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How to Make Complex Info Accessible for Your Audience

By Natalie Gallagher

“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t know it well enough.” – Albert Einstein

One of the biggest challenges speakers and writers face, especially those who are experts in their field, is how to make complex information accessible and relatable to the audience. Whenever I address this topic with my clients, the immediate push-back I get is “I don’t want to dumb it down.” I expect this reaction, because most of us are not only attached to our work, we’re attached to being experts in our field.

However, making something …

Monday, May 7th, 2018 Tags: accessible, audience engagement, connection, content, speech writing, writing
Category: Audience, Business Presentations, Data and Statistics in Presentations No Comments

3 Wacky Leadership Tips that Might Just Help You Lead a Professionally Human Organization

By Kelly Vandever

I’ve led within large organizations and small. I’ve led in the military, in business, and on nonprofit boards. I received my Masters in management science. I’ve read hundreds of books on the subject and taught leadership to managers from over 200 organizations.

Yet it’s still hard for me to capture in just a few words the essence of leadership.

Rather than go on and on about all the amazing things you could do to be the best leader you can be, we’ll discuss three wacky, unconventional things you can do that …

Monday, April 30th, 2018 Tags: leadership tips, team, tips for being a great leader
Category: Leadership No Comments

Don’t Present On a Topic

By Mark Kretschmar

You learned it in college; you may have learned it in high school: Select a topic of interest to the audience for your presentation. This rule isn’t so much “wrong” as it is distracting. Of course you should be speaking of something which interests the audience. Where this rule gets in the way, like most rules, is the implications and ramifications of its assumptions.

When an “interesting topic” becomes the driving force behind your presentation, you feel you have everything you need and you forget the Presentation Prime Directive: Make your …

Monday, April 23rd, 2018 Tags: connect with the audience, delivering a speech, speaking topic, storytelling
Category: Audience, Audience Interaction, Presentation Coaching No Comments

Create a Great Audience Connection

By Bob Goodyear

Creating a great audience connection is key to making a great presentation. It’s easy to say but sometimes it’s very hard to do. What does it take to create such a connection? Let me share 3 tips that I’ve learned over the years that have helped me.
Know Your Audience
This is such a key for making a great presentation and connecting with your audience. I’ve written previously about questions you should ask to get to know your audience before you show up to speak. While these questions will …

Monday, April 16th, 2018 Tags: audience interaction, eye-contact, know your audience
Category: Public Speaking as a Leader, Speech & Presentation Coaching No Comments

Question Every Slide

By Tom Nixon

As you add, edit or review your slides here are 2 quick questions you can ask about each slide to see if it is just right for your presentation:
1. What is the POINT?
Does this slide have a single, clear, easily communicated message for your audience? Is it congruent with the goals of the presentation? Does it simply make sense for where it is and what it is saying?
2. Where is the POWER?
Does this slide deliver its message powerfully and efficiently? Are the graphics unambiguous and professional? Is the wording …

Monday, April 9th, 2018 Tags: clear presentation message, goal of presentation, powerful PowerPoint slides, simple PowerPoint slides
Category: PowerPoint Slides No Comments

The Latest News in Font Compatibility across PC and Mac Versions of PowerPoint!

By Kelly Vandever

Good News on the Font Front!
Not many people will appreciate good news about fonts…

But if you have to be flexible enough to present your PowerPoint slides on either a PC version of PowerPoint and a Mac version of PowerPoint, I have good news.

With the latest update to PowerPoint for the Mac, Microsoft made it so that fonts that are saved as embedded fonts* in a Windows version of PPT can now come over and be viewed correctly in Mac version of PowerPoint! Yeah! This should help some presenters from …

Monday, April 2nd, 2018 Tags: Powerpoint fonts, Powerpoint fonts for Mac and PC
Category: PowerPoint Slides No Comments

How to Give a Presentation Without Using Notes

By Natalie Gallagher

Pop quiz: What’s the best way to lose your place during your presentation?

Answer: Look down at your notes.

It’s counterintuitive, isn’t it? After all, shouldn’t your carefully prepared notes mean you have a greater chance of success? Sometimes, sure. But more often than not, presenters use notes as a crutch because they don’t trust their own brains to keep track of it all. And stopping to look at little words on a note card or piece of paper can be distracting enough that it works against you.

However, speakers who train …

Monday, March 26th, 2018 Tags: practice your speech, train your brain, using notes in a speech
Category: Speech & Presentation Coaching No Comments

Five Sure-fire Ways to Improve Your Presentation Delivery

By Pam Leinmiller

How you say something is every bit as important as what you say. When we begin delivering our great presentation, we want the audience to hear what we say. Perfecting how we are delivering the information can go a long way towards helping our audience take in the information. There is nothing better than practice. Instead of leaving that important presentation to chance, practice actually doing it ahead of time. And video yourself! I know, I know. You don’t like to see yourself on video, you don’t like how …

Monday, March 19th, 2018 Tags: audience, improve presentation delivery, pacing, public speaking, speech presentation, tone of voice
Category: Annoying Public Speaking Habits, Audience, Business Presentations, Speech & Presentation Coaching No Comments

Does Presentation Anarchy Rule?

By Mark Kretschmar

As a presenter, you can and should be in complete command of the audience. Using current rules, anarchy reigns, and it’s costly.

Well-intentioned rules are hurting your presentation skills. This problem is compounded when we look at several rules at the same time and see the dysfunctional presentation culture they create.
A Deadly Affliction
We’ve all been in too many presentations where the presenter advances slide after slide of bullet points and reads them from the screen. We begin to contemplate sticking a pencil in our eye as an excuse to leave …

Monday, March 12th, 2018 Tags: death by PowerPoint, designing a PowerPoint slide, PowerPoint presentation rules, Speaker influence
Category: PowerPoint Slides, Presentation Coaching No Comments

Storytelling Brings Along a Point

by Bob Goodyear

Storytelling in business presentations is a big topic today. It’s something that has been discussed for the last several years and continues to grow. If you Google the term “business storytelling,” you’ll find over 30 million references. The importance of storytelling in business has become essential.

I’ve written about storytelling several times. I’ve written about how to construct a story, where to put a story in technical presentations, and why to use stories. I want to expand on the why.

Recently I …

Monday, March 5th, 2018 Tags: storytelling, storytelling in technical presentations, the point in storytelling
Category: Storytelling in Presentations, Technical Presentations No Comments

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