Becoming a great public speaker is hard! To make it easier, here is a list of tricks for giving better talks or lectures, organized by when to use each trick.
CREATING YOUR CONTENT
Brainstorm
Before doing a ton of external research while developing your talk, first get down the parts of the talk that you can pull directly from your mind and memory to give yourself a much faster start and make it a lot clearer where the holes are and what actually needs to be researched. This prevents you from eating up a bunch of time on research that you don’t end up actually needing.
Surprises
It’s a great way to keep them interested and to recapture interest if they are drifting.
Be Concise
Avoid uncommon words and obscure references that the audience is unlikely to know. It will only confuse them. Be able to state your thesis – know what the one-sentence version of your talk would be, and keep that thesis summary in mind while writing so that your talk stays focussed and doesn’t meander off-topic. Once you’ve figured out the one-sentence version of your talk, now figure out the five sentence version of your talk. What would you say if you could only speak five sentences? This will help you flesh out the core of what you want to say.
Inspire Action
You should be able to answer this critical question about your talk: “What do I want my audience to do differently or think about differently by the end of my talk?”
Identify Key Takeaways
Be sure you can answer the question, “If my audience members only take away a few things from my talk, what do I want those few things to be?” and make sure to hammer those key points home so that they won’t be missed by your audience. You may want to repeat them at the end of the talk.
Be Humorous
Sprinkling light humor throughout a talk can make it more fun and engaging, which makes people absorb more of the content too. Avoid waiting too long to start the humor, though, because you need to signal this will be light-hearted early, or else a joke coming later may not be perceived as a joke.
Be Impactful
Stimulating strong emotions in your audience will make your talk much more impactful. Get excited during the talk. Get angry. If something is crazy, show how crazy it really is! Tell touching stories. Make your audience feel something!
Appeal to Self-interest
Brainstorm how the message of your talk will benefit your audience members, and make sure to talk about those benefits, directly and early on, so they know why it’s worth investing attention in your talk.
Understand Barriers
Understand different reasons people may resist your message and include content that helps people surpass them.
Stick to the Theme
Why did you just add that part of the talk? What do you want the audience to understand, think, feel, or do because of that latest bit you added? If you can’t explain it, or the justification isn’t strong enough, or it’s not core enough to your thesis sentence, then cut it.
Use Stories
Human brains love stories so you should include them in your talk, whether it’s a 30-second story to illustrate a point you just made or a 30-second story to pre-empt a point you are about to make. Longer stories can work well, too, if they effectively illustrate the point you really want to get across. Avoid long stories that are not central to your message, as they waste too much time. Consider bringing in your own personal story (if relevant), as this can make the content more compelling.
Use Contrast
If you’re saying how things should be done, consider including a contrast of how they are now being done or how they shouldn’t be done to make it clearer what is the right way vs. wrong way.
Segue into Examples
If you’re about to give examples of a thing, make it clear that these are examples, for instance, by saying, “here are three examples of …” You can even segue out of examples, for instance, by saying something like “As those three examples illustrate…”
Prepare Answers
Think up a list of questions about your talk, especially criticisms of your point of view, that you think your audience might ask or have in their minds after hearing your talk. Address the most critical of them in the talk itself. For those that aren’t important enough to be included in the talk directly, jot down answer sketches of how you would respond to them so that you’ll have a rough idea of what you’ll say if they come up during Q&A (but respond from memory, don’t look at notes when responding). If there are certain questions you are afraid of, specifically practice responding to them so that you’ll know what to say if they come up.
ORGANIZING CONTENT
Start and end with a bang – the most critical parts of the presentation should be included in the first minute (you have to convince the audience to pay close attention – for instance, with a provocative question, intriguing quote, shocking claim, amazing statistic, surprising anecdote, etc.) and the last minute (which has disproportionate weight in determining what the audience remembers about your talk).
Outline
Consider providing your audience with an outline. You can refer back to this outline as you speak, so that they can treat it like a progress bar. For instance, you can say things like “The third important reason is…” to remind them that they’re in the middle of the list. Another example is that you can use a question related to the beginning of each section that mirrors the outline remind them of the outline. Note that while this approach can help your audience process the information you give them, a lot of the best talks don’t give an explicit outline.
Brevity
If you can say something just as effectively, clearly, and powerfully in 10 minutes as in 20 minutes, then your talk should only be 10 minutes. The audience will appreciate the brevity and likely will enjoy it more since it will have a greater value. Plus, you’ll reduce the risk of losing attention. Just do a longer Q&A or let people out early (I’ve never known an audience to mind having a slightly longer break before the next session).
Recap
Consider ending the talk with a recap of the most important points, or the next action that people should take after the talk content. This helps people retain the value from the talk. Even just a quick bulleted recap of the points can help them stick in the memory.
Full Circle
Consider concluding with a reference to the beginning of the talk, such as finishing the story you opened with or restating what you said right at the beginning (but now, with the audience’s new understanding, they’ll finally realize what it means). This type of conclusion can feel very satisfying to the audience.
Clear Connections
Don’t make your talk feel like a random grab bag. Each idea you talk about should both feel connected to the talk as a whole AND to the idea that came just before so that there is continuity both at a global and local level. The audience should never feel confused about why you just made a point unless this is done strategically to surprise them. If you want to share an idea that will feel disconnected (but tie back in later), you can hint to your audience that they won’t see the significance of what you’re saying right away, which can evoke their curiosity.
AUDIENCE
Know Your Audience
Understand what they are interested in, what level of prior knowledge they can be expected to have, what sort of jobs they do, etc. Tailor your content specifically for the interests and knowledge of that group.
Audience Personas
Have in your mind a couple of examples of prototypical audience members as you are writing, since then you can ask yourself, “what would Bob and Kathleen think of this? Would they find it interesting? Would they understand it?” which is a lot easier than trying to craft your message for an abstract or vague audience.
Be Realistic
Audience members will inevitably zone out at times or lose focus, even if your talk is great, so if you say something critical that the rest of the talk depends on, either say it in a way that captures complete focus or say it multiple times.
POWERPOINT SLIDES
Tell a Story
If you use slides, then someone who has only looked through them without hearing your talk should still understand the progression of your talk, which should naturally tell a story.
Use Headers for Takeaways
Consider having the header of each slide, or the header of each chart explain the takeaway. For instance, a chart that shows that country A has been growing faster than country B can have a header “Country A has grown X% faster than country B” so that when they stare at the chart data, they know what conclusion they are supposed to draw from it.
Use Visuals
Graphics or illustrations can do a great job of visually encapsulating what you are saying to reinforce the information. Large blocks of text, on the other hand, tend to compete with what you are saying out loud since people cannot read words and listen to other words at the same time.
Avoid Boring Images
When selecting visuals, pick things that would be visually interesting to look at (even outside the context of your talk), while also making sure they are relevant enough that they enhance what you’re saying rather than distracting from it. Avoid boring images, stock photos that LOOK like stock photos, and cheap-looking clipart.
Prioritize Value
If your slides are not making the talk better for the audience, then don’t use them. Think about what could go on the slides that would add value, for instance, highly visually appealing images that symbolize what you’re saying, or charts/graphs that show important information, or JUST three big words that succinctly summarize what you say out loud.
Simplicity
Your audience has a limited capacity for new information in a given amount of time, so make sure your talk is information-rich but don’t overstuff it because that can cause your audience to zone out and can mean you don’t have time to say the content in a well-paced, thoughtful way. As the saying goes, “If you squeeze your information in, you squeeze your audience out.”
Avoid Text on Slides
If you have more than 20 words on a slide, you probably have too much text. Three extremely short sentences can work. One sentence is usually better. Five sentences are very likely too many. Never have full paragraphs that your audience is expected to read. Sometimes the best slides are just an image with between 0 and 5 words.
Avoid Slide Transitions
Don’t even think about it!
Slide Sizing
Now, widescreen (16:9) is the default size for slides in PowerPoint (2013 and 2016). These slides have a size of 13.33 x 7.5 inches or 33.867 x 19.05 cm. On the other hand, standard (4:3) was the default slide size in older versions of Microsoft PowerPoint (2003 or 2007). Be sure you know which slide size is expected for your talk.
Know Your Content
You should not be reading from your slides! That is one of the least persuasive ways to present. Don’t read from notes either. It’s okay to keep a simplified outline of the talk on a notecard on the podium just in case it’s needed or you forget your place. Your slides can also act as helpful cues to remind you what you want to say, as long as you don’t read from them and don’t look at them for longer than a glimpse!
Be Prepared
In addition to emailing your slides to the organizers, make sure to also bring a copy of them on a USB drive. You should also confirm with the organizers that you will not need to bring a laptop with you and that they have the same software installed on the presentation room computer that you used to create your slides. For instance, if your slides were made in PowerPoint, then PowerPoint should be available for showing your slides because even if other software can technically convert formats, this can lead to formatting issues that can be a real pain to discover when you begin your presentation. If you have time to flip through your slides at the venue (in the software and on the computer they are using to present them) to look for formatting issues, then that’s ideal, but that isn’t always possible.
PRESENTATION
Utilizing Technology
Will there be a podium? Will there be a microphone? Will there be a screen to project your slides onto? Will there be a “monitor” where you can easily see your slides while still looking forward (these sometimes are located on the podium, other times, they are located just below the stage)? Or, to see your slides, will you have to awkwardly look backward away from the audience? Knowing the answers to these questions can help you prepare. For instance, if you won’t easily be able to see your slides, you’ll want to practice with minimal reference to the slides. Your practice should mimic, as much as possible, the actual setup you will have.
Fluency
Two ways to reliably give a great presentation are: (a) memorize the words in the content perfectly so that you can actively focus on getting your body language and tone of voice right during the presentation, OR (b) converse comfortably and naturally about the subject (like you’re having a natural but eloquent conversation with a group), knowing the material really well but without having memorized your word choice and FEELING each thing you say as you say it (so that your body language and tone of voice follows naturally). Falling between these two extremes is usually bad (e.g., where you have your talk 70% memorized but have to keep checking your notes to remember the other 30%, or where you have memorized 100% of the words but say them in a stilted, unnatural way that doesn’t have the right body language and intonation). Whether you’re doing (a) or (b) what you say should sound natural and comfortable and conversational, rather than like you think it sounds for someone “to give a lecture.” To prepare for the method (a) you need to practice your speech word for word many times while paying careful attention to not just what you say, but how you say it and what body language you use, so that even though your speech is memorized, it doesn’t sound memorized. To prepare for method (b), you need to practice your speech a bunch of times but using different words each time so that you memorize the gist of the content but not the actual words (you generate the words spontaneously each time). Method (a) has the advantage of lowering variability in the presentation (if you are good at it), but method (b) has the advantage that it allows you to make more use of your natural conversational ability and body language. Some people who are good at acting find method (a) easier, but I think for most people, method (b) is the better choice.
Sample Audience
Bring together friends (ideally multiple times, even if it’s only one friend each time) and tell them in advance that you’ll want detailed critical feedback on how you could improve both the content and presentation, then give your talk to them and question them afterward. Consider having them take notes if the talk is 10 minutes or longer since otherwise, they will forget some of their comments.
Memorize Introduction
Even if you are going to be speaking more naturally (without memorizing the whole talk), it’s worthwhile to memorize the first few sentences, including the intonation and body language you want to use to say them, so that you can make sure you get started in just the way you want and so that you can begin with confidence to set the tone for the rest of the talk.
Make the Content Second Nature
Ideally, you will have practiced enough that you know the content so well that you barely have to think about it (whether or not you’ve memorized it word for word), freeing you up to focus on HOW you’re presenting the material, your speech, and body language, and how the audience is reacting, which will make your presentation more dynamic to your audience.
Smooth Transitions
Transitions between sections aren’t always natural and smoothly when done off the cuff. So practice how these transitions will occur, and consider memorizing them word for word, so you say the transitions just the way you want.
Body Language
It’s not enough to just say the content since the audience will also heavily respond to the body language you use when saying it. You don’t want to come off as stiff. Gesticulate in a way that emphasizes what you say without being too receptive. Furthermore, consider using a posture like the following when you’re giving your talk: “Stand with feet underneath hips, tall, with shoulders very slightly back. This makes you seem taller, straighter, and more powerful. Lean weight forward slightly so that front of your feet are against the ground and so that going up on your toes doesn’t require a shifting of weight. Leaning back gives a funny impression, but leaning forward slightly makes you seem more engaged. The best presenters have perfect posture.” Don’t cross your arms in front of you; put them at your sides, or use them to gesture.
Timing
Make sure that when you’re practicing, you practice hitting the time allotted for your talk so that, during the real thing, you don’t go over the limit or have to rush.
Realistic Practice
When you practice, make every detail as realistic as possible (for instance, don’t start over when you mess up; just forge ahead, since that’s what you’d have to do in real-time). Furthermore, imitate the setup of the presentation room if possible (e.g., will you have access to a timer during the talk? Will your slides be visible on a podium in front of you or only on a screen behind you?)
Practice Confidence
Practice speaking with high levels of confidence in your voice and avoiding ending your sentence with upward inflection (which makes them sound like questions – use downward inflection instead, which makes your statements more definitive). A hesitant sounding speaker comes across as less compelling and less believable.
Avoid Lecturing
For some reason, when giving a talk, some people switch to a weird caricature of what they think someone giving a lecture sounds like. While you do need to speak loudly enough so that everyone can hear and need to speak confidently to be compelling, you should be speaking naturally as well and not like you think a lecturer is “supposed” to sound.
Focus on the Audience
It is distracting if a speaker keeps looking away or looking down or looking at their notes. Try hard to avoid this. It’s tempting to look back at the screen behind you if you’re using slides, but avoid it too. Ideally, if you need to look at your slides, you’ll have a podium in front of you so that you can glance at your slides while still pointed towards the audience. Focus on your audience!
Record Yourself
One of the best ways to improve is to analyze videos of yourself speaking, make adjustments, and then record yourself again in an iterative loop. These videos can be short (3-5 minutes is often enough to detect issues with body language).
Volume and Inflection
In public speaking. it’s important to make sure your speech is really clear. Speak a bit louder than normal (though be careful if they give you a mic not to blast the audience), enunciate more than normal, and overemphasize the tone of your voice so that your tone highlights changes in the content. Use the higher vocal register to really emphasize critical points. Keep your volume up and speed constant towards the end of sentences, as there is a tendency for people to speed up and lower volume at the end of sentences, making them easy to miss.
Speak Slowly
Speak slower than your usual speaking pace. This will sound better, be clearer, and is easier to understand than fast speaking. Also, there is a tendency to speed up during real talks, so practicing slow speech is important. Slow down even more and add even more vocal and body language emphasis on the most important points to help the audience know what they need to pay close attention to.
Avoid Crutches
While practicing, it can be appealing to have notes that you keep checking or other crutches that wouldn’t be available in a real talk. Instead, force yourself to remember what comes next even if you feel stuck, and only use your notes if you absolutely need them. Otherwise, you aren’t training yourself to do the real thing. Forcing yourself to remember what comes next is also important for memorizing transitions.
Use a High-Level Outline
If you’re struggling to remember the order of the content or the transitions, use just one word or image to represent each part of your talk, and use these as triggers to know what comes next (ideally in your head, but this list of trigger words could be on a piece of paper on the podium in case you get stuck and need a reminder). It’s not a bad idea to have this list of triggers in your pocket for if you’re really in a pinch, as every once in a while, a speaker does blank out, though obviously, you want to avoid having to refer to these notes. If you do HAVE to use your notes, don’t apologize; just pause, look at them briefly, and keep speaking as though nothing happened! This makes it much less awkward than making it into a thing.
Practice Pauses
Pauses are very important for emphasis and should be used strategically to separate content that is disconnected from other content (so it doesn’t all blur together) and also to create tension when people are waiting for you to give an answer to a question you posed or solve a riddle you laid out. Add brief pauses between sentences so they don’t get jumbled and so that people have time to process a sentence before you rush into the next one
Finish Slightly Early
In practice; you don’t want to be ending with mere seconds to spare, as that will increase your risk of running over and create pressure on yourself.
LEADING UP TO THE PRESENTATION
Physical Appearance
Remember that you’re giving a performance, and how you say the words and what you do with your body is part of that. How you dress and what your hair looks like is also part of that. Take your appearance seriously because it will impact your audience’s reaction to your content.
Posture
Stand tall and confidently. Don’t start with your hands in your pockets. Pick a person out in the middle of the audience; this is the person you’ll be saying the first few sentences to when your talk begins.
Short Pause
It’s fine to look out in the audience letting the tension build as they watch you, before you start speaking. Don’t feel like you have to immediately speak just because people are looking at you.
Get Excited
Get yourself excited right before the talk by thinking of things that genuinely excite you (e.g. about your material and the valuable things you’ll tell your audience about). Remember that nervousnesses feels like excitement, and can actually be turned into excitement by reframing it. You feel sweaty, nervous, and your heart is racing? Wow, you’re really excited to give this talk! Feel the excitement course through you, don’t be afraid of it. It is going to help you deliver an amazing presentation.
Take a deep breath and smile
Just as you are about to start, it can be helpful to take a deep breath to relax yourself momentarily and give a genuine smile by thinking of something that you are truly happy about (e.g., having the opportunity to give this presentation). You don’t want to come come across as unfriendly during your talk.
DURING THE PRESENTATION
One thought, one person – look at one audience member, make a point and watch it land on them as you say it, then look at another audience member, and make a point, etc. This works especially well in a smaller audience where, by the end, every audience member felt like you said something directly to them. But it works well even in a large group too. It’s usually best to look at a person holistically, avoid staring right into their eyes, which can be distracting.
Don’t look down, always out at the audience.
Don’t look back and forth too rapidly at different sides of the room, as that can distract the audience.
Ignore Hecklers
If there is a heckler in the audience, looking at them or engaging them can encourage them to talk. So avoid looking at them unless it is absolutely necessary. If they are persistently difficult, look directly at them for a moment and say “Please save your comments and questions for the Q&A period at the end. I’ll be happy to hear them all.” then immediately look away from them before they can respond.
SPEECH
Hold the Microphone Properly
If you are using a mic for your speech, hold it so that its tip is at least two finger widths from your mouth, but no more than a hand’s width. Hold it at 45 degrees (from the plane of the ground) pointed upward at your mouth, so that it doesn’t block your face. Its tip should be pointed directly at your mouth for the best sound quality. Tilt your wrist rather than your arm to give it the angle you want and to make adjustments. Grip the mic firmly (so it doesn’t wobble) and minimize movement of the mic to avoid crackling sounds. If you sound quiet, move the mic slightly closer to your mouth (but never touch it with your mouth). If you sound crackly or too loud, move it slightly further from your mouth. Don’t let the distance from your mouth accidentally change (or else the volume will come in and out and you might hear crackling), hold it at the fixed distance that sounds the best.
Avoid Fillers
“Um”, “ah”, “you know”, “like”, “as I’ve said”, and other fillers weaken your content and make you seem less professional and like you aren’t sure what you want to say. Avoid them. It’s always better just to pause rather than to use a filler word. Pausing is totally fine!
Draw Comparisons
If you’re comparing or contrasting two things in your words, use your tone of voice and body language to emphasize this difference. For negative examples (or examples of type A), face and gesture to one side, then for positive examples (or examples of type B) face and gesture to the other side. This makes it really easy for the audience to visually see that a contrast is being made. Change your tone of voice for positive vs. negative examples as well.
Speak with Enthusiasm
The more excited you seem about your content, the more it will make the audience excited. A speaker who doesn’t seem enthusiastic about their content can come across as really dull. Remind yourself why you care about this topic so much, and project that for your audience!
Emphasize What’s Important
Be sure to use extra emphasis for your audience when you explaining why what you’re saying is valuable, crucial or important, and any benefits they get from it. Extra emphasis can be achieved with tone of voice, or by increasing volume, or by slowing down.
Project Your Voice
Don’t yell, but stand up straight and let your voice resonate in your lungs (rather than feeling like it’s coming from your throat) to produce a clearer sound. Emphasize hard consopstants for clarity (e.g. d, k, t, etc.)
Vary your tone – don’t use the same tone of voice for everything, adjust your vocal inflection to emphasize and deemphasize what you’re saying dynamically, which makes speech much more interesting to listen to. Speech that stays in one monotonous tone of voice is extremely boring to listen to.
Be Conversational
Think of it as a conversation about a topic you know incredibly well that you’re having with a large group. You don’t want it to seem like a “lecture” or memorized speech. Make sure you FEEL what you’re saying as you’re saying it, otherwise you’ll sound robotic or have the wrong tone of voice in the wrong places.
End Gracefully
Let your final forceful sentence be the natural end of your speech, which should have a strong element of finality (in both the content of this last sentence, and the tone of finality in which it’s delivered – make sure to use a heavily downward intonation to end the sentence to signal the talk is over). Then simply smile naturally (e.g. channel how excited you are with being done) and step away from the lectern or podium if you’ve been standing by one. You can also shake the hands of the organizer or give a slight nod to the audience. Try to avoid saying “thank you,” which can be a weak way of ending a speech, but in a pinch where for some reason the audience doesn’t realize it’s over saying “thank you” can work.
BODY
Breath Comfortably
Don’t hold your breath, which some people do while giving talks.
Appropriate Gestures
You can use your hands to emphasize what you’re saying (many people do it automatically, but it’s good to do it even more while public speaking). Avoid being too repetitious though (e.g. don’t make the same hand gesture over and over, which can be distracting).
It’s fine to have your hands at your side, or to gesture, but don’t keep dropping them over and over between gesturing, as it can be distracting.
Stay Relaxed
If your body is really tight or tense, you can come across as stiff. Relax your body. Taking some slow deep breaths right before you start speaking at the beginning. Consciously relaxing your muscles can also help.
Avoid Fidgeting
It projects anxiety and can be distracting. Keep your hands at your side, or gesture with them. You can also temporarily rest your hands on the podium. Also avoid rocking side to side which some people start to do during talks
Don’t Block The Projector
If there is a projector, don’t get in the way of its beam of light. it will create a distracting shadow or silhouette.
Don’t Hide
If given a podium or lecture, don’t just stand behind it the whole time. It’s especially bad if it blocks the audience from seeing your body language.
Move
Don’t be afraid to move around the stage. It’s great to walk over to one side a bit, then turn towards the other part of the audience and move closer to them, etc. Don’t stand totally statically in one place.
AFTER THE PRESENTATION
Take a Breather
You don’t need to stay on the stage during the applause if you don’t want, you can always just come back up during the Q&A.
Don’t Talk over Applause
Never compete with applause. If you have something to say, wait until it dies down before you speak.
Compliment Good Questions
If during the Q&A someone asks a good question, tell them that it was good. This also buys you a little extra time to formulate your reply.
Repeat Questions In Answers
Sometimes others can’t hear what the question was that was asked during Q&A, so repeat the question in your answer. This also gives you more time to reflect on it.
Eye Contact With Questioner
While answering someone’s question, look at them, but then look away (and don’t return your eyes to them) as you get to the end of your answer, otherwise the person may feel like it’s okay to respond to what you said, which is usually not desirable in a Q&A session.
Be Gracious
If someone gives you critical feedback, thank them for it. You can say “I don’t agree with everything you’ve said” without responding to every point, especially if they made a lot of different criticisms. Just focus on the most important. You can also invite the person to discuss their criticism with you more afterward one on one, which is a graceful way of avoiding having a fight right there in front of everyone. If they won’t stop talking then inviting them to talk to you after is a great way to get them to stop, for instance by saying “I’d be happy to finish this discussion with you, come find me after we’re done” and then just move on to the next question. Repeat the question back so that the criticizer knows you’ve understood them. Tell them any points of agreement that you have with them, which helps them save face if you destroy their other points.
Acknowledge Unknowns
If someone asks you a question you don’t know the answer to, just say, “Thanks, that’s a great question. I would need to do some research to get back to you on that.” Or even just “That’s a great question, I unfortunately don’t know the answer off-hand.” And move on.
Be Accessible
If you want people to email you, have your last slide include your email address and mention that you’d love to hear from the audience, and anyone with further questions or comments can use that email address.
One Question Per Person
It’s unfair to other audience members who may have questions, plus it encourages that person to start a dialogue with you, which you probably want to avoid during Q&A.
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