Slaughter of the Sacred Nine

"Paul du Toit’s presentation at the March 2008 NSAA Convention in Melbourne Australia was ‘world class’. His content and delivery were outstanding. He imparted relevant information in a way that left me excited that I had learnt so much in such a short time. I can immediately transfer the benefits and apply to my own presentations thus improving my own performance."

- Brenda Eckstein (Brenda Eckstein International), Business Consultant and Trainer.

This is the content of the platform skills workshop presented by Paul du Toit at the 17th NSAA Convention in Melbourne, Australia on 30 March 2008

Avoid the nine traps that speakers fall into and take your presentation to the next level

When you make the time to attend a presentation and listen to a speaker, is it not true that you would like that speaker to succeed. Yet, often the speaker will do things - or forget to do things, thereby detracting from the value and the content of his or her message. Let's focus on the 9 "Crimes" that speakers commit, that you should eliminate from your presentation.

1: Speaking too fast

A common pitfall of speakers and presenters is that they often speak too fast, giving the audience little time to reflect on the past sentence. This can be a sign of anxiety in a speaker, and the audience will pick this up. The tension created by having to present or make a speech often manifests in the voice with the vocal muscles tensing up resulting in you sounding unnatural. A more controlled pace helps the speaker to use his/her voice better, create more inflection and emphasis and get the point across with more impact. It also makes you appear much more relaxed. Ideally, you will want to recreate your natural voice that you automatically use when you are speaking to friends.

Here are some of the pitfalls you will want to avoid:

Shouting
Preaching, or coming across as aggressive or prescriptive
Mumbling, resulting in your audience straining to hear you
Speaking too fast - you may lose your audience
Speaking too slowly - you may bore your audience and put them to sleep!
Being monotonous
Failing to pause as appropriate, thereby coming across as if you are in a hurry.

2: Forgetting to pause

Instinctively, we feel that by pausing we show that we don't know what to say next. This kind of pause will indicate to your audience that you are unsure of what to say next. But pauses can be used in many positive ways - and should be!

Perhaps the most useful pause of all is at the end of an important sentence or statement. Our brains work a lot faster than we can speak, and we often think about what someone has just said while they are still saying something else. If the speaker allows a pause for his audience to take in what has just been said, then they are unlikely to miss the start of the next sentence. This also allows the speaker to gather her thoughts.

But there are other kinds of pauses too. You may pause momentarily mid-sentence before an important phrase in order to create emphasis. The reflective pause indicates that you may be choosing the right word or way to say something. The purposeful hesitation can be used to create humour, or make it appear that you are uncertain. You may pause to allow people to quieten down before you proceed, or before an announcement.

Pausing should not be seen as a negative, but as part of your armoury of skills.

3: Shouting

This is a ploy used by speakers who feel that the more that they infuse their message with hype and excitement, the less they need to worry about their content. Today you get speakers with good content, you get speakers with good platform skills and you get speakers with both good content and good platform skills. No prizes for guessing who gets paid the most!

The ability of the Village Cryer to project his voice great distances was a distinct advantage, but in a speaker, shouting indicates insecurity and can come across as bullying. It is good practice to assume that your audience consists of discerning people who require excellent content delivered credibly and enthusiastically.

If you are using a microphone, there is really no need to shout anyway. There are many microphone options to choose from. Find one that suit you and buy your own - if you often talk to audiences, it's one of the smartest things you can do!

4: A Lack of Enthusiasm

Academics are often accused of being boring when delivering very interesting content. This may not make sense, but people are better engaged when a speaker is able to visibly demonstrate their excitement about their topic.

Passion and enthusiasm are enhanced by effective use of body language on stage. Your most effective tools are deliberate movement, big and varied gestures, and purposeful eye contact.

The best speakers know how to use their voices to generate enthusiasm in a speech, but you may be surprised to hear that almost all of us have the ability to use our voices very expressively when we are "fired up" about something. Ask someone to speak about an important game that their team won - and you'll hear what I mean!

So, enthusiasm is naturally supported by your passion for the subject combined with effective use of body language and voice.

There is of course one other thing you can do. Focus on being enthusiastic. Get yourself in to the zone by "self talking" yourself before your talk. Tell yourself how much you're looking forward to presenting this talk and how much people will love it. Then, when you're on stage, make sure you focus on them and not yourself. As you get in to your rhythm, the enthusiasm will be there.

5: Waffling and Interrupting Yourself

There is a disease that affects speakers called waffling. Waffling is when you take ninety words to say what only needed nineteen words - or even better nine!

It is wonderful to hear a speaker with good content presenting at a good pace, perhaps expanding using a few examples….until she interrupts herself and goes off track for a while. As the Speaker goes of track, she will take her audience with her, sometimes dividing their attention, and having to work harder to get everyone "back in to the boat and on the river again."

Try and resist being diverted by "asides" or "little ideas that pop in to your head" while you are speaking. As you go off your point and interrupt yourself, it becomes more difficult for you to get back on track again, so trust your preparation and rather stick to what you had planned to say.

6: Worrying about what people think of you

Speakers that are inwardly focused worry more about how popular they will be than the integrity of their message. Assuming you're the world's best and most engaging speaker, it is likely that approximately 3% of the people that see you will not like at least some aspect of what you say or do, or have some criticism. This opinion stems from extensive research of speakers, trainers and presenters which indicate that consistent ratings of over 96% are rare, and 97% virtually unheard of. One is thereby released, along with everyone else, from the burden of being perfect. What a relief!

I have always found that a sound combination of subject knowledge, preparation combined with two or three practice runs is the best formula to get you ready for your presentation. Once you have set this up, you need to be yourself and trust that it will work. And if some people don't like you, let it be their problem, not yours!

7: Poor use of the stage

Because a podium or lectern is a barrier, it hides many a sin. One associates lecterns with lecturers, church pastors, MC's or the CEO presenting the financial results. The main purpose of the lectern, of course is a place to put notes, particularly useful in a dark venue where the lectern provides a reading light. But there is no question that with your body behind the podium, and your eyes buried in your notes, your persuasive powers and your impact are markedly diminished!

Although many presenters who use lecterns are vocally skilled, their performance would improve markedly if they would move away from the podium and use body language effectively. But then they should practice before a mirror as part of their rehearsal so that what the audience sees is indeed worthwhile! You want your movements to inspire confidence in what your content, not detract from it.

The most powerful part of the stage is the centre. Where no visuals are being used, or the data projector is roof mounted, or the screens are mounted to the side you should spend most of your time in the centre. If you move to the left to tell a story with a powerful and positive message, go there again when you are ready for your next powerful story. If you go to the right to tell a sad story, the next sad story should also be from the right. But wherever you stand, ensure that your eye contact spans your entire audience while you are there.

8: Poor eye contact

There are many places you can look when you're speaking to your audience: The back wall, the ceiling, the floor, your shoes and of course, best of all your slides on the screen. But you won't win many friends that way. Eye contact with all sections of the audience is one of the most effective tools of persuasion you have.

If you are using cue cards, remember that they are there to prompt you and not to be read. The rule is that when you open your mouth, your head should be up - and not reading.

The biggest enemy of eye contact is that we get caught up in our content and find ourselves looking at just one person in our audience. If you have rehearsed your flow, it will be easier to give some attention to your performance and ensure that it is balanced.

9: Gestures and Body Language

If you've ever see the Star Trek movie, you will know that aliens are depicted as having stiff, rigid movements. More fluid movement is what makes us appear human. If you are fortunate enough to have arms, you should use them skilfully as an accompaniment to your words when you present, especially to assist you in emphasising key points. We instinctively understand many universal body language signs and these will enhance your message. Avoid repetitive gestures, and avoid over gesticulating, and avoid meaningless gestures. But well selected gestures can enhance your presentation substantially. Ideally you want to reach the stage where it becomes second nature.

It is helpful to understand that people gain most of their first impressions from your body language - the impact of words increase as the minutes roll on. So focusing on a positive stance at the beginning and throughout your talk will help you feel confident and your audience will pick this up. Avoid shuffling movements. Big, slow and deliberate movements are always best.

Bonus 10: Poor use of PowerPoint

I see it all the time - professionals and amateurs alike. If you're going to use PowerPoint, please ensure that your slide show is set up in such a way that you do not find yourself walking between the beam cast by the data projector and the screen. The temporary moving shadow you cast on the screen is very distracting to the audience, detracts from your presentation, and makes you appear amateurish.

Try and give yourself a few extra minutes to set the room up properly in advance. One of the challenges of presentation using visuals can be something that is virtually impossible to change - the room setup itself, particularly if you know that the room will be packed full of people. If your data projector is mounted on a centre-front table and there is one screen centre-front, wherever you stand you may be obscuring someone's view. You may want to be cognoscente of this so that you can change position from time to time so as not to penalize the same unfortunate few folk for your entire talk.

On occasion I've been able to set up the screen on one side of the stage - either left front or right front. A better scenario is two data projectors aimed at each side! This way you have the stage to yourself and need not concern yourself with avoiding the beam.

By using slides when you need them instead of constantly, you also free yourself to move about the stage as you see fit. I do this by positioning black (blank) slides where I want no visuals. This is achieved by It is also very useful to have a remote mouse that can blank out a slide when you need to. These are available and work very effectively.

Unfortunately modern technology and common sense do not necessarily go hand in hand and users fall into several traps. Slideshows are best used to support your work, rather than to do the convincing. Avoid the following common pitfalls:

1. Too many special effects.
2. Being rigid in format, and unable to adjust (usually shorten a presentation) if necessary.
3. Striding around while visuals are still up.

Conclusion

There are 4 great methods of receiving feedback:

A live audience of one or many people can be very useful and objective - they may see flaws that you don't.
By using a camcorder to video yourself you can playback and capture all aspects of your presentation.
A mirror instantly tells you what you're doing right or wrong and helps particularly with visual feedback.
A digital voice recorder allows you to critique your vocal delivery and can be played back during "dead time" for instance, when you're driving.

In order to understand how to deliver persuasive presentations that reach your objective each time, the best thing that you can do is to gain experience preceded by a good course in presenting. Experience with no training will often just entrench bad habits - so try and avoid taking short cut if you're serious about doing well in front of an audience.

And remember, it is more important that they do what you tell them to afterwards than that they like you. Hopefully, both will happen!

Resources:

You will find over 50 free tips and 13 articles on presenting on www.presentationskills.co.za.

My book on Presenting titled "Even You Can Present With Confidence" will be published during the 4th quarter of 2008. If you would like to be informed of its release, kindly subscribe to my monthly newsletter by going to www.congruence.co.za and clicking the subscribe button or go to www.pauldutoit.net.