Preparing Your Presentation

Preparing your Presentation

For any presentation you give, you will need to have a clear idea of the aim and objectives. Having established this, you need to decide what and approach to adopt and what type of audience you may encounter.

You must also always bear in mind the more constant aim of promoting co-operation between departments, displaying high standards of professionalism and responding to customer needs - both internally and externally.

To create a successful presentation you must:

decide what you aim to achieve.
divide your overall aim into a list of objectives.
consider the kind of audience which is going to see and hear your finished work.
decide on your approach to get your aims and objectives accepted by the audience

What is your aim your Aim?

First you have to decide on your overall aims and objectives. Your aim should be the answer to the question 'What do 1 hope to have achieved at the end of my presentation?' Your objectives are the various elements of the presentation which go together to fulfill your aim. So, an aim of a presentation might be 'To introduce a new computer system into Department X'. The objectives might be

to show the resultant cost savings
to demonstrate the system
to explain the training process required, and so on.

It is essential that you define your aims and objectives before you plan your presentation, or how else will you know that it was a success?

Ask yourself the following questions

Why am I giving this presentation? (To persuade, inform etc.?)
Why have they asked me? (Personal expertise. Layperson.) Personal development?)
What do I hope to achieve? (Change attitudes, better informed staff?)
How can I make it interesting?
How much do the audience already know about the subject?
Have they all the necessary background knowledge?

Think about a presentation that you have given recently. On reflection. do you that the presentation was a success?

If you had to give the presentation again, could you make any improvements?

If you haven't made any presentations, think about when you have been a member of the audience. What improvements do you think could have been made by the person's making the presentation?

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