Make a SWAGGER presentation

Presentation is one of the many heart-racing moments we experience during our working lives. Even the most conceited attention seeker can shy away from the spotlight when the need to stand before a crowd arises. The possibility of being subject to caustic remarks deters anyone from taking centre stage. The intimidating presence of your CEO towers over you and the unforgiving looks on your team mates when you make a blunder only aggravate the situation. All this doesn’t bode well for you if you’re looking to impress your office crush.

And so you take the back seat. You decide that you do not want to put yourself under the unnecessary scrutiny. You gratefully thank your partner for stepping up and volunteering to present your ideas to the boss. You relegate to being the resident PowerPoint tracker, decimating your job responsibility to literally clicking the mouse. Newsflash: no one cares about the guy who is the PowerPoint clicker or the girl who parades with the visual aids.

If you want to get ahead in the company, public speaking is your golden express ticket. Take a cue from your rock star colleagues – they put themselves out there because it is the only way they can get talent spotted in a multitude of people. There is an unspoken admiration for someone who dares to speak before a crowd.

Contrary to mid wives’ tales, the skill of public speaking can be honed. No one is ever born eloquent. Social butterflies, though glib in nature, aren’t necessarily the best presenters in the industry.

1) Put on a show

Bored and uninspired expressions, having people fidget or leave their seats can be all distracting to you. These reactions can impede your presentation because you know you are losing your audience’s attention. And so your defensive instincts go into overdrive and you decide to hasten your presentation. You forget your words, you stammer and you leave out a good chunk of your presentation.

Sustaining interest and keeping all eyes intent on you is no easy feat. You need to garner attention right from the get-go. Excite your audience in the first 30 seconds – make them sit up and go, “this is worth staying awake for”. This is the time to get creative.

The best presentations were never just about reciting a carefully scripted speech and synchronizing your words with your PowerPoint tracker. Instead of sticking to the hackneyed routine of Microsoft PowerPoint, you could kick off your presentation with a video. If it is one important presentation that would determine the course of your career, it is probably best to outsource the making of the video to a professional vendor.

If you do not have the resources, fish out your camcorder and put it to good use (other than limiting it to the bedroom). Address the important points of your presentation in the video – the key message, etc –

If you want to go all out, you can even perform a live skit. Make sure you are well-rehearsed on the day of your performance and rock out! However, be mindful that this is only the start of your presentation; the purpose of the video or skit is to enthrall your audience –ultimately, you want to keep the gems for the actual presentation.

2) Make them laugh

Unless you are in the stratosphere of Barack Obama, chances are people won’t be listening closely to every word you say in an hour long presentation. A few of them would also doze off in the middle of your speech. What better way to wake them up than a sudden roar of laughter? When your audience laughs with you, it only means one thing: they agree with what you are saying and they are enjoying your presentation. More often than not, the part of the speech that resonates best with them is the part you have amused them.

Humor is indeed pivotal to a good presentation. However, this doesn’t mean you should be rummaging through archives of Chris Rock’s monologues and quip about black people when you are trying to do a sales presentation. The funniest jokes are the ones that are the simplest. They are not contrived nor forced. Relate to your audience the things you have observed during your time with the company; the unique work culture etc. Make a casual witticism about management if you will. Talk about work idiosyncrasies but be careful not to cite any names. You will have your audience nodding their head in unison in no time.

3) Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse

Even the most charismatic person cannot deliver a good presentation if he decides to just “go up onstage and wing it”. Remember, when you make a presentation, you are either trying to promote something, sell an idea or push a message. It is very different from speaking in a social setting. If you are ill-prepared, you cannot speak with authority when discussing a subject matter.

Rehearsing is also of paramount importance when it is a team presentation. A lack of preparedness is evident when teammates interrupt each other or cut short each other’s allocated portion. It also disrupts the audience’s train of thought when the team needs to pause for one member to jump back to the previous slide to make his point. Everything is thrown into disarray and your team’s efforts would go down the drain.

A presentation that is polished and executed well on cue is likely to rave the audience.

4) Visual aids

And by that, we don’t mean for you to line all the eye candies in the centre. Visual aids engage the audience and help them grasp the concept you’re trying to sell. You can verbally brag about the threefold increase in sales when you were at the helm, but that point would be put across more effectively when it is depicted in the form of a chart. Don’t leave your audience to their imagination; show them.

Break the monotony of words by including pertinent pictures in your presentation. Make it colorful and dazzling!