15 Presentation Tips for Professionals

The Importance of Presentations in Organizations

Presenting is not only a part of your job, presenting well is vital as a professional. That’s because presentations are a way of not only communicating the what, the how, and the why, they also serve to influence, explain and direct. In this regard, your presentations become a major part of your image. Just as you spend vast amounts of time garnering education, credentials and experience, and make great effort in grooming and wearing just the right clothes, your presentation skills define your professional image.

This discussion addresses major elements in well-delivered presentations and appropriate content. There are three themes: elegant simplicity, preparation and body language.  I think you’ll find the 15 tips below easy to understand and you’ll be able to implement them immediately. For simplicity, we’ll assume you are presenting using a PowerPoint deck, but by no means is this required.

1. Kick Stage Fright Up Front

Many suffer from moderate to severe stage fright. If this is you, there are a few techniques that may help to overcome stage fright right as you begin your presentation. All are intended to engage the audience.

• Practice your presentation many times. You can also practice in front of a mirror, friend or small group. Delivering a good presentation even in practice creates self-confidence.Create keywords on 3x5 cards if this helps.
• Visualize yourself giving a great presentation over and over. Visualizing success breeds success.
• As you are walking up to begin your talk, greet the audience and ask how everyone is doing. Follow-up with a comment on the weather or other generic topic. Elicit a response from someone even if you ask a stranger. This connects you to the audience.
• Tell a quick joke. But something simple and high level. It needs to be easy to tell and easy to understand. Something fast so your nerves don’t show. As the audience laughs, you connect to the audience.
• Show a joke cartoon or photo on your first slide. Comment on it as you were part of the audience. As the audience laughs, you connect to the audience.
• Show a quick film (3 minutes or less) on your topic to loosen everyone up. Ask for comments after the viewing. As you get responses, you will connect with the audience.
• Shy away from long introductions of you by a meeting leader, if there is one. Citing a long list of your credentials and accomplishments can make you even more nervous and can bore the audience. Quick introductions are much better received and shows modesty – an endearing quality to connect you to the audience.

By the way, you can join a professional association such as Toastmasters to build your confidence and prowess in public speaking over time. Toastmasters is an excellent organization with a wide variety of speaker-building tools and programs.

2. Follow the 5 and 35 Rule

How many times have you heard a presenter say, “I know this is an eye chart, but…”  If that’s true, why are they showing it? Obviously no one can read it. So why is it up there? There are three possible reasons. First, it may be intended to show you how smart they are, in that they are the only person on earth that can understand that eye chart. Or, they may be too lazy to convert the slide to something easily understood. Or better yet, they may not even understand it themselves in order to make it simple.

That said, many presentations have slides that are busy with words, difficult to see, and may be impossible to understand. So for the sake of your audience and your image, follow the “5 and 35 Rule.”

• 5 - Use no more than five bullets per slide. More than five bullets can cause the main theme to be buried and may have too many words for readability.
• 35 - Limit your text to 35 words maximum per slide. More than 35 words on a slide can bury the overall message and can also be annoying to your audience - and you could actually lose them.

If you have complex and wordy slides, you run the risk of losing the audience to smart phones, laptops, side conversations and simple daydreaming.  Once lost, attention is hard to get back.

By the way, complete sentences on slides are not necessary. Limit your words. Be stingy with them. Instead, focus on action verbs and power nouns for simplicity and ease of understanding. Expand on your bullet points verbally, a sign of a true professional.

3. Use Graphics on Each Slide

Even if it has absolutely nothing to do with your slide topic, try to use a graphic with each slide. Why? It makes the slide more attractive and interesting. Your audience will look at the material longer and it’s aesthetically more appealing than just dry words.

I suggest completing your presentation first and then going back to add graphics to each slide as a last step. But whatever method you use, please do add graphics to your slides.

4. Use Stories as Anchors

Try to use personal or business stories to anchor major points in your presentation. Stories serve to make the presentation real and creates a lasting memory for the audience. This tactic used by presentation masters and leaders and we can use stories as well to make our presentations more effective. Stories are also a way to garner trust. Personal experience endears the audience to you – it connects. Just ensure your stories and short and clear, with a punch. Don’t be afraid to become a little vulnerable. Vulnerability builds trust.

5. Ensure You Can Be Heard

There is nothing more devastating to a presentation than not being heard well. This falls on the presenter to ensure all in the back of the room can hear you. I recommend a sound check in the beginning and again throughout the presentation.  Two factors may affect the ability of the audience to hear you: your voice level may fluctuate throughout the presentation and there may be competing noise. Keep this in mind during your presentation because when an audience can no longer hear your, they will find other distractions including smart phones and side conversations.

As I have a soft, non-projecting voice, I carry with me a personal PA system if needed. You may not need to go to this length to ensure you are heard. But know this is the speaker’s responsibility.

By the way, you may actually be too loud. Address this by asking about your voice level at the front as well as the back of the room.

Note: Many may drop their voice level during a presentation due to nerves or discomfort. That is why it is important to do voice checks throughout the talk.

6. Dress Appropriately, Dress Well

Dress with color and professionally when presenting. While one might think it stylish to underdress to show independence, but your audience will respond to your appearance in kind. I am usually better dressed than my audience and they expect this of an expert. Remember this is your image. Use your presentation to showcase your professionalism.

7. Smile

Smile a lot. Smiling is free and makes others happy. This frames your presentation as a happy one and it is better received. That’s because audiences like “happy.” Learn how to smile effectively by smiling in front of a mirror and noting how your muscles feel when you are smiling well. Practice smiling randomly to people at work and watch their reactions. This can be the same reaction from your audience.

Obviously there are some presentations that may be somber where a big smile would not be appropriate. Use your common sense and good judgment. But I think you would agree that most presentations would benefit from a hearty smile. 

8. Maintain Equal Audience Eye Contact

Look to your right, to the middle and to the left, rotating these views during your presentation. Many who are nervous may find a friendly face and essentially give their entire presentation to just that person. This loses the attentions of most of your audience.

Avoid this by remembering the phrase “10, 12 & 2”. That is, rotate your views from your left at the 10am position, to straight ahead at the 12 noon position, and then to the right at the 2pm position. Spend no more than 20 seconds on each view to create equal eye contact with your entire audience.  Speaking to one direction or one person only can result in the rest of the audience losing interest and jumping on their smart phones or laptops.

By the way, remember to stand up straight. Ensure your posture is good and remember to look up, not down at the floor. This implies lack of confidence and can result again in losing your audience to their devices. Good posture is also a power position putting the least stress on your body - a stance also promoting confidence.

9. Use Your Hands and Move Around

Don’t just stand there looking at the the projector screen.

Use your hands to express your points as much as possible. Watch yourself in a mirror if this helps. You can even ask a friend to observe you. But your hands lend another form of expression.

Walk around the room as you present. Scope out your travels before your presentation to avoid any surprises. There are no rules here. You can walk all the way to the back of the room or in circles around the room. You can even walk to the center of the room and sit in an empty chair. This all adds interest and sets you up as the master of your topic and leader of the presentation. Move around.

10. Don’t Read Your Slides

There is nothing more amateur and boring than someone simply reading their slides. Paraphrase the content. Say the same thing differently. But above all things refrain from reading your bulleted text or risk losing your audience to boredom. With regards to bulleted content, less is more. Use your slide bullet points as keywords to spur your verbal presentation.

11. Be Smart about Templates and Color

Just because you can, don’t. The use of ornate PowerPoint templates and bright background colors may be pretty, but are very distracting when it comes to content delivery. Err on the side of minimalism. Focus on simple templates, clear content and the use of individual graphics.

12. Prefer Graphics, Graphs and Tables

Prefer graphics, graphs and tables as much as possible over bulleted words. They are visual representations of words and are much easier to understand as well as more attractive and interesting.

• Use simple graphics. A picture can really tell a thousand words. But make sure it is not overly complex.
• Use simple graphs. Although graphs are preferred to bulleted words, complex graphs can lose your audience fast. The graphs must be simple and easily deciphered.
• Use simple tables. If a graphic or graph is not appropriate, try a simple table to graphically represent words.
• Use Bullet Points Last - Use bulleted words only after considering the use of graphics, graphs and tables.

A note of caution; keep graphics, graphs and tables simple. If they become eyecharts, they are no longer appropriate. 

13. Remove Non-Value-Added Words

Non-value-added words take more time to create and longer to read. Make it a habit to remove them. An example would be the phrase “in order to.” This phrase can be replaced with just the word “to.” Another example would be using the word “that.” Most of the time, the word “that” can be removed. Consider removing other words that add little or nothing to your meaning. Complete sentences in bullet points are not required.

Double adjectives are another example of non-value-added words. For instance, the words “… a mistaken error” can be replaced with the words “… an error.” The words "mistaken" and "error" are redundant. Looking more closely at what we present may provide many opportunities to remove non-value-added words.

14. Use Quick Reference Cards

Use quick reference cards as handouts at the end of your presentation to anchor the major points of your message. Audiences love handouts and will hold on to "laminated" cards, even posting them in their offices. These cards can also serve as informal talking points with smaller groups or one-on-ones. Quick reference cards help anchor your points and puts you in an elite class of presenters, showing mastery of your topic.

15. Try to Gather All the Information Before You Create Your Presentation

It’s always a good idea to gather all the information about your topic before putting fingers to keyboard. This can prevent costly and time-consuming revisions down the road. Overcome your need to get started too soon by creating a detailed outline rather than the presentation itself. Outlines are easily changed. Multiple revisions resulting from continuously discovering new information can result in grammar and spelling errors, content mistakes, and omissions.

Make it a Tendency

Make these presentation practices your tendency rather than a hard rule. Mix it up! There will always be times when you may need to do things a bit differently. But embracing these 15 presentation tips may not only help make your presentations well received and better understood, your image could reap huge rewards as well.

Best to you!

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About Mike

Mike is a program manager, organizational change consultant, author, and popular speaker. Please email if you have any questions or comments at [email protected].