During your Presentation

The Presentation

• Be aware of the time – have a clock/ watch/colleague as reminder. Note: when rehearsing you tend to talk faster.
• Introduce yourself (and colleagues if it's a group presentation).
• Start with an outline of your presentation – explain the aims and objectives.
• Speak to your intended audience at their level. Avoid unnecessary jargon and material you know will be obvious or trivial to them.
• Look at the audience and speak slowly and clearly, vary your tone to emphasise.
• Try to sound interested in your subject. Add a bit of passion.
• Present only a small amount of information on the overheads. Each overhead should have a title.
• Do not read word-for-word or you might as well as give a handout.
• Use short bulleted lists, charts, graphs, tables to break up the talk but make sure they are labelled.
• You can also use cards/notes to prompt yourself but write in big letters and leave lots of space between points. Write at the bottom of card/note 'Now turn to new OHP'.
• Skip (or reduce) the maths.
• Use large type, and a sans serif font like Arial, Helvetica or Verdana. Anything smaller than about 23 point may be hard to see in a large room - 12 point would be impossible. Lower case IS BETTER THAN ALL CAPITALS.

Finally

• Plan a summary… ‘I/we have discussed the following... in conclusion...', This is where you can leave a good impression.
• Summarise key points you want your audience to remember.
• Invite questions. Remember that "I'm sorry, I don't know" is a perfectly acceptable answer.

Group presentations

• Plan together.
• All team members must contribute.
• Agree responsibilities and deadlines.
• Rehearse.
• First person should briefly introduce each member and their subject.
• Look interested when a group member is speaking.
• Practise the change-over.
• Help one another out.