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Many of us have heard that 99% of presentations are bad and not effective. This article will outline the 10 most common reasons why so many presentations are so bad, and suggest how to avoid these common mistakes.

1. No clear message- When preparing your presentation, you must make sure you are clear on what your objective is. It may be to just inform, to advocate a point of view or you are seeking an approval. Whatever it is, make sure you are clear why you are giving the presentation. If you start with the end in mind the rest should be easy.

2. Your slides are boring- Unfortunately 99% of presentation slides are really bad and will not be able to grab the attention of the audience. Nobody likes to look at page after page of hardly visible text on the screen, which the presenter is reading like a story book. Generally, less text works better. Simple text with powerful images work best. Remember the slides are there just to help you as visual aids, do not rely on them. You are the ‘star’ who needs to ‘wow’ your audience.

3. Not enough material/content- Sometime your presentation fails due to insufficient content to make a convincing case for the audience. For example, you did not provide enough evidence to back up your argument or point of view. Another example would be a new business proposal which did not include risks and the mitigating contingencies you will put in place.

4. Too much material- Just as bad as not having enough material is having too much material covered in your presentation. Firstly, people have a very limited attention span that rarely exceed 20 minutes. Secondly, having too much material to cover will make it harder for you to highlight the key message or objective of your presentation.

5. Monotonous voice- Nobody enjoys listening to a robot. You need to modulate your voice so that there are times when you raise your voice to emphasise a point and there are times you pause and say nothing, to give your audience time to absorb what you just said. There are times you will speak quickly and times when you will speak slowly to highlight a point in your presentation.

6. Not rehearsing- The vast majority of people do not bother to practice giving their presentation thinking that they are already quite good at it. Unfortunately, they are not! And that probably includes you too. Even the late Steve Jobs spent a lot of time rehearsing his legendary presentations. Take the time to practice and make it a habit. It will make you comfortable with the material and make you far less nervous. This will create confidence that the audience will be able to spot and makes you case stronger. Alternatively, if you do not practice, you will appear less confident and you will not be as convincing.

7. Complicated language- Depending on your audience use language that is as simple as possible. The less the audience has to think about what you are trying to say the better. Avoid jargon and complex terminology unless you are speaking to a room full of experts. Use simple words and short sentences, your audience will appreciate it.

8. Not getting to the point quickly- People hate waiting. Try to get to the point of your presentation quickly. Often it is best to tell them up front what the objective of the presentation is at the start of the presentation. Also another tip is to tell them how long your presentation will take before you begin, this will put the audiences feeling of anxiety at ease. Unless you are told how long a presentation will take, your audience will be speculating and wondering when you will get to the point.

9. Poor structure- To be effective your presentation needs to be properly structured for the objective you are trying to achieve. Like any good story, it will need a start, middle and an ending. A good basic structure is to start with an introduction of the problem or issue you wish to address, and then go into the implications for the audience of the issue. Only then do you go into introducing the solution and also address any possible concerns relating to the proposed solution. Finally, you have a call to action, what you want the audience to do. This is just a basic example; the main point is that you need a logical flow in the structure of your presentation.

10. Giving out hand outs too early- A common mistake many people do is to give copies of their slides before the present. This is a guaranteed way of ensuring the audience will not listen to you because they will be busy reading your slides and they can read much faster than you can present. They will be on your fourth slide when you are still on the contents slide. Give your hand outs at the end of the presentation so that you will have their full attention.

Always remember these 10 sins of presentations and you will be on your way to becoming a better presenter who will always grab the attention of any audience.

It really depends on the purpose of the speech. If it is for entertainment, then humor will be more important than substance. An after dinner speech is one such example. People would expect you to make them laugh more than to make them learn. Can you imagine someone preaching about the seven effective habits of highly successful people after a six-course meal?

However, if your purpose is to inform, persuade or inspire, substance will be indispensable. Patricia Fripp, a well-respected speaker in the industry defined substance as “what makes an audience’s business and personal life better if they act on it”. It could come in the form of a three-step strategy, a recommended book to read or tips to solve a particular problem. If there is no substance in your speech, then there is really no point wasting your audience’s time delivering it.

As a rule of thumb, focus on substance and then tweak the humor level according to your competence and appropriateness. For someone who has a knack for making his audience laugh at cue, he can leverage on humor to increase memorability of his message or even disarm the tough nuts and persuade them to his way of thinking. Otherwise, concentrate on increasing value for your audience. It is a sure-fire way to win your audience over, even without humor!

Style of presenting a speech, on the other hand, lies outside the humor-substance pie. You cannot switch on and off a style since it is part of who you are. However, your style can be polished with more stage time. The more you get up to the platform to speak, the more comfortable and aware you become of your style. And it can inevitably become a weapon you use to personalize your speech. If you are interested to learn how you can “find” and hone your style of speaking, refer to this online entry:

[http://blog.ericfeng.com/how-to-find-your-own-speaking-style]

Beginners always need to be guided in order for them to understand what they have to do. This is true even for businessmen since they have to learn everything about the company that they are going to run as well as the job that they have to perform. For those who are operating or managing businesses, you might have heard about the balanced scorecard and its abilities. This is a business tool that enables one get the overall performance of the company based upon the following perspectives: customer, financial, learning and growth and internal operations. Now, you have to understand that the BSC will only work if all of the employees within the organization now about it. Most company owners neglect this responsibility and only let those at the top level of the organization comprehend what the scorecard is all about. In this case, what you need are BSC presentation templates.

The BSC presentation templates can easily be obtained today from the web. You can download them either for free or there are others that might cost you a few dollars. Once you have acquired the template, it is easy for you to come up with a presentation so that those who are working in your company can appreciate and be enlightened on the topic of the balanced scorecard. Before you download scorecard templates however, you should make sure that you can use the content that is provided by the template that you have chosen. It should provide you help on the introduction up to the conclusion of the whole presentation.

You can look for free BSC templates that you can utilize during meetings, conferences or seminars. This is the right opportunity towards promoting the awareness of your staff towards the whole concept of the balanced scorecard. There are really useful BSC presentation templates which you can download and use in order for you to present to your employees the importance of the scorecard to the processes in the company. The templates will guide you on how you can create the entire presentation but of course, you also need to research on a few things which are connected to the company’s position

Implementing the balanced scorecard will become easier with the help of the BSC presentation templates. This is because all the people who are working in the organization that you are running can define what the BSC really is. Aside from that, they can provide other people with information about how the BSC is being utilized in the company. This is particularly useful for the new employees. It is not required to make a presentation every now and then especially when there are newly hired applicants in the business. You can simply ask the older employees to guide the newbies. This is an effective method and can save time, money and effort on your part. Nevertheless, you need to give updates and even provide new presentations to your employees when there are changes within the scorecard that has been implemented. This way, everything will be clearly defined for them and confusion is avoided.