Tips

The 3 Magic Ingredients of Great Presentations

by Phil Waknell

Is there a perfect recipe for a successful presentation? No. Partly it depends on the audience and the context: a boardroom presentation shouldn’t look like a TED talk, even if the subject is the same. And different presentations at the same event – a conference, a demo day, an Executive Committee meeting – should also look different from each other, because otherwise none of them will stand out. So if there is no magic formula, are there at least some key ingredients we should always include?

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Establish a Connection First

by Pierre Morsa

You’ve probably already seen those presenters who climb on stage and rush into their presentation, apparently oblivious to the fact that they have an audience in front of them. Once they’re done, they rush out of the stage, as if you didn’t exist. To avoid looking like one of these presenters, try to establish a connection with the audience as soon as possible. Look and smile at them as you enter the stage.

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How to Check If Your Presentation Remote Works Without Anyone Noticing

by Pierre Morsa

It’s your turn to present. You’ve launched your presentation and enter the stage. But how do you know if your presentation remote is working? If you start clicking back and forth between your first and second slide to see if it is working, everyone will notice what you’re doing, and you will not make a great first impression. Luckily, someone shared a simple tip on twitter. Just duplicate your first slide.

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Use eye contact to stop moving around on stage

by Pierre Morsa

Moving with purpose on stage is good. Moving around aimlessly is not. It’s what we call derivative actions, things that we do unconsciously that betray our stress, lack of confidence or lack of preparation. Luckily, it’s very easy to stop parasitic movements, but the solution sounds counterintuitive: use eye contact to “anchor” yourself on the ground. Yes, that’s right. Making eye contact with your audience will stabilise your attention and will prevent your feet from moving you around the stage.

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12 Tips for an Amazing Event: Don’t Just Sit There, DO Something

by Rose Bloomfield -

What is it about designing events that I love so much? Suddenly I think of cookie dough, the small crunchy granules of sugar blended with butter, the heavenly flavour of vanilla extract and the sublime melt of dark chocolate chips. Even before I bake the cookies, the main event in this case, the ingredients themselves have satisfied. Designing events are similar because I love what goes into making them delicious–I mean, shine.

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A New Cure for Medical Conferences

by Phil Waknell

Most conferences are fairly boring. Even well-known tech conferences fail to engage their audiences all the time. But medical conferences can be among the worst. Check out this quick interview between Ideas on Stage, new partners with Doctors 2.0 & You, and Denise Silber to find out how to take medical (and other) events to the next level. Our friend Ross Fisher, a paediatric surgeon based in the UK, has had enough of poor medical communication, and when he’s not operating, he spends time educating doctors about a better way to present.

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What Makes an Amazing, Culture-Shifting Event?

by Rose Bloomfield -

Case study of Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts’ 2018 General Managers conference in Regensdorf, Switzerland. __ The Story It was a cool September morning in Paris when my colleague and I sat down in a stylish hotel dining room to meet a Mr. Olivier Chavy, President of Mövenpick Hotels & Resorts. Before 8:00am we jumped right into business: Olivier’s vision and objectives for the spring 2018 general managers conference. “We want people to leave with the sensation ‘wow, I am really proud to work for this company’,” emphasized Chavy.

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Should you actually slow down your speech when you present?

by Pierre Morsa

“You have to speak slower!” This advice is a staple of oratory coaching. But I think it is sometimes given by coaches without thinking about the consequences, and that it can actually do more bad than good. Let me explain why. The first reason is simply that not every speaker needs to speak slowly. Speaking slowly is done for several reasons, such as increasing the perceived gravitas (authority) or allowing the public to digest complex information more easily.

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