Public Speaking: How to Prepare for an Important Presentation
Tags: Presentations, Students, Speech, Sales, Public Speaking

Now that we know so much about the art of public speaking and we have designed attractive presentation slides with the right amount of details, we have created an engaging presentation style and we understand the meaning of confidence and how helpful it will be to us when presenting, we are ready to prepare ourselves for the final stage of this task. Hopefully, this already feels like something we are less afraid of and something within our reach that soon we will be comfortable enough doing on our own. Let’s begin by discussing the Q&A Session.

Public Speaking, Part 7 — Questions

If no one in the audience has questions we can skip to the last slide of the presentation which can have our contact details and say “Please send me an email or a Linkedin message if you have questions” and if that’s not appropriate we can fade out to a black slide and say “Thank you”.

However, it’s more likely that the audience will have questions. That’s why we will explore frameworks that will help us more logically and more comprehensively answer these questions as a crutch. We will talk about how to address questions when we don’t really know the answer. We will discuss more transition words that can help when answering questions and buy us a lot of time to actually think of the answer.

Let’s start by introducing the “crutch” concept and show one example of it. It’s helpful to have frameworks prepared when answering questions and we don’t need to have the perfect answer, we just have to show we know how to use a logical framework. These crutches are generic enough to include in many types of answers if needed:

“The topic X is controversial as there are many reasons to be in favor of X, including Example 1, 2, 3 but there are risks to consider, including Risk 1 and 2.

In terms of Example 1…Moving on to Example 2…We also must consider Example 3…Lastly, let’s discuss…

Moving on to Risk 1 of public speaking (it has to be objective)…We need to also discuss Risk 2…

In conclusion, X is a logical solution because of Example 1, 2, 3, as Risk 1 and 2 are easy to overcome. As such, X is appropriate.

Applying that framework shows that the person using it can communicate logically in a well-instructed manner. When it comes to frameworks to use when giving a speech or answering questions we are going to discuss three things — Qualitative framework or crutches to fall back on; Quantitative framework of crutches to fall back on; Framework to use to answer any question (when we don’t know what is the answer).

-S.W.O.T analysis framework — Stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats;

- The Porter 5 Analysis framework — Framework for analyzing a company’s competitive environment. The number and power of a company’s competitive rivals, potential new market entrants, suppliers, customers, and substitute products influence a company’s profitability;

- BCG framework (Boston Consulting Group) — Framework for marketing-related questions. It classifies business portfolio into four categories based on industry attractiveness (growth rate of that industry) and competitive position (relative market share);

- P.L.C (Product Life Cycle framework) — The life cycle of a product is associated with marketing and management decisions within businesses, and all products go through five primary stages: development, introduction, growth, maturity, and decline.

Quantitative frameworks — They apply for banking or people that work in the finance industry, for CEO’s or strategy consultants

A framework to use to answer any question (when we don’t know what is the answer).

-I will get back to you crutch — “I am sorry but I don’t know how to answer but I will get back to you. Thanks.” Then in the thank you email later that night we can mention the answer. This shows that we are proactive and thoughtful. We can send it to whoever organized the event and if applicable have them send it to everybody else that was in attendance;

-The other company crutch — We could say something like “I am sorry but I don’t know much about company X. However, please let me know if you would like me to discuss company Y instead. Thanks.”;

- The other industry crutch — “I am sorry but I don’t know much about industry X. However, please let me know if you would like me to discuss the similar industry Y instead.

Next

We should talk about transition words to use. Using structure when answering a question during public speaking makes us look polished, prepared, confident, and very competent as well. It helps us communicate information much more clearly and buys us time. For example, if we have a bunch of things that we want to say we can use transition words such as — in addition; in terms of; moving on to; the last thing I want to say is…When somebody asks a question and we need a few more seconds to respond we can just repeat the question. Once again, if we don’t know the answer we can say something like “I’m sorry. I don’t know but I will find out and get back to you.”

There are some things to say in the Q&A session (or the speech) that the audience will remember and that means we have to be real and honest. Personal stories like “ When I grew up in…my mother used to tell me…” or “In…we also did the same thing but the only difference was this…” will be highly appreciated. After all, we want the people to remember they have met somebody with character and diversity, somebody interesting. Separately, we should use the person’s name when answering questions, connect with him and with the audience in general, be humble and self-deprecating.

Also, there are words it’s best not to use at all. We should not start by saying “Honestly, I am going to tell you the truth” as this doesn’t really refer to honesty. More importantly, we should not bad mouth a competition or anybody at all — if we say anything negative, people might not trust us. What we should also avoid is rambling, our answers should be short. If we find ourselves rambling, we could immediately finish the sentence by saying “and so the bottom line is” and put our final thoughts.

When we want to politely disagree with a question we can use the feel, felt, found out framework saying something like “I used to feel that way but I felt differently when I found out that…” Of course, we can just express our opinion on the matter without telling the person that they are wrong.

More

Another thing to consider is how to predict what the next question will be. We will keep our answers short, strategic and end them in a certain way. We should always give a little but not everything and keep some of the information in reserve. When we are asked about something we should answer with a directional comment because when answering a question we also make a statement. We don’t want to reveal the logic as to why, we want them to ask for more details. With that being said, we could make one more extra effort to impress the audience. We can have extra content and additional slides and use them when answering a question if we think they will of any help to us.

Something important to include in the answers are risks or counterpoints to maintain credibility. We should make sure that we are objective and that the counterpoint is actually a credible weakness or a risk that we anticipate the audience might be thinking about. A good exercise is trying to think like the audience — what do they want to hear next, what are they thinking next.

Since the audience is the customer, we should not only look from their perspective but also make sure that we answered correctly. If the person who asked the question looks confused, then other people might be as well. We can ask something like “Does this make sense, John?” using that person’s name. If someone looks a bit nervous and has trouble finishing the question we can help them by smiling a little and nodding. That reassures them out along the way (and if it’s a great question, we can start with that).

What to do when the audience looks bored? It’s not much different from when we are giving a speech. We can change the tone a bit (but not too much or it sounds arrogant), skip to the next topic, use transition words, walk around or we can break the monotony by saying a quote or telling a quick funny story.

Public Speaking, Part 8 — Practice:

Delivering a great speech has a lot to do with practice. That’s why we will discuss many ways to practice — while looking at the slides, then while not looking at them, with massive distractions in front of us, having other people watch us present so they can provide feedback. Also, we will talk about crucial things we have to do before and on the morning of the speech. As a result, we are going to be relaxed and happy and we will thoroughly enjoy giving the presentation to the extent that we are going to be a little bit sad when it’s over.

We can start by saving the presentation on Dropbox, iCloud, OneDrive, on our smartphone and then maybe take a long walk with that phone and memorize the whole text. When we have learned what’s on the slides we can record ourselves practicing without looking at them. After that we could try to practice with a distraction — for example, we could take a walk again but this time we can go to a busy street and record ourselves again. Then listen to the recording over and over again so we could deliver it almost perfectly on the day of the event.

The day before the presentation will be a good time to go to the room we will presenting in and do some more preparation. We should practice the speech there if the room is available and set the smartphone up at the very back of the room and record ourselves. If there is not going to be a sound system we should make sure people in the back can hear everything. Also, we could check if the font size is big enough (maybe 44 or bigger) and if everybody in the back can read it. If possible and if there is a microphone that’s going to be used, we can meet with the person in charge of the microphone and practice talking into it. The laptop should also be well hooked up in advance so we know it works perfectly.

The day before the speech we should also pack or bring 31 crucial items. They might not always be applicable but it’s a good thing to consider them:

Extra shirts, pants, jacket (and get them dry cleaned a week before at least); make sure that the shoes we wear are clean because that’s what people see when we are on the stage and also that they are soft bottomed so we don’t make noises when we are walking on the stage (it’s a distraction); A steamer or iron and make sure we steam or iron our clothes the night before and never the day of the event; Mints in case we speak with anyone after the presentation; Nutri-bars to eat right before going on; A bottle of water as they sometimes forget to give us; Business cards and products details, brochures, few cheap USB drivers that have details of the product, we can give them to massive potential customers or sales prospects; If the speech is early in the morning or in a different time zone it’s good to get up earlier for at least a few days before the presentation; if the speech is later in the day we could get up later in the day as well so we are fresher; Identification (as we might need it to get into the building or the room);

Tech

USB drive back up with the speech on it just in case; A Clicker and back-up batteries for it; Our own laptop and make sure it’s charged; If possible back up laptop; All types of cables to attach the laptop to a monitor, just in case they don’t have the right cables at the event; If there is a sound in the presentation we can bring or borrow small powerful speakers as a back-up; A charged iPhone, Android, or tablet for a timer so we can keep track; The phone number of our contact for the event;

Clothing

Layers of clothes in case the temperature is too hot or too cold; Earplugs for good sleep the night before the event, maybe even renting a hotel room closer to the event if travel is going to be awful; Emailing the contact for the speech the day before the event to confirm; Bringing the appropriate electrical plug adapters; Markers for a whiteboard or portable whiteboard if needed; Traveling to the event the day before so we know where to park (and bring cash); Turning off annoying warnings on the laptop or WiFi in general; Restarting the laptop and making sure there is plenty of space so it can run a lot faster; If we use a browser during the Q&A session we should make sure to have Wi-Fi access (The Wi-Fi is quite often written at conferences on the back of the name tag); Running a security software scan on the laptop the day before — it will get rid of pop-ups; Bringing earphones and listening to whatever gets us in a relaxed and peak state before presenting; Arriving at least the day before (if we fly to present); A notebook and a pen as we might need to write down a question that we can’t answer — so we could research it; A classy and conservative bag for the presentation items, same thing with the suitcase; Aspirin and throat lozenges;

What we need to remember is that perception really becomes reality in the mind of the audience when it comes to every single thing about our appearance.

Public Speaking, Part 9 — Appearance:

Unfortunately, people often judge by the cover and decide in the first few minutes if someone is credible. The same goes for public speaking. So we should think carefully about what to wear but also how to get in ideal, confident, and relaxed peak mental state (the zone), about nutrition and rest as they are crucial to the way we look.

How to get in the zone? After a good night’s sleep, we could get up and listen to inspiring music, meditate or do breathing exercises. It will be helpful to turn off the sound of the phone and every other distraction as nothing matters now, except today. We can say a prayer or think about the people we love — family, friends cheering for us and wanting us to succeed.

We can also start the day by thinking of the time we were so incredibly happy and energized when we were confident and felt invincible. A good idea is to list ten things that we are incredibly grateful for right now — that make us happy and relaxed, put us in a great, peaceful, confident, and relaxed mood. When we arrive at the event, we can make sure to be social and talk to the people there so we can focus on them and not on us, becoming a little less nervous.

How to know what to wear? If we are presenting at another company we can call the contact that we have at that company and ask them what we should wear or check out what people wear on their website. Sometimes Linkedin profile pictures work just as well. If we are close to getting promoted and are presenting at the company where we work, it will be great to dress a bit like the person or people at the level above us — so that the people think of us as being on the next level. If in doubt it’s best to overdress and put on a tie and ask somebody at the company/event if the tie is needed.

Our clothes should be ironed or steamed the day before and we should spend a lot of time picking the perfect clothes to wear. After all, this is a very important day. If the place of the event is in another country we can do a research about what’s appropriate or ask somebody familiar with the culture what colors to wear and what not to wear. We should make sure that we have extra shirts, jackets, et cetera.

What nutrition tips we should follow when preparing for public speaking? We have to bring at least one high-energy protein bar and eat it before the speech for extra energy. It will be best if we don’t eat too many complex carbohydrates or have sugar for breakfast or anything that can make us tired. Too much coffee can make us shaky and irritable.

Public Speaking, Part 10 — Post Presentation to do’s:

We need to keep in mind after the presentation what the purpose was of our public speaking. Did we accomplish everything we needed to accomplish — and if not, what should we do immediately from a call to action perspective. Many people forget to do that and they don’t ask for the sale, for example. That’s why we should revisit the purpose and make sure to follow up based on the purpose of the speech.

If we receive business cards or emails from people that watched the speech, we should connect with them immediately on Linkedin and when they accept the Linkedin request, if possible, we can immediately set up a coffee meeting with them.

It’s also important to thank the event organizer and the administration staff, to send them a quick thank you message (as we want to be invited to present again). We can also mail the event organizer the slides and if the slides are huge we can mail a PDF version and compress the PDF using a free web resource like sodapdf.com.

In conclusion

we can say that fear of public speaking is a common experience. Trying to overcome it and become better at it will help us get far in life. It could change our perspective, the way we look at things, and the way we express ourselves. Although it might seem almost too hard in the beginning, when we follow some bits of advice and prepare carefully we will not only succeed but thrive.