Some time back, Dale and I were the guest speakers on a webinar. The topic was about how we’ve redefined business presentations as Orderly Conversations. We were talking about the use of eye contact and pausing in order to get yourself engaged in the conversation. When we talk about being engaged as a presenter, we’re talking about...
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As a leader, you expect your employees’ business communication to be effective and efficient. But is it? Too often, it’s not. (I’ve written about the business implications here.) However, it doesn’t have to be that way. To be effective and efficient, business interactions must succeed on two levels. Helping your employees understand this concept is the...
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As a presenter, when you are engaged in the conversation, you are connected to your thoughts and externally focused on the people you are speaking with. If you’ve been in business for any length of time, you know that some presenters are NOT engaged in the process. Not only are their presentations hard to listen...
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In our business presentation workshops, we sometimes do an exercise in which we stretch the length of a pause—way beyond what would ever be comfortable or necessary—in order to show our learners how pausing helps eliminate a variety of presentation habits they want to avoid. We also teach people that in a presentation or meeting...
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You’re a detail-oriented person working in a highly technical position. You probably wonder how much detail you should go into when presenting to managers and leaders. You may even have been asked not to go into information overload again. You’re not alone. This is a topic that comes up a lot in our presentation skills...
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Among many of our learners, there is a persistent belief that the number of slides in one’s presentation is somehow related to the amount of time the presentation will take. While there is some connection when it comes to big differences (a 600 slide deck will probably take longer to present than a 6 slide...
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I was leading a presentation skills workshop a few weeks ago when something happened that has never happened before. It was during the needs assessment discussion. This is when we go around the room, and everyone talks about their needs and what they’d like to take away from the class. This was a small group,...
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The Orderly Conversation is getting around. This time it’s in India where an online publication, Indezine, has interviewed co-authors Dale Ludwig and Greg Owen-Boger about the book and the writing process they followed. We’d like to thank Geetesh Bajaj, editor at Indezine, for his insightful questions. Geetesh: Compared to other presenters’ books, The Orderly Conversation is a book...
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Any number of books and articles about business presentations focus on skills and outcomes that really belong to the world of theater. Such resources may tell you that you need to be entertaining, invent a presentation persona, or use acting techniques to jazz up your presentation. For example, they may tell you to rehearse when...
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Last week I was working with a nervous workshop participant. Let’s call him Nate. Nate said that his biggest concern when presenting was nervousness. “What sort of nervousness is it?” I asked since nervousness is caused by different things for different people. “Is it about the audience, the topic you’re talking about, or something else?”...
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