Before presenting, practice, practice, practice
Get ideas, notes, and visual aids together in advance
Before presenting to a large group, Zeena Engelke, RN, MS, patient education manager at the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics in Madison recommends that people talk to their mirror. Pull your ideas together and know what you are going to say well in advance. Also prepare your visual aids, such as overheads. Then practice, practice, practice, she advises.
"If you are new to presenting, practice in front of colleagues and have them give you feedback or videotape yourself," says Engelke.
Although seasoned presenters no longer have to go through the presentation word-for-word, it still is important to be well prepared, agrees Sandra Cornett, RN, PhD, director of The Ohio State University Health Literacy Program in Columbus. Although she has given hundreds of presentations, Cornett always thinks through her introduction to the topic because she wants to immediately capture the audience’s interest.
Cornett also makes sure her transparencies for illustration are all in order, and if she is doing a PowerPoint presentation, she makes transparencies as backup in case the system doesn’t work. If flying to a conference she keeps the transparencies in her carry-on luggage.
Practice should help a presenter stay on time. Have a plan for reducing information quickly should the presentation go too long. It is possible to hit the highlights and not cover every point and still successfully present your overview, says Engelke. "Rather than say, I don’t have time for this,’ it is better to learn how to reduce the content and abbreviate, then it is a much more skillful presentation," she says.
Presenters who engage the audience in an activity need to make sure there is time to complete it before adjourning. To keep such activities within the timeframe of the presentation, they must know how to facilitate group interaction. "When presenters break the audience into a small group and ask them to brainstorm something for five minutes, they’ve got to know how to manage that," says Cornett.
Practice also should help presenters give their talk without reading their notes. Cornett lists key points to cover as a reminder, but each person needs to figure out what will work best for him or her.
When delivering the talk, speak directly into the microphone so that the audience can hear you, says Leah Kinnaird, EdD, RN, a consultant with Creative HealthCare Management in Minneapolis. Also, repeat major points so that everyone understands what was said. Often someone will cough or there will be a loud noise off-site right when a major point was made and someone will miss it, she explains.
It’s important to pay attention to the audience as well. If at a certain point you notice that people are getting up to go to the restroom take a break, don’t wait until the scheduled time, advises Kinnaird.
If a member of the audience should bring up a point that you intend to cover later in your talk, go ahead and cover the information; then when you get to that part in your notes, simply mention it, says Kinnaird.
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