Powerpoint Presentation Skills

Like any tool, Powerpoint’s effectiveness greatly depends on the person wielding it. Powerpoint is a visual aid, with the emphasis being on the word ‘aid’. All too often, novice speakers lose sight of this fact and make their Powerpoints the focus of their presentations. It can be a way of trying to reduce nerves, by taking the audience’s attention off the speaker and onto a screen full of bullet points. Whatever the reason, there are skills that can and must be learnt in order to effectively learn how to do a Powerpoint presentation.

Before even opening the software, you have to ask yourself what the purpose of your presentation is. What is the end result that you are looking for? Is it to persuade, to convince, to inspire? How can you best achieve that? Whatever you do, resist the urge to start typing up bullet points and looking for clipart before you have your end result clearly in mind.

Learning how to create a Powerpoint presentation involves not only the mechanics of font size, colour schemes and amount of text to display, but how you convey YOUR interpretation of the data to the audience. Step back and look at the big picture. How can you have a conversation with your listeners and really engage them, whilst using Powerpoint solely as an aid to that conversation?

Powerpoint presentation training is invaluable in teaching the practical skills necessary to engage your audience in a dialogue and achieve the end result you’re looking for. Advanced training will give you honest and direct feedback on how you appear to your audience through the use of video playback. For example, did you turn your back on your listeners and read from the screen without even realising it? This is all too easy to do when you’re feeling nervous. Becoming aware of your tendencies and habits before presenting to a live audience will certainly enhance your confidence and effectiveness on the day.