Chapter 14 Delivering Presentations 427c Be prepared to give the same speech without slides in case of a technology
glitch. Having backup handouts or transparencies is one idea, but in any
case, make sure your presentation is effective even without your slides.
c Prepare and practice in advance! As we will discuss in the next section, you
will need to give yourself enough time to organize, reorganize, edit, and feel
comfortable moving between slides.
Practicing Your Speech
If there’s one key to developing skill as a public speaker, it’s practice. Practice
transforms nervous public speakers into confident ones and good public speak-
ers into great ones, particularly when speakers pay attention to four important
points: remembering the speaking outline, practicing with presentation aids,
simulating the speaking situation, and practicing the actual delivery.
Remember Your Speaking Outline
By now you know the benefits of creating a speaking outline consisting of key
words and phrases. Now it’s time to practice from it. Review your speaking out-
line to make sure that all of your key words and phrases work as prompts—if you
can’t remember that the letters “SD” stand for “sleep deprivation,” for example,
you might need to write that term out.
Practice Using Presentation Aids
Recall our discussion in Chapter 12 of the annual keynote presentations of the
late Steve Jobs. Clearly, Jobs rehearsed his presentations, including his use of
presentation software and other technological aids—in fact, he knew it all well
enough to work around it when inevitable technological glitches arose. When
practicing with your presentation aids, consider the following tips:
c Eliminate surprises. If you’re using any kind of technology, practice with it
long before you deliver your speech. A video or audio clip that didn’t down-
load properly may stall or disrupt your presentation.
c Test the facilities in advance. Be proactive. Will your speaking site’s wireless
connection be fast enough to stream a clip from Netflix of YouTube? You’ll
rest easier if you test it out beforehand. Likewise, you should do sound
checks for video and audio clips to make sure that the entire audience can
see and/or hear them.
c Write notes to yourself. In your outline, make sure that you provide delivery
cues to let yourself know when to move to the next item or when to show
an image or play a clip. This will help you avoid rushing ahead to get to a
particular aid, as well as ensure that you don’t forget any.
c Rehearse any demonstrations with a partner. When your presentation aid is
actually a live prop (for example, a student in your own class), you’ll need to
practice with this person in advance of the presentation.CONNECT
The words in your speaking
outline must prompt you to
remember your ideas. Dur-
ing your rehearsal, you’ll
discover whether you’ve
chosen key words that
are at an appropriate level
of abstraction, or vague-
ness versus concreteness
(Chapter 3). If the word is
too vague, it may not jog
your memory under pres-
sure. But if it’s too con-
crete, you may be tempted
to read directly from your
notes. You will need to
practice under realistic
conditions to discover the
right level of abstraction.