Presenting PowerPoint slideshows created by someone else can be difficult. One of the most effective ways to build up your fear of public speaking as well as make PowerPoint presentations sound stale as well as… actually, boring attempt to give the same PowerPoint slideshow that someone else created for you. It doesn’t mean you can’t use PowerPoint slideshows which someone else has created. This is just a reminder that if it comes time to deliver a speech, you’ll be more anxious and have less natural flow than you would normally do when you stand up and make an address. Be aware that a presentation, or speech is an interaction with your audience. Therefore, when you write the speech, it will be speaking with yourself. If you let someone else write the speech for you it will make you feel more nervous and your anxiety associated with public speaking will grow.
If you are familiar with the film Roxanne as well as the stage play Cyrano de Bergerac you will remember the two male characters Christian as well as Cyrano are equally loving Roxanne However, Christian thinks he’s unarticulate, and Cyrano believes that he is ugly. Christian finds Cyrano to write him love letters and it works well until Roxanne discovers who wrote the letters. In the films, Christian is portrayed as a snob, but according to the script, Christian is a brave and smart soldier who is just nervous. Christian is the type of person Roxanne would have loved were he to use the words he himself used to attract her. However, because Cyrano’s words were used (his slideshow) it only caused Christian even more nervous , not less. Roxanne did not get to meet who was the actual Christian. Your audience is similar to your audience. You’ll feel more comfortable if you speak your own thoughts to your audience, rather than trying to create your own “right thing to say” regarding the PowerPoint slides or bullet point which someone else has created.
With this in mind it is clear that there will be times when situations can arise where we will not have any control over the PowerPoint slideshow, or the images really. For instance, if , for example, you are a salesperson and your employer requires that you use a standard PowerPoint presentation for your talks to customers , or when you have a sick caller and you are required to cover for they call in on the spot, these guidelines below can help you immensely.
Top PowerPoint Tips for Narrating Presentations
1. Include Your personal experiences: One of the primary factor that separates a presenter from the other is their personal experiences or stories they share during their presentation. It is easy to create your PowerPoint presentation personal by adding stories and other personal experiences within the speech. Let’s say for instance, the bullet point you choose to use is “Sales decreased by 10% last quarter,” you’ll need to define the statement and elaborate on what it signifies. You could, for instance, display the total number “call-in” leads that the sales team received during the current quarter in comparison to the prior quarter. After you’ve explained the reason behind it, use an experience from your own life to clarify the situation. “A couple of years ago, when I was a sales rep, I remember days that as soon as I would set the receiver down, another new incoming call was already being routed to me. The guys who are on duty now, however, are averaging ten to fifteen minutes between each call. At first, we thought that the time between calls was wasted time, so we looked at downsizing the sales team. However, because each salesperson is able to follow up better with each incoming lead, their closing rations have increased over 250%. So that 10% decrease in sales is coming from less than half the number of incoming leads that we were receiving in the boom.” With no personal narrative it appears that it’s the team selling is not doing well, but actually, they’re performing a fantastic job with the resources they’ve been given.
2. Don’t try to memorize notes from someone else If you attempt to note everything you hear someone else say and then memorize it, you’ll make your anxiety worse. Instead, you should go to every punctuation mark and think “What is the most important thing that the audience would need to know about that point?” Anything that pops into your mind as you ask the question is likely to be what your audience wants to be aware of. If you employ this method and you do forget what you’ve prepared before you’re speaking, you can simply think about it, and then take the same question and ask it again and the answer will likely come back quickly.
3. There is no need to address every Point If someone else create an PowerPoint document for your, they typically include a lot of information into every slide. In the end, it is often difficult to address every single detail. Be aware that as the presenter, you’re in charge of the words you use. I once had a client whom the executives decided wanted to design an all-encompassing slideshow that sales representatives could use in any scenario. The final PowerPoint deck included more than 120 slides. It’s impossible for any presenter could provide that much information in this small a time. The only thing my client could do was print out the entire deck and have office-supply stores place a cover over the deck. She distributed it to the clients for source of information and then picked out the slides she thought were suitable for each client during the time she spoke. In the end, she didn’t bore any one of her audience. Therefore, sometimes, you’ll have to be inventive when you’re delivering your message.
Be aware that presenting an PowerPoint slideshow that someone else has created for you is certainly more difficult than delivering an original presentation on your own, but it is doable. Be sure to make the PowerPoint personal by adding your memories and personal experiences on the slides. Spend time determining what’s most important to your audience and then you are free to remove some bullet points when your presentation is heavily laden with data. If you stick to these steps, you’ll appear more attractive and clear when you are narrating the story of someone else’s PowerPoint presentation.