This is why bullet points often hinder rather than help – your audience reads on and gets to the punchline ahead of you. You’d be annoyed if the last chapter of the book you were reading was revealed on page three. Remember, too, that not every point needs to be backed up with a slide. This will give you greater control over the subject, and you can stay on each as little or as long as you like. When it comes to slides, think ‘1 slide = 1 message’. Essentially, you want your listener to glance, get interested, and then move to you, the speaker, for greater depth.
Use your imagination - no one wants to see another light bulb representing creative thinking! Get them glancing.Ī good slide should work on the principle of ‘glance technology’, just like a billboard.
#PRESENTATION EXPERT HOW TO#
It takes a lot of work to craft a simple idea – a lot of time thinking about what to leave out, and how to distil everything down to one great point or example rather than an under-confident handful. You only have to look at Apple to see that true simplicity comes from real intelligence. When you’re building slides, think simplicity. Remember that only when people are listening are they able to gain any understanding. Keep this balance all the way through so your audience keeps listening and is then rewarded for their attention with new knowledge. So, aim for 20% of your slides and talk to be thought-provoking and challenging, and the remaining 80% to be insightful or informative. Of course, you want to create some impact and gain attention, but that needs to be backed up by substance. Always consider the 80/20 rule of engagement. You need to take your listener(s) with you, get them participating in the argument or story you are developing. Think of your presentation as one half of a conversation that you will lead, rather than a monologue where you will bludgeon them with facts and statistics. This is as much about how you fit with them as them fitting with you. We asked David Bliss, presentation guru and director of training company Edison Red, for his top tips on slide design and presenting at interview… Keep the interviewer engaged, make them think and question. But at an important job interview, where you need to perform at your very best, your presentation needs to be up to the mark too. In the course of our daily work, where decks are produced often and on the fly, some of these excesses may be forgivable. The result is usually some unpalatable combination of too many slides, tiny fonts and unimaginative imagery. The phenomenon of ‘death by PowerPoint’ is one of those things that we all agree is a bad thing – but, when interview nerves strike, it can be all too easy to hide behind our decks.
It’s second-interview time, and they’ve asked you to present - but how do you show what you know without sending people to sleep with your slides? We asked a presentation expert, David Bliss, to reveal his top tips.
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