Selecting your Topic

It has been said that the greatest challenge faced by a writer is that of the blank piece of paper and similar challenges can exist for anyone involved in the development of a presentation. At times you may have a general idea or outcome required of your presentation; however there are multiple methods to get to your goal. Perhaps the more challenging situation is when as a presenter you are given a brief to “just entertain them” … often prompting the question in the presenter’s mind of “Have I just been given enough rope to hang myself?”

2 factors to consider in approaching your presentation are cause and comfort. Cause is where you wish to take your audience; comfort is about how you want to get them to the destination.

Thinking about cause in more detail, your brief might be to inform a group of sales people about a new product line that they will have access to. Your presentation might be constructed around the technical specifications of the product or alternatively you might develop a presentation that highlights the new features and how they would benefit the consumer – both of these presentations (technical and marketing) achieve the brief you have been provided but would result in two quite different presentations.

The question in this scenario is do you want your audience to know the product or to be enthusiastic about the product. It is possible to achieve both outcomes however your initial strategy in preparing the presentation should be to focus on one goal, then review to incorporate the other goal. Trying to hit both targets too early in the development of the presentation can result in you missing both.

Your cause should be direct and if it takes more than about a dozen words to express it is probably in need of refinement. The more focused the cause, the more use they provide in getting your presentation to meet the audience.

As a speaker you are always asking that your audience trust you in some way, whether that is trust in your knowledge or authority on the subject on which you are speaking or simply your honesty and sincerity in your communication.

That trust can be easily lost if the audience senses you are acting or pretending. If your natural speaking style is to be informative and accurate, a presentation where you are vague or focused on humour can appear disjointed.

Does this mean you should never stretch yourself and always stick to what you know? Definitely not, I would encourage all presenters to try in each presentation to incorporate something new as these both expand the range of tools you have as a speaker and makes the presentation fresh – but if you have the option in choosing your style of delivery, you would be wise to consider what style you are most comfortable with.

By designing your presentation to play to your strengths you will find yourself more comfortable with the presentation and that comfort will communicate itself to the audience through confidence.

By having a cause to focus your presentation and a style of presentation that is comfortable, your presentation is on the way.