How to write a presentation - Emphasis

How to write a presentation How to write a presentation Delivering a memorable and effective presentation to your colleagues or customers is about so much more than pulling together some PowerPoint slides and donning your best suit. You need to inspire your audience, not bludgeon them with jargon and visuals. Robert Ashton provides some handy tips on how to impress. Gordon Brown, in one of his first high-profile public presentations as shadow chancellor, talked in detail about the post neo-classical endogenous growth theory. He was greeted with widespread media derision while the electorate remained bemused and unenthused. Now, 13 years later, and finally on the cusp of being the new Prime Minister, his words on the economy are unquestionably more straightforward and easier on the ear: The task ahead is to build an even stronger economy with even higher standards of living It would be fair to say that Mr Brown has learned a thing or two about giving a presentation. Of course much has been made of his changing style: he smiles more, speaks more openly, looks more relaxed, wears more fashionable clothes. All of these may have improved his presentation style. But giving a decent presentation is about more than wearing the right outfit and developing a more upbeat speaking voice. It is also about the words you use. As Mr Brown said himself in his leadership-bid speech, I have never believed presentation should be a substitute for policy. He may have been referring to politics (while having a little dig at Tony Blair), but we should echo his call for substance to triumph over style in the world of business presentations. Presentation has always been an important part of professional life, but there has been a noticeable trend over the last few years for the focus to be on delivery and appearance rather than content. Mr Brown is not the only one who has been polishing his presentation style. Countless organisations send their staff on presentation skills courses to learn how to improve their public speaking. Not that presentation skills dont count of course they do. But a good presentation depends on much more than simply presenting yourself. A clear voice and a confident manner will never disguise irrelevant, ill-chosen content or over-complicated, inappropriate terminology. And by content, Im not referring to PowerPoint slides. Most of us have had enough of sitting through presentations where we are either bored to tears by slide after slide overloaded with text or dazed by endless graphics whizzing pointlessly across the screen. To be fair, some businesses are starting to realise this. But many have missed the point in their response to the growing disenchantment with PowerPoint. A well-known software company, for example, decided that employees were not engaging with corporate presentations. Its solution was to decree that no presentation should be longer than six slides. The result? Slides with as many words, figures and graphics as possible squeezed in by means of the teeniest illegible font and the narrowest margins. The employees, I imagine, have gained nothing other than future eyesight problems to add to their disengagement. But my real objection to PowerPoint is nothing to do with the number or style of the slides. It is the fact that pulling together the slides seems to have become almost synonymous with writing a presentation. Slides may give you a checklist of points to cover, and sometimes even some worthwhile visual support. But they will never win over your audience. Wise words To engage and inspire an audience you need to appeal to their values. To carry them, you need pace and rhythm. To change minds and influence decisions, you must choose and order your words carefully. In short, you need to plan and write your presentation, not just pull together some slides. Presentations demand a physical style of writing thats tied to your breath, the ability to deliver a telling phrase or sentence and whether you can capture and keep an audiences attention. You need to tell a good story and you need to keep it short and snappy, using simple, evocative words that will immediately strike a chord. You cant afford to leave your audience behind to have them wondering what you meant by something when youve already moved on to something else. Your ideas and values have to register in the moment. Your words need to be both simple and powerful. No matter how accomplished or experienced a public speaker you are, you will rarely get a good response from using technical, philosophical, or intellectual jargon or convoluted language in a presentation. Imagine if Martin Luther King had said: I am in possession of a vision statement for mankind that my four offspring will at some future juncture reside in a nation where they will not be appraised by the pigmentation of their skin but by the nature and substance of their disposition. I am in possession of a vision statement today. Or if John F Kennedy had tried to appeal to peoples national pride with: In addition, therefore, co-habitants of America, do not request of yourselves as to the nature of the obligations your territory should render unto you; request of yourselves as to the nature of the obligations you should render unto your reign of domicile yourselves. Perhaps their undisputed personal magnetism and formidable public speaking skills may have compensated a little for the lacklustre content. But it is their use of simple but carefully-constructed language that has secured their speeches a place in the pages of our history books: I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today. And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country. So next time you have to give a presentation, whether it is to win hearts and minds, flog your products, or simply tell people what you do, forget the PowerPoint slides, the vocal exercises and whether or not your suit is looking a bit out of date. Instead, concentrate on the actual content of what youre going to say and the words that are going to make an impression on your audience. Some hints and tips for writing a good presentation: Syntax: Disentangle your thoughts and arrange the words in your sentences to be simple and logical. Often when theres a lot of information obscuring a main point, syntax becomes far too complex. Jargon: Every profession or industry has its jargon, but only use it if you are speaking to peers and are sure they will understand you. Words: We all have our favourite words that we enjoy using and make us feel confident. As you write, imagine yourself saying the words you use and see if you are comfortable with them. And avoid any words you have trouble saying eg. if you might stumble over statistics, then say figures instead. Sentences: The sentences in a presentation should be shorter than in the typical business document. When you do write a longer sentence, make sure there is a natural break point so you can take a breath. Pace, rhythm and tone: Varying the pace, rhythm and tone of sentences makes both the speaking and listening experience far more enjoyable. Make sure the stress falls on the most important words (eg. To be or not to be; I have a dream); vary the length of sentences; arranging words in pairs and trios (saying things in threes gives a sense of movement, progression and resolution: Going, going, gone). Saying words in pairs gives a more balanced tone (courage and commitment, energy and effort) or sense of tension between the words (war and peace, imports and exports). Analogies: Good analogies can work well in presentations because they paint vivid pictures for the audience. The best way to do it is to use either a simile (It wasnt so much a dinner party, more like feeding time at the zoo) or a metaphor (Shes a dragon of a teacher). Words to avoid: Be careful about using clichs like pushing the envelope, playing hardball and thinking outside the box. And think carefully about any word that ends with -ism, -ise, -based, -gate, -focused and -driven. Alliteration: Big and bold, sleek and shiny, key components. On the page alliteration may look contrived, but it can effectively highlight important phrases in a presentation. Repetition: Repeating words also works well in physical writing. The phrase used by New Labour politicians, Education, education, education, was much stronger (and far more memorable) than something bland like, Were going to make education our priority. Punctuation: Use punctuation to help you deliver your speech. You dont need to have perfect punctuation in your presentation script instead use exclamation marks, underlining and brackets to tell you when to breathe and which words to stress. You can always have another correct version of your script for distribution. Robert Ashton is chief executive of business writing specialists Emphasis. For more information see emphbootstrap.wpengine.com Do you want your team to write persuasive presentations? Have a look at our in-house presentation-writing course.