Executive Tools
- Executive Summary
- Self Assessment Checklist
Expert Practices Articles
- The Art of Presenting
- Delivery Skills: How to Present Like a Pro
- Presenting in a Visual World
- Persuasive Presentations
- Creating Persuasive Presentations
- Content: The Final Piece of the Puzzle
- The ABCs of AVs
- Improving Your Presentation Skills
Tools & Analysis
- Mikki's Top Five Presentation Tips
- Vistage 200 Club Presentation Tips
Book List: Presentation Skills
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CEO Best Practice: Presentation Skills
Executive Summary
- The Art of Presenting
- Delivery Skills: How to Present Like a Pro
- Presenting in a Visual World
- Persuasive Presentations
- Creating Persuasive Presentations
- Content: The Final Piece of the Puzzle
- The ABCs of AVs
- Improving Your Presentation Skills
The Art of Presenting
The ability to communicate powerfully and effectively represents
one of the most critical skills a business leader can have. The
secret to becoming a world-class presenter, say Vistage speakers
Jonathan Gordon, Jeff Krawitz and Tom Mucciolo, involves a two-step
process. First, master the basics. Then incorporate the "intangibles"
that separate the great speakers from the merely good ones.
According to Gordon, the basics include the following:
- Delivery involves the "how" of the presentation.
It includes eye contact, voice, dress, body language and all the
things you do to create perceptions in the listener's mind.
- Content addresses the "what" of the presentation;
specifically, what you will talk about and what you will not talk
about.
- Interaction consists of all the different ways to get your
listeners involved in your presentation.
In addition to this trio of elements, Mucciolo adds a fourth one
-- the visual dimension.
"We live in a visual world," he explains. "Accordingly,
we need to deliver our presentations from a visual rather than a
print perspective. That involves a whole array of skills including
how we plan and organize the presentation, how we move about the
stage, and how we design and present our visual support materials."
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Delivery Skills: How to Present Like a Pro
"As a communicator, it's essential to be believed and trusted,"
he states. "If the audience doesn't believe you, they won't
believe what you're saying. Trust and credibility have far more
to do with how you say it and a lot less to do with what you actually
say."
When deciding whether to believe and/or trust you, an audience
is affected by three factors:
- What you say -- 7%
- How you sound -- 38%
- What they see -- 55%
If you want people to believe in you and what you say, you have
to look and sound confident. When it comes to connecting with the
audience and creating an aura of confidence and competence, one
skill stands head and shoulders above the rest -- eye contact.
Most people intuitively know how to make appropriate eye contact
in one-to-one conversation. For many speakers, however, problems
arise when addressing more than one person at a time. The secret
to making effective eye contact in large groups, says Gordon, is
to create a series of one-to-one contacts. Make eye contact with
one person, hold it for three to six seconds and then move to another
person. Do the same with the next person and then move on to someone
else.
"The key is to move your one-to-one contacts randomly through
the crowd, not up and down the rows of chairs," states Gordon.
"Otherwise, you look like a robot. And don't buy into the myth
that you can look over people's heads at the back wall and they
will think you're looking at them. Make direct eye contact with
one person at a time, hold it for at least the minimum threshold
and then move on to the next person."
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Presenting in a Visual World
From a structural standpoint, the art of presenting can be broen
down into three basic areas: message (what you need to say), media
(visual support) and mechanics (delivery).
In business situations, most speakers do a reasonably good job
with the message and mechanics. But, suggests Mucciolo, they often
fall woefully short in their use of media, primarily because they
think from a "print" mindset while their audience lives
in a visual world.
"The metaphor of presenting has changed dramatically because
we now live in a visual world," he explains. "People under
the age of 40 tend to be visual creatures, which means they think
in pictures and images. They prefer the big picture perspective
over facts or details. To make effective presentations in a visual
world, you must learn to think in a visual mode. And that starts
with having a visual strategy."
According to Mucciolo, an effective visual strategy has three
main components:
- Purpose involves your objective, the conceptual reason for
giving the presentation.
- Movement deals with the way the audience's eyes move through
the information on your visuals.
- Color affects mood, interest, motivation and perception. It
enables you to reach inside and change something about the way
your audience feels.
To make your presentations more visual, Mucciolo offers the following
tips:
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Persuasive Presentations
In the business world, most presentations involve more than just
the passive transfer of information; they also involve persuasion.
According to Krawitz, the ability to persuade others begins with
an understanding of three communication "domains":
- Persuasion versus information. Persuasion involves trying to
get people to act on the information you communicate. It does
not involve coercion, manipulation or convincing.
- Theatrical versus one-to-one. Successful presentations require
making a one-to-one connection with each individual, regardless
of the size of the audience.
- Formal versus casual. This domain refers to your dress, presentation
style and delivery. The decision to go formal or casual depends
on the audience and the unique circumstances of each presentation.
In addition, says Krawitz, every persuasive presentation contains
three core elements:
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Creating Persuasive Presentations
Every presentation has three distinct sections -- the opening,
the body of the talk and the closing. If you want to deliver a persuasive
presentation, says Krawitz, begin with the end in mind. To develop
a powerful closing, start by determining your key action items.
Ask questions like:
- What results do I want to accomplish by the end of this presentation/meeting?
- When I finish talking, what do I want the audience to do?
- How do I want them to think or act differently?
- What specific action(s) do I want the audience to take?
Your answers to these questions constitute your closing. Once you
have a powerful close, your next step involves tying it directly
into your opening.
The main ingredient of the opening, says Krawitz, is the purpose
statement, which focuses the meeting/presentation on what you want
to talk about and leads to the desired action. In order to get people
to take the action you want, the purpose statement needs to be audience-oriented
and value-based. In other words, it must answer the question everyone
in the audience is thinking -- what's in it for me?
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Content: The Final Piece of the Puzzle
The process of building your content starts with an effective
communication strategy that contains three essential elements:
- Your position (right brain…feelings)
- The benefits to the audience (left brain…logic)
- The action/outcome you want to generate
According to Gordon, most speakers cover the benefits and the action/outcome
well but give position the short shrift. What does a position sound
like? Nothing more than a statement of your feelings or beliefs
about the issue at hand. For example:
- "It's absolutely essential that we move forward with these
changes."
- "We'll miss a critical opportunity if we don't implement
this plan within the next 30 days."
- "Our client is counting on us to complete this project
on time and within budget."
"A position doesn't have to get any more complicated than
that," explains Gordon. "However, all three elements are
vital. To deliver an effective presentation, the audience must understand
where you stand on the issue, what you want them to do and what's
in it for them if they do it."
Before preparing your content, Gordon recommends creating a listener
profile, which identifies five key points about your audience:
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The ABCs of AVs
Visual aids can add style, polish and meaning to your presentation.
Or, they can make you look like an amateur. By following certain
basic guidelines, say our experts, anyone can learn to use visual
support materials like a pro.
- Stay focused on the goal. Before using any visual, ask three
questions: What is the purpose of my talk? What do I want to move
my listeners to do? How does this visual support that goal? If
a slide adds value to the listener, keep it in. Otherwise, get
rid of it!
- Keep it simple. If it takes longer than eight seconds for the
audience to decipher the visual, make it simpler or get rid of
it.
- Never use your visual content for your notes. If the audience
catches you reading your slides, it sends the message that you
don't inherently know the material.
- Don't surrender your territory to your visual aids. When possible,
keep your projector and screen off to the side, so that you remain
front and center. This allows you to stay in charge of the presentation
and move about with greater ease.
- Limit your talking while the audience is reading a slide. Give
your listeners a few moments to digest the information and then
start talking. Always talk to the audience and not the slide.
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Improving Your Presentation Skills
To take your presentation skills to another level, our experts
recommend the following:
- Plan ahead for the Q&A session. When possible, role play
possible questions and your responses ahead of time.
- Videotape yourself to get real-time feedback and identify specific
skills/habits to work on.
- Strive for slow, steady progress. Work on one or two habits/skills
at a time. Don't try to fix everything at once
- Always warm up before giving a talk. At least a half-hour before
you go on stage warm up your voice and your body. Identify areas
of stress in the body and stretch those areas.
- Prior to speaking, avoid ice water, excess caffeine, overeating
and tight clothing. These restrict the voice and sap your energy.
- Smile. It breaks down the barriers between you and the audience
and shows that you're approachable.
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