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Presentations Skills

HPCFinance PhD course Ole Lauridsen

Center for Teaching and Learning

BSS – Aarhus University

What it is not about

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Agenda

• Elements of a Presentation

• Preparation

• The PowerPoint-presentation

• The Presenter: Body Language and Speech

• Moving on

Intended Learning Goals

• After this presentation you should be able to:

– Prepare your presentation in a structured way.

– Create a well functioning PowerPoint-presentation.

– Identify and work with important parts within the field of body language and speech and deliver your presentation effectively.

– Develop yourself and your presentation skills.

Elements of a Presentation

Content

Layout

Materials

The Presenter:

Performance

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Agenda

• Elements of a Presentation

• Preparation

• The PowerPoint-presentation

• The Presenter: Body Language and Speech

• Moving on

Preparation (1)

• Who is my audience?

– Family, colleagues, experts, laymen, customers, …

• Important for your personal performance on the whole, for the selection of items, and for the ‘delivery’ .

• How much time have I got?

– What must be covered in the presentation – and what not necessarily?

• It is like packing a suitcase for a holiday: discard all the nice-to-have items and concentrate on the need-to-have ones.

• Less is more.

Preparation (2)

• Write down key concepts on index cards.

– Organize the cards.

– Change the order of the cards in order for you to create a strong structure and a good flow in your presentation.

• This procedure will also help you find and discard some nice-to-know items – or make you aware of nee-to-know items you might have forgotten in the first place.

• Get started!

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Agenda

• Elements of a Presentation

• Preparation

• The PowerPoint-presentation

• The Presenter: Body Language and Speech

• Moving on

Why PowerPoint?

• ”PowerPoint is evil!” thunders Edward Tufte from

Yale University.

• And there are bad examples, indeed.

• But a presentation is never better than the person

who has designed it.

• A PPP can be designed so that it hits the bull’s eye.

• And it’s easy!

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Do I Have to Use PowerPoint?

• No, of course not – there are other tools such as Prezi.

• But: do always use visual materials of some kind to support the information you deliver orally.

– Only few adults are good auditive learners whereas many learn well by using visual input.

– Generally, presenters should address as many sensory channels as possible to support the learning of the attendees.

Learning Styles – Definition

• The ways we go when we:

– Concentrate on new (and often) difficult

information,

– Take in this information,

– Process it into knowledge and/or adjust our

existing knowledge,

– Store this knowledge,

– Use this knowledge again (remember).

Dunn’s og Dunn’s læringsstilsmodel

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© OL – ASB/HHÅ – 16-01-2013

Which LS Elements Are Directly Addressed in a PowerPoint-Presentation?

Analytic: (1) The presentation, (2) The hand-out. Global: (1) The hand-out, (2) The presentation.

Auditory: The presenter‘s „speak“. Visual: The screen and the hand-out. Tactile-kinesthetic: The hand-out.

+Structure: The presentation and the hand-out. - Structure: The people present can make their own structure afterwards.

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PowerPoint – How? (1)

• General rules:

• A PPP always consists of the following three elements:

– The presentation as such.

• Layout.

– The handout.

• Layout.

– The performance.

A unified whole

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PowerPoint – How? (2)

• The interaction between presentation and handout:

– A presentation in which information is presented step by step benefits the analytic learner.

– For a global, this is lethal. S/he, therefore, should learn how to create an overview of the information to be presented by skimming through the handout; thus s/he is able to concentrate on the screen slides.

PowerPoint – How? (3)

• The interaction between presentation and handout:

– The analytic learner should learn to use the

handout to create an overview when the last

information on the slide has been presented.

– Therefore the presenter holds a slight pause when

s/he has launched the last bullet of the slide – i.e.

before s/he goes to the next slide.

PowerPoint – How? (4)

• It is important to keep the amount of information on each slide to a minimum.

• Follow the rule of 7±2: Our working memory processes information step by step and can never handle more than 5-9 information units at the time. In other words, 7 is the average that we should use as our guideline.

George A. Miller The Psychological Review, 1956, vol. 63, pp. 81-97.

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PowerPoint – How? (5)

• ‘Information unit’ is obviously an ambiguous concept.

• It is linked to the learner’s existing knowledge and the way we present the material.

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PowerPoint – How? (6)

• Colors are also information.

• If the presenter restricts him/herself to 5

information units per slide, i.e. 5 ”bullets”, s/he

can use 4 colors:

– 2 colors for the background (more to come).

– Further 2 colors for other purposes.

As to colors, fonts and font size

• Read my booklet:

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What About the Handouts?

• Always bring handouts, or even better publish them at least 24 hours before the presentation – preferably 3 pics per page with lines (as the one you got).

• Bring also separate copies of printed text, graphs, tables etc. …

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A Final Word – and Warning

• Avoid spelling errors including punctuation errors.

• Avoid layout inconsistences.

• Your language and your material contribute to the impression you give of yourself.

• - which leads on to the part on to the presenter and body language and speech.

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Agenda

– Elements of a Presentation

– Preparation

– The PowerPoint-presentation

– The Presenter: Body Language and Speech

– Moving on

The Presenter: Body Language and Speech

Speech • What you say

• How you say it

Body Language

• Appearance

• Facial expression

• Pose

• Motion

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• Your size, shape and your looks.

• Your clothing.

• Your facial expression.

• Extremely difficult to change.

• Easy to change.

• You can try – and you must try.

• Smile at least!

Appearance

Body Language: Facial expression

• Your facial expression should match your message:

• Keep eye contact.

– If you are uncomfortable with this, look at people’s foreheads.

You are too kind, thanks a lot!

Your are fired, get out here – now!

Pose

• Two Donts – among many, but these illustrate common problems (often connected with facial expression):

1. Don’t cross your arms – this signals hostility or defense (though a smile helps).

• If you don’t know what to do with them, put them behind your back or fold your hands in front of you.

2. Don’t put your hands in your pockets – this signals lack of interest.

• If you want to get rid of them, put only one hand int the pocket or let your thumbs stick out.

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Motion • Move:

– use the “stage”,

– alter distance and closeness, but steer clear of the caged tiger.

• Talk with your hands but don’t shout:

– “This is important!”

– “ There are two central messages … “

Try not to turn your back

towards the audience

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Don’t cover what you have written. Stand to the right.

Write legibly. Only in capitals when stressing something

Turn on the blackboard

lamps

If you feel naked … best not to hide behind paper…

… try to hide behind a pen instead.

Speech

• What you say counts.

• How you say “it” matters.

• Be sure about “what”

– If you are not sure about the “what”, any “how” will be superficial and shallow – and embarrassing.

– The performance is important as an ‘eye opening wrapping’, but the contents should match it.

– The performance should support the contents of the presentation.

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Starting your speech

• Briefly present yourself (less is more!) – or thank whoever has presented you.

• Await silence.

• Create attention:

– Refer to some relevant event/incident or refer to a headline in a newspaper; show a relevant picture/illustration/graph/video clip – an eye catcher.

– Give away a few exiting points first and perhaps some conclusions – subsequently elaborate.

What you say …

• Create relevance:

– Use examples your audience can relate to.

• Avoid technical jargon (or translate at least).

• If appropriate start a dialogue.

• Never ask “Are the any questions?”

– If you want to answer questions during the presentation, then let people ask when they need to.

– Usually “Are the any questions?” is nothing but an empty phrase.

What you say: Rhetoric’s 101

• Repetition – as much as possible.

• Dramatic pause – don’t overdo it.

• Rhetoric question – don’t overdo it.

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Always State Your Intended Goals

• In order for the attendees to create understanding (to learn) is it important to give them navigation tools, among other things the intended (learning) goals of your presentation:

– ”After this presentation you should understand/know/see…”

– ”After this presentation you should be able to…”

• In writing!

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Use signposting (1) Words/expressions that guide the audience and create structure:

• Starting:

– Thank you for giving me this chance to speak to you about...

• Introducing the topic:

– I have divided my presentation into two/…/several parts:…

• Respect for the listeners:

– As you may know… – As you can see… – As you may be aware…

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Use signposting (2)

• Transitions:

– Let me start by explaining the background – So I’ll start with... – Let’s get started: First... (Second… Third…)

– Next I’ll talk about...

• Referring backwards and forwards:

– As I mentioned earlier...

– More on this later on.

• Finishing:

– Thank you very much for your attention.

– That was all from me today. It’s been a great pleasure to share this with you.

Pitch, Speed, and Volume

• There are three recommendations:

1. Find the right level: Don’t shout and don’t mumble.

2. Don’t talk too quickly (You do in fact get tickets for speeding.

3. Jazz it up - use variation.

Speech Don’ts

• The wrong start: “Ahm, Right, hmm, let me see, o.k. the Danish taxes are …”.

• Do not ask for pity:

– “I’m so sorry, but I’m very nervous”.

– “I just came in this morning, so I’m very tired.”

– “My children kept we awake the whole evening, so I am sorry to say that I am not as well prepared as you might wish.”

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Agenda

– Elements of a Presentation

– Preparation

– The PowerPoint-presentation

– The Presenter: Body Language and Speech

– Moving on

Moving on

• Being nervous is normal and good.

– “Blackouts” seam much longer to you than to the audience.

– Take a draught of water – or squeeze in a time out.

– Develop your technique little by little:

– Do not try every new presentation skill idea at the same time.

– Rehearse and let others evaluate you if you feel the need – supervision is a strong development tool.

– Watch others and watch television to pick up tips ands tricks.