Improve Your Communication Skills, 2nd Edition

126 Improve your Communication Skills
By writing only brief notes, triggers and cues on your cards, you 
force yourself to think about what you are saying, while you
are saying it. This means that you will sound much more 
convincing. Obviously, your audience will only tolerate a certain 
amount of silence while you think of the next thing to say. The 
note on the card is there to trigger that next point and keep you 
moving. 
Write your notes in bold print, using pen or felt-tip. Write
on only one side and number the cards sequentially. Include: 
• what you 
must
 say; 
• what you 
should
 say to support the main idea; 
• what you 
could
 say if you have time. 
Add notes on timing, visual aids, cues for your own behaviour. 
Keep the cards simple to look at and rehearse with them so that 
you get to know them. 
Adding spice 
Exciting presentations bring ideas alive. You are the medium 
through which the audience understands the material. You must 
make the presentation your own and give it the spicy smell of 
real life. 
Rack your brain for anything you can use. Think it up, cook it 
up, dream it up if necessary. Look for: 
• images; 
• examples; 
• analogies; 
• stories; 
• pictures; 
• jokes (but be very careful about these).
( c) 2011 Kogan Page L imited, All Rights Reserved.

---

127 Making a Presentation
The aim is to create pictures in your audience’s mind. Don’t let 
computer graphics do it all for you. And don’t fall into the trap of 
thinking that putting text on a visual aid makes it visual. Your 
audience wants 
images
: real pictures, not words. 
The most powerful pictures are the ones you can conjure up 
in your audience’s imagination with your own words. There’s a 
famous story about a little girl who claimed she liked plays on the 
radio, ‘because the pictures were better’. You should be aiming to 
create such pictures in your audience’s mind.