell compelling stories.

Stories have power since we remember them and they help us link something we do know and understand to something we don’t know or understand.

Here’s an example: You could try to tell your audience that if they change their beliefs, they will also change their results. You can almost see that on a boring PowerPoint slide right?

Change Beliefs = Change Results.

And the audience reaction would likely be something along the lines of “Sure, whatever.”

Or you could use a story of Roger Banister and the four-minute mile to illustrate that idea.

An English runner, Bannister, came from a working class family that couldn’t afford college tuition. He dreamed of becoming a doctor and earned a track scholarship to Oxford so he could pursue a medical degree. In 1952 he went to the Helsinki Olympics as the favorite to win the 1500 meters. He was going to be a rags to riches story. But he finished fourth in the 1500 meters in those Games. His pursuit of a medical degree would likely keep him from training for the 1956 Games. He felt like a failure. He wanted to redeem himself. So he set his sights on becoming the first runner to run a mile in under four minutes. Scientist had long said that was impossible, and most runners believed the scientists. The core belief was that it was physically impossible for a human to run a four-minute mile. For the next two years it looked like they might be right. Then on May 6th, 1954 Bannister ran a mile in three minutes, fifty-nine point four seconds. A sub-four-minute-mile. The first one anyone had ever run.

Just 46 days later, Bannister’s world record of 3:59.4 was broken by Australian John Landy. Within one year, 24 other runners had broken the four-minute mile too. The only thing that had changed was one runner who believed it was possible. First the belief changed. Then the results changed.

 

Roger Bannister went on to become a neurologist and in 1975 the Queen of England knighted him for his service. Not bad for a kid whose parents didn’t have the money to send him to college.

Fair to say that story is more memorable than a PowerPoint slide?

Let’s break it down so you can see the three main parts to a successful story:

1. The set up

2. The struggle

3. The solution

The Set Up:

These are the details that put the story into context:

English runner
Family couldn’t afford college
Wanted to be a doctor

The Struggle:

We all have struggles in life. This is where we relate to the main character because of his or her struggles:

1952 Olympics. He was the favorite and finished fourth.
Bannister thought about quitting running.
He felt like a failure.
Because of his studies he wouldn’t have another shot at the Olympics.
Wanted to redeem himself by running a four-minute mile, but scientists said it was impossible.

The Solution:

This is the outcome of the story that always has a powerful teaching point. And you don’t have to hit the audience over the head with the point. They’ll get it.

May 6th, 1954 Bannister ran a mile in 3:59.4
46 days later someone broke his record.
One year later 24 other runners had done the “impossible” too.

If you follow that formula, you can bring your key points to life in your next presentation too:

1. The set up

2. The struggle

3. The solution

There is no perfect length of a story. Stories can be long. They can be short. Make the no longer than they need to be in order to make your point. I told you the Roger Bannister story in 275 words. It would, interestingly enough, take less than four-minutes to tell that story to an audience.

Try using the story formula in your next presentation. In next week’s blog, I’ll show you where to find the dozens and even hundreds of stories that you have available from your own life that will bring your presentations and speeches to life!

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Three Things to Put in Your Presentation Close

Your presentation has done most of its work before you reach the close, but the close can elevate a very good presentation to a great one because it’s what the audience experiences last and remembers first. You want to include three things in your presentation close to have maximum impact and get your audience to take strong action. I outline the three aspects to a great close in this video.

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Two Things You Need to Do in a Presentation Open

You’ve heard enough people tell you about the importance of the open in your presentation. And you’ve probably sat through enough long, tedious opens to know how dreadful a boring open can feel in the audience. But how do you construct an open so it has real impact? That’s what I set out to show you in this video—and in less time than you might think. The open isn’t about length. It’s about impact.

Take a look and leave me your thoughts below.

 

 

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The Power of Three’s in Presentations

Ever notice it’s easier to remember the area code on someone’s phone number than the last four digits of their number? That’s because the area code is three numbers. The last four digits are, well, four. Our minds quickly and easily connect to things that come in groups of threes. There are plenty of theories for why we do this. Three is the first prime number. We divide time into past, present, and future, and we live in a 3-dimensional world. Regardless of why we connect so easily and so often with things that are grouped in threes, lies the fact that we do.

As a presenter, keep that in mind. Your audience will connect to groupings of ideas that come in threes more easily than groups of five or six or seven.

Since we relate so easily to a triad, it makes sense to build your presentation, speech, or meeting around triads. This has a few major benefits:

1. It forces you to limit the amount of information you share.

2. It puts your information into a grouping your audience is already inclined to consume.

3. It creates a natural rhythm of beginning, middle, and end.

Do you see what I did there? I could have given you two reasons to group your ideas in threes or I could have given you five reasons. But two reasons to do something in groups of threes wouldn’t feel quite right, and five reasons would have felt wrong too. If I had given you five reasons, you would have likely only remembered three anyway and I would have lost control of which three you remembered.

By grouping main ideas in threes, you speak to a cadence that your audience members are conditioned to all day, every day, in multiple areas of their life:

Books:

Books have a beginning, middle, and end.
One of the classic children’s stories is Goldilocks and the three bears.
Another is Three Blind mice.

Government:

The Declaration of Independence puts forth three unalienable rights: life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.
The U.S. government has three branches: executive, legislative, and judicial.
Government agencies include the FBI, CIA, and FDA.

Food:

We eat—or are supposed to eat—three meals a day.
At Starbucks you can choose from three sizes: tall, venti, and grande.
Fountain sodas come in small, medium, or large.

Religion:

Christians believe in the Holy Trinity: The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Buddhists take refuge in three jewels: Buddha, Dharma and Sangha
A devout Muslim makes a pilgrimage to three holy cities: Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem.

Driving:

Cars have three rear-view mirrors
Cars have three main gears: drive, neutral, and reverse.
Traffic signals are red, yellow, and green.

Sports:

Basketball has a 3-point line.
Hockey has a hat-trick: three goals.
In baseball each team gets three outs per inning.

Expressions:

Julius Cesar’s most famous quote had three parts: Veni, vidi, vicci (I came; I saw; I conquered).
Third time is the charm.
He’s giving me the third degree.

Entertainment:

TV networks favor three letters: ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX, CNN.
Barnum & Bailey became famous for it’s three-ring circus.
3-D movies.

So as you begin to layout your next presentation, speech, or even meeting, ask yourself what are the main points you want to share with your audience and build your program around three of them.

You may have five, or six, or seven key points that you thing you want to make, but since your audience relates to triads, pick the three most important points and build on those.

Think of it as the ABC’s of communication. Sorry, couldn’t resist.

After all, there’s always time for the next presentation, speech, or meeting, but the audience might not come back to those—or give you their attention if they do—if you don’t speak their language the first time around.

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Five High Impact Do’s and Don’ts for Presenters and Speakers

When it comes to presentations we all speak the same language: body language. We both speak and listen in body language. It makes sense then that better body language will lead to better results in presentations. Here are five do’s and don’ts for presenters that you can put to use immediately for high impact results.

The single most important thing to strive for in body language is to look natural. You can look natural long before you actually feel comfortable in the front of the room. From there it works like one domino knocking down another. When you look comfortable in front of the room, your audience feels more comfortable. That, in turn, helps you to feel more confident which will reflect in your body language.

Of course it can work in the other direction too. You look uptight and nervous. That makes your audience feel uncomfortable. You sense the tension in the audience. That undermines your already shaky confidence and it’s all downhill from there.

So in order to help you look natural—even if you don’t yet feel comfortable—in front of the room, here are five do’s and don’ts that will help your body language send a more confident, comfortable message:

#1 MOVING AROUND:

Do: Move at a comfortable pace, and change your pace.

Always identify how much space you have to work with in the front of the room. Are you limited by a podium? Is there a stage? Are you using a projector that casts a cone of light onto a screen? How is the seating in the room arranged? All of those impact how much space you have to work with in the front of the room. You want to use as much space as possible. It helps you “own” the room.

A couple of ideas to keep in mind:

Avoid walking in front of the projector light.
Avoid turning your back to large portions of the audience at a time.
If the room allows it, try walking into the audience. Use the aisles when appropriate to help break down mental barriers.
Invite audience members to the front of the room to help you demonstrate something. This is a powerful way to help the audience feel included in your presentation.
If you are forced to use a podium, try standing to one side or another and leaning against the podium. That creates a very relaxed, comfortable look (if that look serves your intentions).

Don’t: Pace like a nervous animal.

Moving around in the front of the room will help you to release some the adrenaline that naturally surges in your body before and during a presentation, but move under control and don’t move constantly. Your movements should look natural, not like you’re speed walking in a competition or plodding along a road side like a weary travel. Use a combination of good energy, movement, and pauses to hold your audiences attention.

A couple of ideas to keep in mind:

Use the pace of your movement to set up important ideas. Move as you build toward the idea then stop, pause, and deliver the idea. That has maximum impact.
Chance the pace of your movement. Don’t spend the entire presentation walking or pacing at 12 miles an hour from one side of the front of the room to another. That makes you look like a caged animal—never a good look in a presentation.
If you feel like you’re moving too much, find something in the front of the room to help anchor you. You can lean on a podium or stand on a particular spot for a moment, but break up a repetitive movement pattern. You want your movement to look and feel natural to your audience and not like you are a captive animal wearing a human suit.

#2 MOVING YOUR HANDS:

Do: Let your hands help you communicate

I speak with my hands all the time when I’m in front of the room or just having a one-on-one conversation. There are no hard and fast rules about hand movements. If you move your hands in conversations, when you’re on the phone, when you’re talking with a loved one, then by all means use your hands when you present from the front of the room. That’s part of your natural personality and it will help you to look natural to your audience.

A few suggestions :

Be careful to keep your hands away from your face. You don’t want anything to come between you and your audience.
Be careful not to touch your face too often in a presentation. This will make you look nervous, and you probably are but we don’t want to advertise that.
Speak with your palms up when you want to include your audience; speak with your palms down when you want to exercise authority over your audience.

Don’t: Program your hands to move in perfect cadence with your words.

This makes you look robotic and contrived. Occasionally you’ll come across someone who can pull this off. Bill Clinton was a master of it, but I suspect that’s because he also talks in private with his thumb resting over his fist and his hand moving in rhythm with his thoughts.

#3 PUTTING YOUR HANDS IN YOUR POCKET:

Do: Put one hand in your pocket when you want to look comfortable, even casual.

You’re not alone when it comes to wondering what to do with your hands during a presentation or a speech. Fortunately if you take care of one hand, it usually solves the problem for both hands. Try putting your non-dominant hand in your pocket. That keeps your dominant hand free to make gestures. It also helps you strike a professionally casual look, comfortable but not sloppy. When you look at ease it helps put your audience at ease too.

Don’t: Put both hands in your pockets at the same time. 

If you stuff both hands in your pockets you will look like you are nervous and hiding something—bad

combination. When both of your hands going down into your pockets, you also run the risk of slouching your shoulders, further undermining your message with bad body language. Stay away from putting both hands in your pockets—even if your instincts tell you to do that so you have some place to put your hands.

#4 HOLDING NOTES:

Do: Keep your notes handy where you can get to them

There’s nothing wrong with using notes in a presentation. It’s better to use notes and stay on track then to avoid using notes and constantly lose your place and get off course. The trick with notes is to use big fonts, wide margins, and position the notes in front of you where you can easily see them on a desk, table, or podium. You can still move around while you present and when you want to check your notes simply move back to the place where you have placed your notes.

Don’t: Clutch your notes

Remember, one of the ways adrenaline gets out of your body is through your hands. If you hold your notes while in front of your audience your run the risk of your notes shaking if your hands shake and becoming a distraction to the audience. I saw this happen with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews at a keynote in Las Vegas. He was holding his notes and twisting them like a wet towel as he spoke. He never referenced his notes. He just twisted the papers over and over. It became a major distraction to his audience.

Put your notes down and walk back to them when you need to reference your notes. Keep them out of your hands. Even though they might feel like a safety blanket to you they run the risk of becoming a major irritant to your audience.

#5 USE BODY LANGUAGE TO ENGAGE YOUR AUDIENCE:

Do:  Show the audience what you want them to do

The audience takes its cues from the presenter. So when you want a show of hands, rather than just ask a question like, “How many of you have travelled overseas?” raise your hand while you ask the question. That one simple thing will dramatically increase audience involvement—and few things bring a presentation to life like audience involvement. If you want the audience to get up and move to the left side of the room, use both of your hands to make a rising motion and then you walk to the left side of the room. The audience will follow. We listen with more than our ears in a presentation. We listen with our eyes too. If you show people the same message that you tell them and do it at the same time you greatly increase the chance of them hearing and acting on your request.

Don’t: Point, thrust, or jab your finger at the audience

An upturned palm from a presenter is inviting. Downturned palms are the sign of authority, and finger point, thrust, or jab is threatening and confrontational. Unless you want to confront your audience, be careful pointing your finger. It makes people feel isolated and attacked. I can’t think of too many settings outside of sports lorckerrooms where that kind of challenge can have a positive effect but I have noticed that the accidental use by presenters and speakers of a finger point can have an extremely negative effect on the audience. Unless you are acting out a story that involves someone pointing a finger at you, be very careful of pointing at your audience. Do too much of it and audience members might want to share a finger of their own in your direction.

Try different combinations of the do’s:

Move at a comfortable pace, and change your pace.
Let your hands help you communicate.
Put one hand in your pocket when you want to look comfortable, even casual.
Keep your notes handy where you can get to them, but not in your hands.
Show the audience what you want them to do.

By experimenting with different combinations you will find your comfort zone and your own personal style. Once you have that, you have what you need to look—and feel—like a natural in front of any and every audience.

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Man-hug or Handshake? How Do You Know What to Do?

If you were to meet the Queen of England etiquette dictates that as a man you refer to her as “your majesty” and if you reside in the United Kingdom you bow. If you don’t reside in the UK, then you should extend your right hand after she extends hers to shake hands. You should also never turn your back on the queen. Pretty straight forward and simple.

If you were to meet the President of the United States you should rise when he enters the room, refer to him as “Mr. President” and again, offer your right hand in a greeting.

If you meet a businessman in Japan for the first time, you bow and then take part in an elaborate exchange of business cards holding the card with both of your hands as you offer it to him.

Each of these—and countless others—exchanges have rules of etiquette. You know what to do when you’re in those situations. You know what’s acceptable and what’s not. The rules simplify the interaction.

So what are the rules of etiquette for the man-hug?

You’ll see it dozens of times tonight in the NFL draft. As each pick is announced the player walks on stage, man-hugs the commissioner, and then holds up the jersey of his new team. The man-hug (or as some call it the bro-hug) starts with a hand clasp then the two men pull each other in for a shoulder to shoulder touch and seal it with a simultaneous back slap.

It’s more friendly than a handshake, less personal than a full-on, so-glad-to-see-you-my-old-friend full-on hug, but who determines when you use it? What are the rules? I’ve met guys for the first time and they leaned in for a man hug. I don’t even know you. I don’t want you in my personal space!

I’m not going to man-hug my brothers. That seems insincere and contrived. I’m certainly not going to man-hug the Queen of England. She’s not a man. Younger guys, guys under 25 seem comfortable man-hugging every guy they meet for the first time. In some settings I sense guys are offended if the person they meet doesn’t lean in for a man-hug. But what are the rules? If I interview a first round NFL draft pick the day after he man-hugs the commissioner am I supposed to lean in for a man-hug too or does a handshake still suffice? Are they man-hugging the commissioner because everyone is in such a good mood or because he holds a position of power and authority?

According to this New York Times article, English professor Eric Anderson believes the man-hug grew out of cultural changes in the early 90’s when cultural homophobia began to soften in the west.

Dr. Akil Houston of Ohio University calls the man-hug a socially acceptable display that combines affection with aggression (http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/get-over-here-man-decoding-the-brohug).

No one I can find lays claim to inventing the man-hug. Dr. Houston believes it originated in African-American culture and grew into the main stream because of the popularity of MTV and BET networks in the late 80’s.

Personally I think it’s all part of the blurring between personal and private matters—the law of unintended consequences playing out through social media. Do I really need to see a photo of your dinner before you eat it? Isn’t that part of your private life? Sort of like hugging used to be part of my private life? We hugged the people we knew well, our parents, our kids, our friends who we visited the hospital. But never strangers. Never people who ran organizations we just got hired into. Never another guy we met for the first time in a social setting. And we knew that. We knew when to shake hands and when to hug.

I’m clearly not sure when to do either now. And I suspect a lot of people—even people much younger than me—share the same confusion. For example, if one of the players who hugs the NFL commissioner at the draft tonight gets called into the commissioner’s office next year because of a disciplinary matter will the commissioner great him at the door with a man-hug? I don’t think so, but I’m not sure. And if they do man-hug does it come before or after they post their selfie on Instagram?

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The Three Things Your Audience Really Wants

I work with executives and professionals across the country on communication and presentation skills. Most of them have a preconceived notion that puts them off course before they even get to the front of the room: They think they have to strive for perfection. Good luck with that. It’s worthwhile to try to improve. We all want to get better, but striving for perfection is a wast of time for a couple of reasons:

It’s not a realistic goal.
It’s not what your audience wants anyway.

Audiences don’t want a perfect presentation. they want a presenter they can relate with, a presenter who connects with them, a presenters they feel understands them.

If someone did deliver a perfect presentation it would likely just freak out the audience. Who can relate to someone who never makes a mistake, who never stumbles over a word? Not me. Not anyone I know either.

Audiences want three things, and you won’t find perfection in the list:

Insights
Energy
Engagement

Insights:

Audiences want to learn something from you that they don’t already know: how to prepare a presentation, cook a classic French meal like coq au vin, optimize their websites for search engines, understand the previous quarters financial reports, learn your business plan, etc.

That’s your content. It’s the what of your presentation. Good, even great, content is crucial but it’s not enough to guarantee a great presentation. You need more. You need energy.

Energy:

There is no bigger mistake a presenter can make than not bringing enough energy to the front of the room. A lot of people confuse the rush of adrenaline they get before a presentation with her. Sure, fear might produce that originally, but you always have the option to put it to use as something else, as fuel.

As a presenter if you bring authentic energy—not the phony kind that some politicians or second rate salespeople use, but real, from-the-heart energy—your audience will respond by giving the energy back to you. But you have to give it first. If you give your audience genuine energy, your audience will respond in kind. The audience takes its cue from you.

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Energy is the how of your presentation, how you convey your content. Do it well and it opens the door to the third thing your audience really wants: engagement.

Engagement:

Your audience wants to feel like a part of your presentation. Audience members want to feel like you get them, you understand them, you speak to them their needs, their situation, their wants.

You can do this in many ways: the content itself, the Q&A session, exercises, including audience members in demonstrations, telling stories they relate to, giving examples, using statistics. These all create engagement, and engagement is what turns your presentation into a conversation. It makes it personal and powerful.

Engagement is the why of your presentation. It’s why your audience cares.

Insight is the what. Energy is the how. Engagement is the why. If you can put significant what, how, and why into your presentation I promise you that your audience will find your presentation insightful, impactful, and memorable.

That’s far more powerful than chasing perfect.

 

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