Whether you’re holding your annual budget meeting or introducing a new cost-cutting initiative, you need to command people’s attention while you’re presenting.
After all, the last thing you want is for employees’ to leave your presentation without remembering a single point that was made.
To keep presentations on-point and engaging, follow these three best practices:
1. Short, relevant & interesting
As you weave from topic to topic, keep this point in the back of your mind: If you’re talking for more than 20-minutes straight without any audience interaction, it’s probably too long. And there’s a good chance you’ll lose a decent amount of your audience.
You don’t have to constantly ask questions to spur audience interaction. Another option: Polling the crowd regularly throughout your presentation.
2. Offer detailed handouts
It’s always a good idea to give employees their own copy of your PowerPoint slides so they can follow along. But handouts are more effective when they include things that aren’t on the slides, like websites where employees can find additional info on the topic.
3. Put them to work
After you’ve finished presenting, give employees an opportunity to do something with the info they’ve heard. You can do this by surveying them on their most/least favorite parts of the presentation or quizzing them on what was covered.
Got any tips of your own? Share them with us in the Comments section.
