Do you regret this??

The platform is set. The key audience is seated in the room. This could be a classroom or a boardroom. You did not sleep the previous night since you were giving the final touches to your project or presentation. There is silence in the room. Now it’s your turn to showcase your project or presentation to the key people who matter. You start with your presentation and suddenly you see the critical eyes, argumentive & over powering people staring at you and your data, almost giving you the impression that every data or slide you are presenting is incorrect. You go blank and lose your confidence. You just sail through the presentation looking at some friendly eyes who nod in affirmation to your points. You come out dejected and with regret.

If this is the common thing that you also suffer as i initially did, this blog may of help to you.

Let’s try and understand why this happens.

Most of us are not habituated to give presentations to a group. As a result of this there is a great fear of failure. This is good enough to make us feel nervous.

The other reason is our assumption that the audience is so super learned that they may look at all the flaws or data mis-matches in our presentation. One more reason to deepen our nervousness.

The third reason is that our slides may have so much of text or data that we ourselves get confused which one to highlight in the limited time available at hand. Additional reason to make us nervous and confused.

A friend of mine who works with a multinational company once told me that his department people prepared 84 slides presentation to be made to the Managing Director and the time slot given was 30 minutes!!! Imagine the plight of a presenter who have to finish close to 3 slides per minute to give justice to 84 slides. He further told me that each slide had lot of text and data. No prizes for guessing what would have happened to the presentation. It miserably failed.

Here are the quick tips:

1. Keep it simple

Does not mean you write in mono syllables or dumb down your presentation. Find the core idea or key message you wish to highlight on a slide and ensure its coming out clearly.

2. More pictures less words

Pictures or graphs represent a great visual story. It allows you to keep the main thing the main thing. You can always give the printouts for micro level data.

3. Follow a three step approach

a. Tell them what you are going to tell them; b. Tell them the key message; c. Tell them what you have told them.

Try using these things in your next presentation. The clarity on slides will keep your thoughts clear during presentation. This will allow you to present the main things in a way you wish to present and make the desired powerful impression.