This blog is about presentations & public speaking - how to make 'em, how not to make 'em and how other people are making 'em. Feel free to read, use and comment on what you find here. And good luck with your presentations...
…..and breathe while you present
Yes, okay, obviously! I’ve seen people start their presentations with a complete freeze, during which they even ‘forget’ to breathe and I’ve seen people hyper-ventilate. Neither is pretty!
The latter is particularly interesting: I’ve just come across some research that suggests that over-breathing (such as when you’re presenting and nervous) for as little as only one minute can drastically reduce the amount of oxygen in your brain - with the obvious consequences that you more easily forget what it was you were going to say.
So your presentation hangs in the air - silence - and you get more nervous; that leads to more fight-or-fight breathing, less oxygen in your brain and more risk to your presentation. Long-term readers of this blog will know what I’m going to say next….
…breathe from the diaphragm, nice and slowly and you’re presentation skills will go up, not your blood pressure.
Teachers freebie
You might have noticed over the summer here in the UK that one of the big teaching unions has called for voice training to be part of the training all teachers get as part of their ITT (Initial Teacher Training). Good idea. We see too many teachers after they’ve got problems.
We thought that it might be nice to try and help. Consequently we’ve knocked together a booklet (it’s stretching it a bit to call it an ebook but some folks would!) on voice & teaching. It’s probably useful for other people too, but it’s particularly aimed at teachers. You can download it for free, gratis and for nothing - just the warm fuzzy glow we get of giving voice training tips to teachers.
It would be great to get some feed back on these free tips!
Presenting in French
Well, okay, not actually presenting in French (’cos I am rubbish at it!) but hearing French people do presentations has been a bit of an eye-opener for me. I’ve just spent two weeks in France with my family (and have come back to work for a rest).
Now, I have to admit that my French isn’t very good. In fact, at school I was actually pretty much forbidden to take an O-level in it; they recommended I take something I would actually stand a chance of passing. Since then I’ve taken classes at lunchtimes and things though, and I’ve got a good smattering. Sometimes I can understand what’s being said to me in France and sometimes I can’t. What’s the difference between these times?
Clarity. Specifically, clarity of diction.
It’s just the same for presentations, I’m afraid. Just as the guy behind the bar in France could speak so that I understood him by making his words crisp, clear and individual, so the presenter can make him/her self more easily understood in the same way.
If your diction is excellent you’ll get away with a lot of other stuff, too.
For example, presentation skill trainers often tell you that to be clear you need to speak slowly. In fact that’s a gross simplification; you need to slow down enough to avoid problems with echos and so on, sure, but hands up the number of us who actually make a presentation in such big spaces? No, I thought not.
In fact, when they say you should speak slowly during your presentations what they actually mean is that you should speak slowly enough for your words to be clear.
I say: if your diction is very good, just like my helpful French barman or presenter, then the rate at which you can speak (and still be clear and understood) is higher.
Don’t get me wrong - I’m not suggesting that you can conciously use this trick to speak more quickly in your presentations (though expert presenters can and do!) just that if you’re nervous when you present (and who isn’t!) and you are talking quite fast as a result, it’s sometimes easier to improve the clarity of your diction than it is to slow down the rate at which you’re speaking.
Of course, how you do that is another matter - and covered in other posts.
Presentations as a part of networking
Networking is a way of life for some people.
For most of us though it’s a necessary chore.
For others still it’s their worst nightmare. Whatever your level of “assurance” it’s a real test of your ability to present yourself. I’m often asked to help people who are very good at what they do, but can’t find the way of saying it when they’re networking. Somehow they feel pressured to be able to ‘present’ as it “should be easy because they know about their subject after all”.
The good news is that this isn’t anything to be ashamed of! In fact it’s normal. After all, I know nothing about being a computer programmer, so why should a programmer expect to know how to present? That said, of course, the programmer needs to get work just like the rest of us!
The worst – and most common – mistake people make when they’re telling people what they do is to be too vague. They try to cover all bases and end up covering none. People need to know exactly what you do – you can’t expect them to take the general principle and ‘translate’ it into something they can use. (That’s why it’s always useful to listen first, because you can change what you say in response to what you hear.)
On the other hand there’s a serious risk of assuming the other person knows too much and taking about something like “high function backend DBs”. You know what you mean – because it’s what you do all day every day – but that’s just you! They might know about funding - and be looking to invest - but if they can’t understand what you do, they can’t invest in you!
We have a formula which balances both of these problems: use a colon. Before the colon you tell the other person what the problem is: after it you tell them how you solve that problem.
For me:“most people don’t like making business presentations and aren’t any good at it: our training means they give presentations with less stress and more impact”
For our hypothetical programmer: “Lots of websites would be a lot better if they were a bit more interactive and less like online versions of their brochure: we build the technical stuff that people don’t see but which makes websites work better”
See how it works? Even if you don’t like the specific one-sentence approach the idea is more widely useful. The key thing is to use the first part of the sentence to put yourself on the side of the person you’re talking to. Give them a problem that they recognise, a pain that they feel. Then offer to take it away.
Sometimes I even suggest cheating a little in the first half of the sentence by making it a question. “Everyone’s got to make presentations these days – are you one of the people who gets stressed out by it?” - here’s the colon – “Yeah? Me too, that’s why I train people.. blah, blah…”
The rest of your chat should just be filling in the details. Simple, eh?!
Voice is crucial for teachers as well as presenters
You can get the full details at the bbc here but the gist of the story is that the Professional Associate of Teachers has said that “the care and the use of the voice should be an essential and mandatory component of all initial teacher training“. Couldn’t agree more! Interestingly he was covering both elements of the teachers’ use of voice - communicating the subject itself and the thorny issue of Classroom Management.
I can remember writing about this several years ago - the only reason the articles aren’t still around is because of some mind-boggling incompetence on the part of various webmasters! Can you tell I’m still sulking about it?
Actually, I’ve now modified my views and think there’s a third reason that voice-work needs to be included in teacher training: if you don’t do it, a high proportion of them will suffer and even leave.
So, putting my money where my mouth is, I’ve knocked up a very short ebook overnight(!). See how dedicated we are here?! It’s only 12 pages, but it’s free 
It’s aimed at teachers and it’s here.
Presentations without errs and umms….?
Tim’s excellent Mother Tongue Annoyances blog had a recent article about how to get rid of the bane of the nervous presenter - umm and err.
The idea behind his article - and many of the comments - was that by providing feedback, so that the speaker knew he/she was “umming” during their presentation, they’d magically stop doing it.
I have to say, that’s not my experience; not personally and not in my training. Tim’s idea of video recording yourself and looking back at it is fine as far as it goes (and helpful!) but some of the others (typical of toastmasters etc.) such as putting up your hand every time you hear your presenter umm is just designed to fluster an already nervous disposition!
It’s about as much use as putting out fire by pouring petrol (gasoline) on it: after all, water’s a liquid and petrol’s a liquid, therefore petrol should put out fires like water does, right?
Errrrr…. no, actually!
As a presentation skills trainer - particularly in my public courses (which tend to be frequented by those who have to make presentations, rather than want to make them) there are two basic causes of ‘fillers’ such as umm and errr. The first is that the presenter/speaker doesn’t know what to say and is sub-conciously filling the silence while they think of what to say next… and that this is caused by them not having done enough work before-hand.
For this kind of presenter I have little time or sympathy. If they’re standing there, presenting, without having practiced and rehearsed (the two are not the same!) to the point where they know what to say, then they deserve to sound as daft as they inevitably will!
The second type of filler-sound-maker gets more of my sympathy. This is the kind of presenter who really would rather not be there. They’re presenting because they have to: perhaps because of a direct edict from their boss or the necessity of their work. More often in my experience though, because they’ve got a passion about something and they need to say it; not so much because they’ve got to say it but because they “can’t not” say it, if you see what I mean.
For this kind of presenter, filler-sounds are a kind of self-deprication. These people know they’re not God’s gift to presentions and they don’t need to be reminded of it every 30 seconds by some smug pillock in the audience putting his hand up!
No - what this kind of presenter needs is the time and space to get their act together.
Of course, as a trainer, my life is made easier because the cure for both these issues is pretty much the same - know the presentation and it’s material inside out, back to front and sideways, so that there’s no need for hesitation, repetition or deviation.
Prepare: rehearse and practice!
