Abilities in Giving Talks

Abilities in Giving Talks

Knowing this basic fact about human nature will help you realize the limits of how much information you can put on your presentation slides.

Most slideshows we encounter have the unfortunate assumption built into them that audiences will sit and wait for the presenter to explain everything. Wrong.

When the speed of transmission was slower, we tended to view news in a more retrospective light; events took center stage. We had been accustomed to checking in on the news each morning: "Did you see the morning paper?" Are you up to date on the evening news?

The advent of electronic innovations, however, shifted our focus from the past to the present when considering news. Cinema gave us motion, but live video broadcasts took us there. The use of digital screens has surpassed printed media as the primary medium for disseminating news. Several of the most storied newspapers in American history, like the New York Herald Tribune, went out of business. To stay afloat, newspapers shifted their focus from breaking news to producing in-depth features, which are of less immediate and perishable value to readers.

Since its inception, Cable News Network has gambled heavily on the idea that people all around the world want access to news around the clock. You can get the most recent headlines whenever you want.Those who long to "know first" finally have their wishes granted.

So how does this relate to slide show creation? A natural curiosity is something we all share as humans and other intelligent species, and it doesn't take being a news junkie to understand that. Since rapid learning is essential to our survival, curiosity is hardwired into every living thing. Humans share a universal urge to be among the first to learn about any developing situation. They want to be in charge and don't want to wait for you, the presenter, to be the first to know.

An audience's attention is usually restored to the presenter once a slide's intrigue has been sated.

But when a new slide is shown for the first time, everyone's attention is drawn to the screen like a moth to a flame, and everyone instantly begins a mad dash to figure out what the slide is about. They are not to blame! These beings are actually human!

Once everyone in the audience is certain they understand what the slide signifies, they will return their focus to what you are saying.

Before now, you might as well not exist. You can do what everyone else does and start describing the things on the slide, but it won't change much. It's possible you'll wet your pants. You are free to leave at any time. Explicit humor is within your reach. But until the audience members figure out what the various data and word tracks on the screen actually imply, you will have zero percent of their attention.

This is the point at which most modern business presentations' slides go horribly wrong. You have to remember that the average audience member needs more than 30 seconds to read the material on a slide, let alone internalize it. However, reading is slowed because the viewer must first decide where to begin and which piece of information is most important.But viewers often make faulty assumptions about the information's importance based on cues like text size and screen position.

That's why you need to estimate how long it would take the average viewer of your slide to find all the information there on their own. The longer it takes the average person to process the information they see, the higher the probability that they will lose interest and move on.

Where does this lead us, then? Hence, the only practical approach is to restrict, to the greatest extent feasible, the data that is exposed with each mouse click.

Faster comprehension of new material means that viewers may return their attention to you and your presentation more quickly, allowing you to "communicate" exactly what you intend.

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