The following is from the great blog “Nick Morgan, Public Words” –
The 10 Commandments of Presentations
I. Thou shall speak authentically, from the heart.
II. Thou shall focus on the audience.
III. Thou shall not use Power Point as speaker notes.
IV. Thou shall not begin thy speech with a joke*.
V. Thou shall speak with all appropriate passion, and not be boring.
VI. Thou shall tell stories and not kill thine audience with endless data.
VII. Thou shall not make a sales pitch for thy company or thy services.
VIII. Thou shall not begin with talk of thyself.
IX. Thou shall not speak through thy nose, or at the floor, or while advancing thy slides.
X. Thou shall not exceed thine allotted time.
(*unless thou is really, really funny.)
This is great advice and was driven home recently when I attended a presentation where the speaker violated all of these.
Make sure you check out Nick Morgan’s blog at http://publicwords.typepad.com/nickmorgan/
Take care.
Brian Willis