How to make an oral presentation like a pro

Are you a student working on a presentation for your research?  An employee who wants to make a successful oral presentation for a project? … And you are not sure if you can do it as you wish, because of the lack of experience you have when it comes to oral presentations? Don’t worry it’s no big deal and it's not extremely hard like you may think, you too can make good and effective presentations.

In this article, we will not talk about the steps and basics of making an oral presentation, like planning or information synthesis for example. We will focus on 6 simple and practical tips that will significantly help you present your work like a pro.

Preparation

Yeah, most of us hate that word… But still, preparation is the most important thing behind making a good oral presentation. When we say preparation, it’s not sitting down and trying to memorize everything we are going to say, no! It’s just a boring waste of time and especially effort.

What you should do is to get up, open your visual support for the presentation if you have one, and start presenting like if you are really in front of the audience. Don’t worry if you don’t know yet exactly what you are going to say, just keep going, because the most important thing is that you clearly understand the subject of your presentation.

This will make you come up with your speech, and by at least the fifth repetition you will find that you are now having a clear idea about everything you are going to say. Preparation will also boost your self-confidence especially if you had some friends or your family like an audience during your repetitions, which will greatly reduce your stress during the real presentation.

Wearing comfortable clothes

In the day of your presentation make sure that you are feeling completely comfortable in your clothes, and try to avoid new clothes or a new fashion style you are not used to because uncomfortable clothes will increase your stress. But if you don’t have the choice or maybe you think that you have to wear new clothes, you should wear them before, during your preparation and simulations to get used to them.

Be smooth when you are stuck

Even with good preparation and low stress, it’s possible to get stuck. When you get stuck, just don’t say anything, anything at all, no “excuse me” or “hmmm ahh hmm” nothing, just take your time and think about what you forgot to say, and if you can’t remember just stop thinking about it and go to the next thing you want to say and continue your presentation.

A silent person trying to think with a confident smile in the face is far more elegant than someone clearly trying to remember and saying “sorry …”, actually, this is not elegant at all. Remember that you are the owner of your presentation, you make the decision of what to say and what not to say, and you can change your plans anytime you need or want, no one will say “No wait, I assisted to your repetitions you forgot to say ...”

Avoid monotonous voice

One of the fastest ways to make an audience lose interest is a monotonous voice. Try to add punctuation to your speech and to change your voice tone during the presentation.  Before starting preparation, try to watch some videos from TED Talks channel on YouTube for example, it will give you a great idea about how one can talk and manipulate his voice during an oral presentation, and try to do the same thing during your repetitions.

Watch this video, it is a great demonstration of good voice manipulation and oral presentation's art on general.

Don’t say something you are not sure about

Just make your presentation simple, stick with what you exactly know and avoid talking about things far from your presentation subject or your field in general, and even if it is related but you don’t understand it well, just let it down and eliminate it from your presentation. In the most of the time when someone is talking about something he is not sure about, the audience can feel it which makes them lose interest and reduce the credibility of the whole presentation.

Look at all your audience

No not everyone, of course, just make sure to look at different sides of the room while you are talking. You can also choose 3 to 5 five persons from the audience to swap your look between them during your presentation. This look will create a link between you and all the audience, and it will make your presentation look more interesting.