A500.8.3.RB_FogartyShawn

            Good presentations and briefings captivate, motivate, and infuse the audience with the subject matter being presented. They overall theme of the brief will set the tone but the audience is generally there for the taking; so it’s up to the presentation and presenter to win their favor. The most difficult element for any presenter is to know their audience just as much has their material. The audience can make or break the selling point of the presentation, further, the demographics are necessary so you tailor the presentation to your audience.

            Essential to any good presentation is a simple, easy to follow content which has illustrations embedded into its content. Illustrations are great, but the presenter should strive to further leave an impression on the audience. Feelings are remembers as fact and figures would likely be forgotten in a day’s pass. The content itself would drive the format but overall less is more. Too often, as a failure during development, is the creator’s inability to weed out the less important items, which are trivial and forgotten about anyways. I can’t over emphasize that less it more.

            Further defining the format is the appropriate choice of font, colors, styles, background colors and themes. You also have to know the location and lighting as I’ve seen some lighting bleach out the slide such the audience could barely follow along. Also, the outline has to flow, similar to writing a paper there must be an introduction, main points, and a conclusion. Each presentation is different, but generally that format will help to leave an impression on the audience members. You want to avoid people leaving saying that was a waste of time or what was that brief about?

            Lastly, the brief has to be brief, nobody like sitting through an episode of death by PowerPoint, if the presentation is like to run past and hour break it up. Have an intermission to allow the audience a mental break and being able to recap and revitalize your main point. Another alternative is to have multiple briefings and break down the main points into digestible amounts of information in a colorful, vibrant brief that can captivate the audience.