Chapter 14 Delivering Presentations 421comprehension or confusion. Be sure that your volume is sufficient to be
picked up clearly by your video recorder or microphone.c Note the location of your video camera. Your camera is the “eyes” of the audi-
ence; they’ll see what it sees. Make sure that your background (for example,
a wall in your home or dorm) doesn’t have a lot of distracting elements on
display. Also adjust your zoom lens to capture the upper half of your body
as well your presentation aids. If you and your aids are too close to the cam-
era, the audience may feel claustrophobic; if the camera is too far away, the
audience may strain to comprehend your facial expressions or the writing on
your poster.c Involve your audience. Even if you don’t have an audience that is physically
present, you can still create a sense of immediacy by establishing eye contact
with the camera, smiling, using inclusive gestures and posture, speaking in a
conversational tone, and using humor. Ultimately, be yourself!c Take your presentation seriously. Just because your audience is remote or self-
assembled doesn’t mean that your topic, your audience, and the occasion
aren’t important or worthy of respect.
Effective Presentation Aids
Bill Gates is a technology buff, to be sure. He is the man behind Microsoft,
the company that invented the ubiquitous presentation software, Power-
Point. So when he gives speeches on behalf of the Bill and Melinda Gates
Foundation, it’s not surprising that he uses PowerPoint slides to graphically
display information on changing death rates from malaria in poor coun-
tries and the impact of mosquito netting, vaccines, and other preventatives.
But Gates also thinks outside the technological box when it comes to pre-
sentation aids: “Malaria is, of course, spread by mosquitoes,” he tells the
crowd. “I’ve brought some here,” he adds, as he opens a jar to let a small
fleet of (uninfected) insects fly around
the auditorium. “There’s no reason only
poor people should have the experience”
(Gates, 2009). This simple presentation
aid got the audience’s attention and made
the fight against malaria familiar to all
those who have ever swatted a mosquito
off their arm on a summer evening.
Like Gates, today’s speakers online
and in person have many tools to create
dramatic visual presentations that enhance
their words and deepen the audience’s
understanding of the topic. We’ll explore
how presentation aids work in the sections
that follow.
BILL GATES was
certainly thinking outside
of the box—or the jar!—when
he released mosquitoes into
the auditorium to aid a
presentation on malaria. Fernando
Castillo/LatinContent/Getty Images