One of the things that I’ve always found challenging (and unfortunately just as challenging to teach) is how you should end a speech. A lot of variables and styles play a part here. Pacing to slow down your speech and end with a final thought is one good way to conclude. Most often, people will anticipate your conclusion if you say, “In conclusion…” and then recap your main points. However, I also taught one recently that seems to be a presentation-killer: “Does anyone have any questions?”
Too many presentations end without a grand finale. Some wander off-topic with a closing statement that has nothing to do with the content of the presentation. And quite a few end with these stinkers:
Wimpy. “I see my time is up. Thank you and goodnight.”
Honestly, I’m guilty of this. I never renewed my antivirus subscription, so I get three or four messages from McAfee telling me that my Security Center is not configured properly or something. And honestly, I wish I could turn it off, but I think the only way to do it is to fork over the $50. Hooray.
In a given day, or week, or month, how many messages pop up on your computer to:
Update Java, RealPlayer, or Windows?
Connect to a wireless network?
Remind you of an upcoming meeting or birthday?
Keep you up to date on your subscribed RSS feeds?
Warning: Some of these pop-ups may appear while you’re presenting in slide show view! Not a pretty picture!
After a few minutes of inactivity (let’s say you’re answering questions), does your screen saver kick in, or does your computer go into hibernation mode?
Before you get into such a situation, right now, start making a list of the pop-ups that you see, and research how to turn them off. It’s not always easy to find the answer, because the software companies want you to see those pop-ups!
I’ve heard of even more embarrassing situations that pop-ups have created. For example, I was at a conference where they told a story of a pastor that had pornographic pop-ups on his computer because he had downloaded some spyware off a pornographic web site he had visited. Instant messengers are also annoying (both in pop-ups and in their “alerts”) sometimes if you forget to turn them off.
Anyway, if you know how to turn off the pop-ups, it might behoove you to do so.
This is probably a strange topic of discussion, but “bad PowerPoint” has become somewhat of a hobby of mine. I attended the Midwest Scholars Conference over the winter, and I discovered there that my classroom PowerPoint slides were bad, and not bad in the good way either. I have since tried to reformat my slides into something a little less “bad”, but it is difficult to keep from bulleted lists, which are apparently a no-no because they get too wordy. The problem for me is that I look at bulleted lists and notice that they look clean and organize, but they apparently don’t facilitate learning very well.
Anyway, I think the last example on this page about the components of a presentation may finally break my overuse of the bulleted list. Perhaps while I have these few months off this summer, I may be able to utilize some of these concepts in my hundreds of slides containing bulleted lists. We’ll see. However, if you are planning on putting together a presentation for class, there are plenty of ideas and references on Ellen Finkelstein’s page you can use. I’ll try to get some more up here as they become available.
As you all begin preparing for your final team presentations next week, I thought this slide show might be helpful to you. There are probably 10,000 people on the internet with their own ideas of how to put together a PowerPoint presentation, but this is one of the few I have found that integrates the delivery and communication aspects of the presentation equally with the technological aspects.
Here are the PowerPoint slides from last night’s class:
In addition, I will be emailing you the rubrics for the team teaching presentation and the individual speeches over the weekend. Remember the team teaching presentation must be a minimum of 1 hour in length, and the speeches will be 3 to 5 minutes.
To give you an idea of how this coming week and the following week will go so you can prepare: we’ll start class off with the individual speeches. That will probably last about an hour-and-a-half. The team teaching will follow the speeches. After that will be a video and maybe a quick recap of some of the points of the reading.
ASB 868, I have been woefully lax this week about providing content to your class, and while my post earlier in the week about the perils of Orwell’s 1984 happening about 25 years too late might have sparked some interesting thoughts, I want to provide content specific to your classroom experience. I think our discussions tonight might provoke some ideas, but in the meantime, you might find the tags to the right on Communication and Public Speaking of some interest to you. The problem with blogging on about a communications class is that there are so many other facets to the subject than just simply giving speeches. So, anyway, in the meantime, look in those subjects for some past articles of interest, and perhaps (God willing), I will be able to come up with some more subjects to post on this week.
I noticed that some people have been clicking on the web site of the Australian Toastmasters Champion, Darren Fleming, who recently commented here on my blog. Well, he has his own blog called the Executive Speaking Weblog. If you guys are interested in further refining your public speaking skills, I think this is a good place to look for continual updates.
For example, here’s a particularly interesting article on persuasive speaking. While I doubt that our class will be as unwilling to listen to your viewpoints as a 2-year-old is unwilling to take her medicine, I think it does merit the point that there is generally a “doubting Thomas” in the crowd who needs some extra convincing (or sometimes just someone who wants to impress the rest of the audience by taking the spotlight from the speaker and trying to get one over on the speaker to show how smart he or she is). Sometimes that is just an unavoidable part of public speaking, but adept speakers can turn them around and use them for their benefit.
One of the topics that we’ll be talking about next week in class is what your next step will be to utilize the skills you’ve (hopefully) learned in class in other situations. I think that good communication and the ability to speak in front of others can help us in many situations, from job interviews to business presentations to training events. One of the places I would consider looking into would be one of the many Toastmasters organizations in the area. You might want to check with your employers, because some of the larger companies have their own speaking clubs that have been organized by employees (Lilly, Raytheon, BMG, Rolls Royce, Roche are some of those).
I don’t belong to Toastmasters, so I’m not getting a referral fee from them or anything, but they are internationally recognized as a great organization, and I think if you’re interested in furthering your education in public speaking, Toastmasters would be a great place to do so.
There is a lot of helpful information on making presentations on Lenny Laskowski’s web site, including some topics that we’ll be discussing tomorrow night and in future workshops:
Since I cut the video short by a few minutes last night, I found the full version of “I Have a Dream” on YouTube.
I thought class went well last night. Everyone will get two speaking opportunities next week, so there will be ample time for all of you to be able to continue to practice your skills.
I found another good article from eHow.com on how to deal with public speaking anxiety. I know I’ve spoken to a couple of you on the subject already and that you thought you might have some issues in this area.
From my own personal experience, I feel that the very first step is probably the single greatest key to becoming more comfortable speaking in front of others: preparation. The more prepared I am to give a speech and the more I am familiar with the material I am presenting, the easier it is for me to focus, stay on track, and get back on track if mishaps occur with my notes, my technology, or my train of thought.
When you get the “deer in the headlights” look from people during a speech, it is most likely because they forgot something or something isn’t working properly, and that look is a look of panic because they think that they are suddenly on a trapeze without a net. The better you prepare for something to go wrong, the less likely that is to occur, and the more you end up having successful presentations, the more confident you will be.
