Seven Deadly Mistakes Presenters Make, and How to

Avoid Them
http://extremepresentation.typepad.com/blog/2007/07/seven-deadly-mi.html
Dr. Abela on July 19, 2007
How to build an audience- (not presenter-) centered presentation. Why is it that
standards for presentation design are so abysmally low? Why is it that most
people would rather sit in the dentists chair than through another
presentation? Why has the phrase "Death by PowerPoint" become so
prevalent? The answer to all these questions is that most presentation advice
and tools have been developed for the benefit of the presenter, not the
audience. As a result of this, presenters have adopted several bad habits that
weaken their effectiveness terribly. Here are some of worst ones.

Mistake #1: Setting presentation objectives in terms of what the

presenter intends to do, rather than how the audience should change
their minds and actions as a result of the presentation.

Mistake #2: Focusing on what you want from your audience, rather than
on how your presentation will help them solve a pressing problem of
theirs.

Mistake
#3:
Only
including
evidence
that
supports
your
recommendation, instead of providing an objective evaluation of all the
evidence, for and against.

Mistake #4: Adding lots of color, sounds, and clipart to make your
presentation look professional, instead of only using exactly what you
need to get your point across.

Mistake #5: Assuming that your audience has the same personality and
communication preferences as you do, instead of consciously considering
how those with different personality types from yours would like to
receive their information.

Mistake #6: Presenting your information in the order that makes most
sense to you, instead of building an intriguing story.

Mistake #7: Using your slides as prompts, instead of as visual aids that
supportrather than compete withyour spoken message.

Today I am back in Redmond, Wa. delivering another Extreme Presentation

workshop at Microsoft. I always enjoy debating the causes of (and solutions to)
"Death by PowerPoint" with the makers of PowerPoint themselves, and today
was no exception.
The question of audience focus came up a lot today, which reminded me that
I'd promised to go into more detail about the seven deadly mistakes presenters

make, mistakes that result from being presenter-focused, not audiencefocused.

Mistake #1: Setting presentation objectives in terms of what the
presenter intends to do.
Your objectives should not be about what youthe presenterintend to do in
your presentation. Those are not objectives; theyre an agenda. Your objectives
should be about how your audience will change as a result of your
presentation: how will they think and act differently after they leave the room.
If their thinking or behavior is not changed as a result of your presentation,
then why are you wasting their timeor yours?
Mistake #2: Focusing on what you want from your audience.
Most of the time, you deliver a presentation because you want something from
your audience. You are selling a product or an idea; why else would you go
through the bother of writing and delivering a presentation? But thats your
motivation for being there. What is their motivation for listening to you? The
only reason your audience is listening to you is they are hoping for some
information that will help them solve one of the many problems they are facing
in life. If you want to capture and keep their attention, focus your entire
presentation deliberately and undividedly on solving an important problem of
theirs.
Mistake #3. Focusing on what you want from your audience.
Most of the time, you deliver a presentation because you want something from
your audience. You are selling a product, an idea, or a new set of skills; why
else would you go through the bother of writing and delivering a presentation
unless you wanted something from your audience? But thats your motivation
for being there, not theirs. What is their motivation for listening to you? The
only reason your audience is listening to you is that they are hoping for some
information that will help them do something better or solve one of the many
problems they are facing in life. If you want to capture and keep their attention,
focus your entire presentation deliberately and undividedly on solving an
important problem of theirs.
Mistake
#4.
Only
recommendation.

including

evidence

that

supports

your

It is tempting to include only facts and arguments that support your case in
your presentation, because you want to strengthen your case, not weaken it.
However, all the empirical research confirms that audiences will find you more
credibleand more convincingif you also include the arguments against your
recommendation (and then carefully rebut each one of them.) Lawyers call this
stealing thunder: if you bring up an objection first, that objection has far less
force than if someone in your audience does.

Mistake #5. Presenting your information in the order that makes most
sense to you.
Typically, presenters put their material into some kind of logical order, an order
that makes senseto them. For example: background, opportunity, strategic
imperative, competitive environment, financial implications, human resource
implications, etc., etc. Boring. Begin your presentation with a pressing problem
that your audience has (see Mistake #2) and then tell them your proposed
solution. Heres the important part: to decide where to go next, ask yourself: If
I were to stop right here, what is the first question that would come from the
audience? That will tell you what your next slide should say. Design that slide,
and then repeat the question. This way you will progressively design a
presentation sequenced in the way your audience wants to hear it, not in some
arbitrary order that seems to make sense to you.
Mistake #6. Using color, sound, and clipart to make your presentation
look professional.
Adding all the embellishment that PowerPoint allows you to may make you feel
more professional, but it harms your communication. The research is
unambiguous here also: any added color, sound, or image that does not
directly reinforce the specific message on your slide will distract your audience
from that message. Animated slide transitions, in particular, are almost
universally destructive.
Mistake #7. Using your slides as prompts
Perhaps the very worst example of developing a presentation for the benefit of
the presenter rather than for the audience is the use of slides to prompt the
speaker. Youve seen this kind of presentation: slide after slide of bullet points,
so that the poor presenter wont forget what he intended to say. Yet extensive
research confirms that when you project slides filled with bullet points while
speaking at the same time, your bullets and your voice compete with each
other, with the result that your communication effectiveness is worse than
either if you projected your slides and asked your audience to read them (while
you keep quiet) or if you spoke without any slides at all. If you are going to use
visuals, make sure that they support, rather that vie with, your spoken
comments. One way to do this is to use more graphics and less text (several
research studies conclude that while voice and text compete with each other,
voice and graphics reinforce each other). Another way is to ensure that every
slide you design passes the squint test: if you squint at the slide, so that
none of the text is legible, the layout of the slide alone should communicate or
at least reinforce the main point of the slide.
If you want your audience to listen to you and act on what you say, then every
aspect of your presentation should focus on them and serve their needs.