Hello and welcome to the fundamentals of Communicating and Presenting. In this video, we will specifically explore how anyone can learn to present in a professional, impactful way. When it comes to presenting yourself and your ideas persuasively, there are two things to remember. Firstly, the messages you deliver must be easily understood by and relevant to your audience. Secondly, you have to deliver these messages in an engaging manner. Otherwise, regardless of how useful the information is, people will disengage and stop listening. So this means there are two critical areas of focus for the world-class presenter.

Planning and design, and impactful delivery. Let's look at each of these in turn, starting with effective planning and design.

These are the nine planning steps which represent the best approach to take in order to translate your ideas into a persuasive presentation that has an effective balance between visual content and verbal dialogue. Step one, audience analysis. Why are you delivering this presentation? To whom? What is its purpose? Considering these questions allows you at step two to create a smart objective for your presentation that articulates what seeks to achieve. Step three, gather persuasive information that evidence is the point you are making and therefore generates a more compelling narrative. Step four, choose a structure upon which to hang your ideas.

Step five, map out your content using your chosen structure.

Step six, practice delivering it without visuals to hear how it sounds. Do this several times and then make any necessary changes. Step seven, based on what you have just heard yourself say as you practice, consider and then create simple complimentary visual aids, PowerPoint slides for example. With an emphasis on color, shape, and space rather than just endless bullet points. Rather like this slide. Remember, most people have a visual learning style and learn more from seeing simple graphical representations than from reading huge chunks of text. With this slide, you are able to refer to the information on the slide that I am showing you but also hear everything I am telling you.

Step eight, deliver your presentation. And step nine, review it afterwards to see what can be improved next time. Join me in the second part of this video where we will focus on the second step to presenting success, impactful delivery.