When less is more in public speaking

By Ellen Egan

I was reading a post in Garr Reynold’s Presentation Zen – if you don’t already know of it, you should check it out.  He was speaking of :

 ”A fundamental design and life lesson from the Zen arts is to never use more when less will do. This goes for the use of color as well. The problem with most slide presentations is not that visuals contain too few colors, it’s that they contain too many”

So, I was thinking about all of the horrendous presentations I’ve seen with loads of color and animation – so much that it give you a headache. Two minutes into the presentation and your brain shuts down beaucse it can’t handle all the color input.  Then, I started to think about how this relates to presentations in general.

When and “expert” is delivering a very technical presentation, the tendency is to add somuch supporting data and information and graphs and charts and backup  research, blah,blah,blah.  the audience, who probably got the point and agreed with it in the first five minutes,  quickly becomes bored when presented with too much supporting detail. 

Remember, when giveing a presentation not to overload the audience with too much detail.  Provide, at the most three examples to support each point.  Keep these examples clear and short.  Then move on to the next thing.  If you like, you can ask your audience if they would like further examples.  They will tell you if they do.  Usually, they are quite happy to move on to the next point in your presentation.

So, when preparing your presentation “never use more when less will do”.

to your success,

Ellen

Establishing trust in public speaking

By: Ellen Egan

Recently I was working with a public speaking group on media communications.  In particular we were working on how to communicate with the media during crisis situations.  So, we are talking about high-stress situations where the interviewer may or may not be asking difficult or aggressive questions. 

One of the things we discussed was non-verbal communications.  What messages do you send during public speaking just by the way you hold your body, present yourself and interact with others?  The main point I would like to address here is about eye contact.  We all know that it is important to “have good eye contact” during public speaking.  But, how do we do that and why?

Eye contact establishes trust.  When someone cannot look you in the eye, you think they are lying to you or they are hiding something.  This is true for public speaking as well.  This is especially true if someone is asking a question – even a difficult question.  It is important to look at them while they ask the question and at least begin your answer by looking at them directly.  You can finish the answer while looking at other participants in the room.   While presenting, it is a good idea to look around the room and speak as though you are speaking to individuals rather than a large group.  This helps establish  rapport with the group.

Establishing eye contact with people in the audience during a public speaking presentation builds a foundation of trust.

To your success,

Ellen

Using humor to defuse difficult situations in public speaking

By Ellen Egan

Even if there is only one negative person within the audience, it can be a source of tension for your presentation.  Tension for you and tension for the entire audience.  When this starts to happen, you will need to distract the audience so that you can defuse the tension.  One of the best ways to do this in public speaking is with humor. 

Humor will change the atmosphere and allow you to bring the audience back on track towards their and your objectives for the presentation.  “But how” you ask?  One of the easiest ways for me is to simply tell a story.  So, before you go into your presentation, think up (invent it if you need to) a funny story somehow related to your topic.  Keep this story in your mind, on hold, until you need it. 

One of the keys to using humor to defuse a tense situation is to remember not to use humor against the person who is being negative.  This will put you in an adversarial position with this person, when actually, you are there to help them.  Also, if you get into an adversarial situation with a participant, it is more likely that the audience will resent this and side with one of their own.  Then you are completely lost.  Always keep up the atmosphere that you are on their side.  You are there to help.  Public speaking is really all about helping people.

To your success,

Ellen

More about handling difficult audiences

By Ellen Egan

The first step that we talked about when dealing with a difficult audience member in public speaking is to depersonalise.  Don’t take it personally.  The next thing to do is to step back and try to keep your ego out of the situation.  We already know that the problem is probably not about us.  So, you can then try to discover what is being the person’s negativity. 

Our ultimate goal is to deliver an effective presentation.  We want every member of the audience to leave the presentation having achieved the outcomes that they wanted from the presentation – this includes our one negative participant.  If it is fairly obvious, as in the example I gave in an earlier blog post of the participant who was upset about a management decision, you can try to have the participant air their grievance and ask them if there is any way that they can participate positively within the presentation.  They may realise that their concerns are able to be addressed and leave the presentation as your greatest advocate.

One way to prepare in order to head off negativity before it begins is to ask the person organizing the event if there are any concerns or resistance that the audience might have to the material you will be presenting.  You can then include responses to this resistance within your presentation.  Preparation is always the best cure to any negativity within public speaking.

to your success,

Ellen

Handling difficult audiences in public speaking