Classes 3-4 DISPENSA

Visual Communication

The present Reader includes the following articles, which you can use as self-study material:

• Williams, V. Fundamentals of Business Communication (Chapter 1: “Effective Business

Communication” and Chapter 18: “Business Presentations”), PressBooks, 2020.
• What is the Importance of Using Visuals When Giving a Presentation? (adapted from
https://www.presentationtraininginstitute.com/), 2020.
• Gabrielle, B. R. Speaking PowerPoint (selected pages from Chapter 1: “The New Language
of 21st Century Business”), Insights Publishing, 2010.
Fundamentals of Business Communication is (c) 2020 by Venecia Williams
and is licensed under a Creative Commons-Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0
International license.

Chapter 1: Effective Business Communication

VENECIA WILLIAMS

Communication is an activity, skill, and art that incorporates lessons learned across a wide spectrum
of human knowledge. Perhaps the most time-honoured form of communication is storytelling. We’ve
told each other stories for ages to help make sense of our world, anticipate the future, and certainly
to entertain ourselves. The art of storytelling draws on your understanding of yourself, your message,
and how you communicate it to an audience that is simultaneously communicating back to you. Your
anticipation, reaction, and adaptation to the process will determine how successfully you are able to
communicate. You were not born knowing how to write or even how to talk—but in the process of
growing up, you have undoubtedly learned how to tell, and how not tell, a story out loud and in
writing.

Effective communication takes preparation, practice, and persistence. There are many ways to learn
communication skills; the school of experience, or “hard knocks,” is one of them. But in the business
environment, a “knock” (or lesson learned) may come at the expense of your credibility through a
blown presentation to a client. The classroom environment, with a compilation of information and
resources such as a text, can offer you a trial run where you get to try out new ideas and skills before
you have to use them to communicate effectively to make a sale or form a new partnership. Listening
to yourself, or perhaps the comments of others may help you reflect on new ways to present or
perceive, thoughts, ideas and concepts. The net result is your growth; ultimately your ability to
communicate in business will improve, opening more doors than you might anticipate.

Importance of Good Communication Skills

Communication is key to your success—in relationships, in the workplace, as a citizen of your
country, and across your lifetime. Your ability to communicate comes from experience, and
experience can be an effective teacher, but this text and the related business communication course
will offer you a wealth of experiences gathered from professional speakers across their lifetimes. You
can learn from the lessons they’ve learned and be a more effective communicator right out of the
gate.

Business communication can be thought of as a problem-solving activity in which individuals may

address the following questions:

• What is the situation?

• What are some possible communication strategies?
• What is the best course of action?
• What is the best way to design the chosen message?
• What is the best way to deliver the message?

In this book, we will examine this problem-solving process and help you learn to apply it in the kinds
of situations you are likely to encounter over the course of your career.
Communication Influences Your Thinking about Yourself and Others

We all share a fundamental drive to communicate. Communication can be defined as the process of
understanding and sharing meaning (Pearson & Nelson, 2000). You share meaning in what you say
and how you say it, both in oral and written forms. If you could not communicate, what would life be
like? A series of never-ending frustrations? Not being able to ask for what you need or even to
understand the needs of others?

Being unable to communicate might even mean losing a part of yourself, for you communicate
your self-concept—your sense of self and awareness of who you are—in many ways. Do you like to
write? Do you find it easy to make a phone call to a stranger or to speak to a room full of people?
Perhaps someone told you that you don’t speak clearly or your grammar needs improvement. Does
that make you more or less likely to want to communicate? For some, it may be a positive challenge,
while for others it may be discouraging. But in all cases, your ability to communicate is central to
your self-concept.

Take a look at your clothes. What are the brands you are wearing? What do you think they say about
you? Do you feel that certain styles of shoes, jewelry, tattoos, music, or even automobiles express
who you are? Part of your self-concept may be that you express yourself through texting, or through
writing longer documents like essays and research papers, or through the way you speak.

On the other side of the coin, your communications skills help you to understand others—not just
their words, but also their tone of voice, their nonverbal gestures, or the format of their written
documents provide you with clues about who they are and what their values and priorities may be.
Active listening and reading are also part of being a successful communicator.

Communication Influences How You Learn

When you were an infant, you learned to talk over a period of many months. When you got older,
you didn’t learn to ride a bike, drive a car, or even text a message on your cell phone in one brief
moment. You need to begin the process of improving your speaking and writing with the frame of
mind that it will require effort, persistence, and self-correction.

You learn to speak in public by first having conversations, then by answering questions and
expressing your opinions in class, and finally by preparing and delivering a “stand-up” speech.
Similarly, you learn to write by first learning to read, then by writing and learning to think critically.
Your speaking and writing are reflections of your thoughts, experience, and education. Part of that
combination is your level of experience listening to other speakers, reading documents and styles of
writing, and studying formats similar to what you aim to produce.

As you study business communication, you may receive suggestions for improvement and
clarification from speakers and writers more experienced than yourself. Take their suggestions as
challenges to improve; don’t give up when your first speech or first draft does not communicate the
message you intend. Stick with it until you get it right. Your success in communicating is a skill that
applies to almost every field of work, and it makes a difference in your relationships with others.

Remember, luck is simply a combination of preparation and timing. You want to be prepared to
communicate well when given the opportunity. Each time you do a good job, your success will bring
more success.
Communication Represents You and Your Employer
You want to make a good first impression on your friends and family, instructors, and employer.
They all want you to convey a positive image, as it reflects on them. In your career, you will represent
your business or company in spoken and written form. Your professionalism and attention to detail
will reflect positively on you and set you up for success.

In both oral and written situations, you will benefit from having the ability to communicate clearly.
These are skills you will use for the rest of your life. Positive improvements in these skills will have
a positive impact on your relationships, your prospects for employment, and your ability to make a
difference in the world.

Communication Skills Are Desired by Business and Industry

Oral and written communication proficiencies are consistently ranked in the top ten desirable skills
by employer surveys year after year. In fact, high-powered business executives sometimes hire
consultants to coach them in sharpening their communication skills. According to the National
Association of Colleges and Employers (2018), the following are the top five personal qualities or
skills potential employers seek:

1. Communication skills (verbal and written)

2. Strong work ethic
3. Teamwork skills (works well with others, group communication)
4. Initiative
5. Analytical skills

Knowing this, you can see that one way for you to be successful and increase your promotion potential
is to increase your abilities to speak and write effectively. An individual with excellent
communication skills is an asset to every organization. No matter what career you plan to pursue,
learning to express yourself professionally in speech and in writing will help you get there.

What is Communication?

Many theories have been proposed to describe, predict, and understand the behaviours and
phenomena of which communication consists. When it comes to communicating in business, we are
often less interested in theory than in making sure our communications generate the desired results.
But in order to achieve results, it can be valuable to understand what communication is and how it
works. All communication is composed of three parts that make a whole: sharing, understanding, and
meaning.

Sharing means doing something together with one or more person(s). In communication, sharing
occurs when you convey thoughts, feelings, ideas, or insights to others. You also share with yourself
(a process called intrapersonal communication) when you bring ideas to consciousness, ponder how
you feel about something, figure out the solution to a problem, or have a classic “Aha!” moment when
something becomes clear.
The second keyword is understanding. “To understand is to perceive, to interpret, and to relate our
perception and interpretation to what we already know.” (McLean, 2003) Understanding the words
and the concepts or objects they refer to is an important part of the communication process.

Finally, meaning is what you share through communication. For example, by looking at the context
of a word, and by asking questions, you can discover the shared meaning of the word and better
understand the message.

• Interpersonal communication is any message exchanged between two or more people.

• Written communication is any message using the written word.
• Verbal, or oral, communication is any message conveyed through speech.
• Nonverbal communication is any message inferred through observation of another person.

Communications Process: Encoding and Decoding

In basic terms, humans communicate through a process of encoding and decoding. The encoder is
the person who develops and sends the message. As represented in Figure 1.1 below, the encoder
must determine how the message will be received by the audience, and make adjustments so the
message is received the way they want it to be received.

Encoding is the process of turning thoughts into communication. The encoder uses a ‘medium’ to
send the message — a phone call, email, text message, face-to-face meeting, or other communication
tools. The level of conscious thought that goes into encoding messages may vary. The encoder should
also take into account any ‘noise’ that might interfere with their message, such as other messages,
distractions, or influences.

The audience then ‘decodes’, or interprets, the message for themselves. Decoding is the process of
turning communication into thoughts. For example, you may realize you’re hungry and encode the
following message to send to your roommate: “I’m hungry. Do you want to get pizza tonight?” As
your roommate receives the message, they decode your communication and turn it back into thoughts
to make meaning.
Of course, you don’t just communicate verbally—you have various options, or channels, for
communication. Encoded messages are sent through a channel, or a sensory route, on which a
message travels to the receiver for decoding. While communication can be sent and received using
any sensory route (sight, smell, touch, taste, or sound), most communication occurs through visual
(sight) and/or auditory (sound) channels. If your roommate has headphones on and is engrossed in a
video game, you may need to get their attention by waving your hands before you can ask them about
dinner.

The transmission model of communication describes communication as a linear, one-way process

in which a sender intentionally transmits a message to a receiver (Ellis & McClintock, 1990). This
model focuses on the sender and message within a communication encounter. Although the receiver
is included in the model, this role is viewed as more of a target or endpoint rather than part of an
ongoing process. You are left to presume that the receiver either successfully receives and
understands the message or does not. Think of how a radio message is sent from a person in the radio
studio to you listening in your car. The sender is the radio announcer who encodes a verbal message
that is transmitted by a radio tower through electromagnetic waves (the channel) and eventually
reaches your (the receiver’s) ears via an antenna and speakers in order to be decoded. The radio
announcer doesn’t really know if you receive their message or not, but if the equipment is working
and the channel is free of static, then there is a good chance that the message was successfully
received.

The interaction model of communication describes communication as a process in which

participants alternate positions as sender and receiver and generate meaning by sending messages and
receiving feedback within physical and psychological contexts (Schramm, 1997). Rather than
illustrating communication as a linear, one-way process, the interaction model incorporates feedback,
which makes communication a more interactive, two-way process. Feedback includes messages sent
in response to other messages. For example, your instructor may respond to a point you raise during
class discussion or you may point to the sofa when your roommate asks you where the remote control
is. The inclusion of a feedback loop also leads to a more complex understanding of the roles of
participants in a communication encounter. Rather than having one sender, one message, and one
receiver, this model has two sender-receivers who exchange messages. Each participant alternates
roles as sender and receiver in order to keep a communication encounter going. Although this seems
like a perceptible and deliberate process, you alternate between the roles of sender and receiver very
quickly and often without conscious thought.

The transaction model of communication describes communication as a process in which

communicators generate social realities within social, relational, and cultural contexts. In this model,
you don’t just communicate to exchange messages; you communicate to create relationships, form
intercultural alliances, shape your self-concepts, and engage with others in dialogue to create
communities. In short, you don’t communicate about your realities; communication helps to construct
your realities (and the realities of others).

The roles of sender and receiver in the transaction model of communication differ significantly from
the other models. Instead of labelling participants as senders and receivers, the people in a
communication encounter are referred to as communicators. Unlike the interaction model, which
suggests that participants alternate positions as sender and receiver, the transaction model suggests
that you are simultaneously a sender and a receiver. For example, when meeting a new friend, you
send verbal messages about your interests and background, your companion reacts nonverbally. You
don’t wait until you are done sending your verbal message to start receiving and decoding the
nonverbal messages of your new friend. Instead, you are simultaneously sending your verbal message
and receiving your friend’s nonverbal messages. This is an important addition to the model because
it allows you to understand how you are able to adapt your communication—for example, adapting a
verbal message—in the middle of sending it based on the communication you are simultaneously
receiving from your communication partner.

Eight Essential Components of Communication

The communication process can be broken down into a series of eight essential components, each of
which serves an integral function in the overall process:

1. Source
2. Message
3. Channel
4. Receiver
5. Feedback
6. Environment
7. Context
8. Interference

Source
The source imagines, creates, and sends the message. The source encodes the message by choosing
just the right order or the best words to convey the intended meaning and presents or sends the
information to the audience (receiver). By watching for the audience’s reaction, the source perceives
how well they received the message and responds with clarification or supporting information.

Message
“The message is the stimulus or meaning produced by the source for the receiver or audience”
(McLean, 2005). The message brings together words to convey meaning but is also about how it’s
conveyed — through nonverbal cues, organization, grammar, style, and other elements.

Channel
“The channel is the way in which a message or messages travel between source and receiver.”
(McLean, 2005). Spoken channels include face-to-face conversations, speeches, phone conversations
and voicemail messages, radio, public address systems, and Skype. Written channels include letters,
memorandums, purchase orders, invoices, newspaper and magazine articles, blogs, email, text
messages, tweets, and so forth.

Receiver
“The receiver receives the message from the source, analyzing and interpreting the message in ways
both intended and unintended by the source” (McLean, 2005).

Feedback
When you respond to the source, intentionally or unintentionally, you are giving feedback. Feedback
is composed of messages the receiver sends back to the source. Verbal or nonverbal, all these
feedback signals allow the source to see how well, how accurately (or how poorly and inaccurately)
the message was received (Leavitt & Mueller, 1951).

Environment
“The environment is the atmosphere, physical and psychological, where you send and receive
messages” (McLean, 2005). Surroundings, people, animals, technology, can all influence your
communication.

Context
“The context of the communication interaction involves the setting, scene, and expectations of the
individuals involved” (McLean, 2005). A professional communication context may involve business
suits (environmental cues) that directly or indirectly influence expectations of language and behaviour
among the participants.

Interference
Interference, also called noise, can come from any source. “Interference is anything that blocks or
changes the source’s intended meaning of the message” (McLean, 2005). This can be external or
internal/psychological. Noise interferes with normal encoding and decoding of the message carried
by the channel between source and receiver.

Your Responsibilities as a Communicator – 4 tips

Whenever you speak or write in a business environment, you have certain responsibilities to your
audience, your employer, and your profession. Your audience comes to you with an inherent set of
expectations that is your responsibility to fulfill. The specific expectations may change given the
context or environment, but two central ideas will remain: be prepared, and be ethical.

Preparation
Being prepared means that you have selected a topic appropriate to your audience, gathered enough
information to cover the topic well, put your information into a logical sequence, and considered how
best to present it.

Organization
Being organized involves the steps or points that lead your communication to a conclusion. Once
you’ve invested time in researching your topic, you will want to narrow your focus to a few key points
and consider how you’ll present them. You also need to consider how to link your main points
together for your audience so they can follow your message from point to point.

Clarity
You need to have a clear idea in your mind of what you want to say before you can say it clearly to
someone else. It involves considering your audience, as you will want to choose words and phrases
they understand and avoid jargon or slang that may be unfamiliar to them. Clarity also involves
presentation and appropriate use of technology.

Conciseness
Concise means to be brief and to the point. In most business communications you are expected to ‘get
down to business’ right away. Being prepared includes being able to state your points clearly and
support them with trustworthy evidence in a relatively straightforward, linear way. Be concise in your
choice of words, organization, and even visual aids. Being concise also involves being sensitive to
time constraints. Be prepared to be punctual and adhere to deadlines or time limits. Some cultures
also have a less strict interpretation of time schedules and punctuality. While it is important to
recognize that different cultures have different expectations, the general rule holds true that good
business communication does not waste words or time.
Ethics in Communication
Communicating ethically involves being egalitarian, respectful, and trustworthy—overall, practising
the “golden rule” of treating your audience the way you would want to be treated. Communication
can move communities, influence cultures, and change history. It can motivate people to take a stand,
consider an argument, or purchase a product. The degree to which you consider both the common
good and fundamental principles you hold to be true when crafting your message directly relates to
how your message will affect others.

The Ethical Communicator Is Egalitarian

The word “egalitarian” comes from the root “equal.” To be egalitarian is to believe in basic equality:
that all people should share equally in the benefits and burdens of a society. It means that everyone
is entitled to the same respect, expectations, access to information, and rewards of participation in a
group. To communicate in an egalitarian manner, speak and write in a way that is comprehensible
and relevant to all your listeners or readers, not just those who are ‘like you’ in terms of age, gender,
race or ethnicity, or other characteristics. In business, an effective communicator seeks to unify the
audience by using ideas and language that are appropriate for all the message’s readers or listeners.

The Ethical Communicator Is Respectful

People are influenced by emotions as well as logic. The ethical communicator will be passionate and
enthusiastic without being disrespectful. Losing one’s temper and being abusive are generally
regarded as showing a lack of professionalism (and could even involve legal consequences for you
or your employer). When you disagree strongly with a coworker, feel deeply annoyed with a difficult
customer, or find serious fault with a competitor’s product, it is important to express such sentiments
respectfully.

The Ethical Communicator Is Trustworthy

Trust is a key component in communication, and this is especially true in business. Your goal as a
communicator is to build a healthy relationship with your audience and to do that you must show
them how they can trust you and why the information you are about to share with them is believable.
Your audience will expect that what you say is the truth as you understand it. This means that you
have not intentionally omitted, deleted, or taken information out of context simply to prove your
points. They will listen to what you say and how you say it, but also to what you don’t say or do.
Being worthy of trust is something you earn with an audience. Many wise people have observed that
trust is hard to build but easy to lose.

The “Golden Rule”

When in doubt, remember the “golden rule,” which is to treat others the way you would like to be
treated. In all its many forms, the golden rule incorporates human kindness, cooperation, and
reciprocity across cultures, languages, backgrounds, ad interests. Regardless of where you travel, with
whom you communicate or what your audience is like, remember how you would feel if you were on
the receiving end of your communication and act accordingly.

Summary
Being a good communicator is essential to becoming a successful business person. Therefore, it is
important to learn how to communicate well. The first step in that process is understanding what
effective communication means. This will help you to evaluate and improve your communication
skills.

References

Ellis, R. and Ann McClintock, You Take My Meaning: Theory into Practice in Human
Communication (London: Edward Arnold, 1990), 71.
Leavitt, H., & Mueller, R. (1951). Some effects of feedback on communication. Human Relations, 4,
401–410.
McLean, S. (2003). The basics of speech communication. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
McLean, S. (2005). The basics of interpersonal communication (p. 10). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
NACE. (2018). Employers Want to See These Attributes on Students’ Resumes. Retrieved August
26, 2020, from https://www.naceweb.org/talent-acquisition/candidate-selection/employers-want-to-
see-these-attributes-on-students-resumes/
Pearson, J. C., & Nelson, P. E. (2000). An introduction to human communication: understanding and
sharing. Boston: McGraw Hill.
Schramm, W., The Beginnings of Communication Study in America (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage,
1997).
Chapter 18: Business Presentations
VENECIA WILLIAMS AND OLDS COLLEGE

Along with good writing skills, the ability to communicate verbally is vital to many employers today.
It is an integral part of the modern business world. People in the workplace spend the majority of
their time communicating. Verbal communication in the workplace takes many forms such as staff
meetings, discussions, speeches, presentations, informal conversations, and telephone and video
conferences. Communicating verbally is more personal and flexible than writing. It allows workers
to exchange ideas, information, and feedback more quickly. Verbal communication tends to occur in
person, making it easier to negotiate, express emotions, outline expectations, and build trust, all of
which are important in today’s workplace. Communication can also occur between people who are
not together in person. In these situations, unique skills are necessary to achieve success. Simple
conversation skills are also valued in the workplace, but this does not mean using casual or informal
language. Rather, what is prized by many employers is the ability to communicate important
information professionally but in a meaningful and understandable way. This can be important when
making spontaneous presentations as well as more elaborate formal group presentations, which are a
part of many work roles today.

What Makes a Successful Speaker?

According to longtime Toastmasters member Bob Kienzle, there are a few key elements that tend to
make a successful speaker:

• Voice: Can the person be easily understood?

• Body Language: Does their body support what they’re saying? Are they confident?
• Coherent Structure: Does what they’re presenting make sense? Is it logical?
• Enthusiasm: Do they care about what they’re presenting?
• Expertise: Do they know what they’re talking about? Are they credible?
• Practice: If they haven’t practised or sufficiently prepared, it will likely show up in one or
more of the above.

A successful speaker can be inspired by other speeches or speakers but may fall flat if they try to copy
someone else. Authenticity and passion can resonate so much with an audience that it can outweigh
elements otherwise considered pitfalls. The techniques, tools, and best practices are a guideline, and
it’s important to note there is no such thing as “perfection” in public speaking. “Failure” can happen
in myriad ways, but it’s more helpful to see them as learning opportunities, or opportunities to make
a stronger connection to your audience. The biggest failure, according to Kienzle, is to pass up
opportunities to practise your skills in presenting or public speaking.

Preparing a Presentation
Develop your message while keeping in mind the format, audience, style, and tone. First, you’ll need
to think about the format of your presentation. This is a choice between presentation types. In your
professional life, you’ll encounter the verbal communication channels in Figure 18.1. The purpose
column labels each channel with a purpose (I=Inform, P=Persuade, or E=Entertain) depending on
that channel’s most likely purpose.
There are some other considerations to make when you are selecting a format. For example, the
number of speakers may influence the format you choose. Panels and Presentations may have more
than one speaker. In Meetings and Teleconferences, multiple people will converse. In a Workshop
setting, one person will usually lead the event, but there is often a high-level of collaboration between
participants. The location of participants will also influence your decision. For example, if
participants cannot all be in the same room, you might choose a teleconference or webinar. If
asynchronous delivery is important, you might record a podcast. When choosing a technology-reliant
channel, such as a teleconference or webinar, be sure to test your equipment and make sure each
participant has access to any materials they need before you begin.

Once you have chosen a format, make sure your message is right for your audience. You’ll need to
think about issues such as the following:

• What expectations will the audience have?

• What is the context of your communication?
• What does the audience already know about the topic?
• How is the audience likely to react to you and your message?

Next, you’ll consider the style of your presentation. Analyze your specific presentation styles.
Perhaps you prefer to present formally, limiting your interaction with the audience, or perhaps you
prefer a more conversational, informal style, where discussion is a key element. You may prefer to
cover serious subjects, or perhaps you enjoy delivering humorous speeches. Style is all about your
personality!

Finally, you’ll select a tone for your presentation. Your voice, body language, level of self-
confidence, dress, and use of space all contribute to the mood that your message takes on. Consider
how you want your audience to feel when they leave your presentation and approach it with that mood
in mind.
Presentation Purpose
Your presentation will have a general and specific purpose. Your general purpose may be to inform,
persuade, or entertain. It’s likely that any speech you develop will have a combination of these goals.
Most presentations have a little bit of entertainment value, even if they are primarily attempting to
inform or persuade. For example, the speaker might begin with a joke or dramatic opening, even
though their speech is primarily informational. Your specific purpose addresses what you are going
to inform, persuade, or entertain your audience with the main topic of your speech.

Incorporating Backchannels
Technology has given speakers new ways to engage with an audience in real-time, and these can be
particularly useful when it isn’t practical for the audience to share their thoughts verbally—for
example, when the audience is very large, or when they are not all in the same location. These
secondary or additional means of interacting with your audience are called backchannels, and you
might decide to incorporate one into your presentation, depending on your aims. They can be helpful
for engaging more introverted members of the audience who may not be comfortable speaking out
verbally in a large group. Using publicly accessible social networks, such as a Facebook Page or
Twitter feed, can also help to spread your message to a wider audience, as audience members share
posts related to your speech with their networks. Because of this, backchannels are often incorporated
into conferences; they are helpful in marketing the conference and its speakers both during and after
the event.

Developing the Content

As with any type of messaging, it helps if you create an outline of your speech or presentation before
you create it fully. This ensures that each element is in the right place and gives you a place to start
to avoid the dreaded blank page. Figure 18.2 is an outline template that you can adapt for your
purpose. Replace the placeholders in the Content column with your ideas or points.

Introduction
The beginning of your speech needs an attention-grabber to get your audience interested right away.
Choose your attention-grabbing device based on what works best for your topic. Your entire
introduction should only be around 10 to 15 percent of your total speech, so be sure to keep this
section short. Here are some devices that you could try:
After the attention-getter comes the rest of your introduction. It needs to do the following:

• Capture the audience’s interest

• State the purpose of your speech
• Establish credibility
• Give the audience a reason to listen
• Signpost the main ideas

Body

Once you have identified an attention-getting, it is time to develop the body of your presentation or
speech. In your body, you will focus on the specific points you would like to communicate to your
audience.

Rhetoric and Argument: Your audience will think to themselves, Why should I listen to this speech?
What’s in it for me? One of the best things you can do as a speaker is to answer these questions early
in your body, if you haven’t already done so in your introduction. This will serve to gain their support
early and will fill in the blanks of who, what, when, where, why, and how in their minds.

Organization: An organized body helps your audience to follow your speech and recall your points
later. When developing the body of your speech, recall the specific purpose you decided on, then
choose main points to support it. Just two or three main points are usually sufficient, depending on
the length of your speech. Anticipate one main point per two to three minutes of speaking.

Concluding on a High Note

You’ll need to keep your energy up until the very end of your speech. In your conclusion, your job is
to let the audience know you are finished, help them remember what you’ve told them, and leave
them with a final thought or call-to-action, depending on the general purpose of your message.

Presentation Aids
Presentations can be enhanced by the effective use of visual aids. These include handouts, overhead
transparencies, drawings on the whiteboard, PowerPoint slides, and many other types of props. Once
you have chosen a topic, consider how you are going to show your audience what you are talking
about. Visuals can provide a reference, illustration, or image to help the audience to understand and
remember your point.

Visual aids accomplish several goals:

• Make your speech more interesting

• Enhance your credibility as a speaker
• Guide transitions, helping the audience stay on track
• Communicate complex information in a short time
• Reinforce your message
• Encourage retention

Methods and Materials

There are many different presentation aids available. Before you decide on a presentation aid, think
carefully about how you plan on using it and how it will enhance your presentation.
Using Visual Aids

Visual aids can be a powerful tool when used effectively but can run the risk of dominating your
presentation. Consider your audience and how the portrayal of images, text, graphic, animated
sequences, or sound files will contribute or detract from your presentation. Here are some tips to keep
in mind as you prepare yours.

Designing Slide Decks

When you design your slide decks, you might be overwhelmed by the possibilities, and you might be
tempted to use all the bells, whistles, and sounds, not to mention the flying, and animated graphics.
If used wisely, a simple transition can be effective, but if used indiscriminately, it can annoy the
audience to the point where they cringe in anticipation of the sound effect at the start of each slide.

Stick to one main idea per slide. The presentation is for the audience’s benefit, not yours. Pictures
and images can be understood more quickly and easily than text, so you can use this to your advantage
as you present.
If you develop a slide deck for your presentation, test these out in the location beforehand, not just
on your own computer screen, as different computers and software versions can make your slides
look different than you expected. Allow time for revision based on what you learn.

Your visual aids should meet the following criteria:

• Big: legible for everyone, even the back row

• Clear: easy for audience to understand
• Simple: simplify concepts rather than complicating them
• Consistent: use the same visual style throughout

In Figure 18.3 the slide deck on the left has a colour combination which makes the information
difficult to understand. The list is not parallel and the slide contains a grammatical error. The slide
deck on the right is an improved and more professional version.

Font
Another consideration that you’ll need to make when designing your slide decks is font. As previously
mentioned, think about the people at the back of the room when choosing the size of your text, to
make sure it can be read by everyone. A common mistake that presenters make is to use decorative
fonts or to incorporate many different fonts in their slides. This not only creates a mixed message for
the audience but also makes your message difficult to read. Choose legible, common fonts that do not
have thin elements that may be difficult to see.

Colour
When considering your choice of colours to use, legibility must be your priority. Contrast can help
the audience read your key terms more easily. Make sure the background colour and the images you
plan to use complement each other. Repeat colours, from your graphics to your text, to help unify
each slide. To reduce visual noise, try not to use more than two or three colours. Blue-green colour
blindness, and red-green colour blindness are fairly common, so avoid using these colour
combinations if it is important for the audience to differentiate between them. If you are using a pie
chart, for example, avoid putting a blue segment next to a green one. Use labelling so that even if
someone is colour blind, they will be able to tell the relative sizes of the pie segments and what they
signify.

Colour is also a matter of culture. Some colours may be perceived as formal or informal, or masculine
or feminine. Certain colours have understood meanings; for example, red is usually associated with
danger, while green signals “go.” Make sure the colours you use align with your message. If you are
discussing climate change or the natural world, for example, you’d be more likely to use blues and
greens rather than metallic colours to avoid confusing the audience.

Once you have prepared your visual aid, do not forget to revise. There is nothing more uncomfortable
than seeing a typo or grammatical error on your screen in the middle of your presentation. These
errors can create a bad impression and affect your credibility with the audience. You want your
audience to focus on your message so be sure to revise to maintain the audience’s attention and keep
your credibility.

Preparing to Present

You are almost ready to deliver your presentation. What are some final elements you can focus on to
ensure a smooth delivery?

Rehearse
To deliver your presentation to the best of your ability, and to reduce your nerves once you take the
stage, you need to practise by rehearsing. As you do, try to identify the weaknesses in your delivery
to improve on them. For example, do you often misspeak the same words (e.g., pacific for specific;
ax for ask) or do your hands or feet fidget? Use your practice time to focus on correcting these issues.
These sessions should help you get comfortable and help you remember what you want to say without
having to constantly refer to notes. Try practising in front of a mirror, or even recording yourself
speaking to a camera and playing it back. It’s also helpful to get feedback from a supportive audience
at this stage. Perhaps a few family members or friends could watch you give your presentation and
provide some feedback.

Dress for Success

While there are no definitive guidelines for how you should dress for your presentation, your
appearance is an important part of your audience’s first impression. If you want them to take you
seriously, you’ll need to look the part. While you don’t have to wear a suit each time you present,
there are some scenarios where this would be expected; for example, if you are presenting to a
corporate audience who wear suits to work, you should do the same. You should dress one step above
your audience. If your audience is going to be dressed casually in shorts and jeans, then wear nice
casual clothing such as a pair of pressed slacks and a collared shirt or blouse. If your audience is
going to be wearing business casual attire, then you should wear a dress or a suit. The general rule is
to avoid any distractions in your appearance that can distract your audience’s attention from your
message.

Set Up Your Environment

Depending on the circumstances of your speech or presentation, you may have some choices to make
about the environment. Perhaps you have a choice of meeting rooms that you can use, or, perhaps
you have only one option. If you have some flexibility, it is helpful to think about what sort of
environment would best help you get your message across. For example, if you are running a
workshop, you might want to assemble participants in a circle to encourage collaboration and
discussion. If you are holding a webinar, you’ll need a quiet location with a strong Internet connection
and a computer system. It is imperative that you think about what facilities you need well before the
day of your presentation arrives. Arriving to find that the equipment you expected isn’t available is
not a nice surprise for even the most experienced speaker!
If you have access to the location beforehand, you may need to move tables or chairs around to get
things just the way you want them. You might choose to have a podium brought in, if you are aiming
for a formal feel, for example, or you may need to position your flip chart. Double-check that you
have all the equipment you need, from whiteboard markers to speakers. It is far better if you can get
comfortable with the room before your audience arrives, as this will make you feel more prepared
and less nervous.

If you are using technology to support your presentation (i.e., PowerPoint slides or a projector), test
everything before you begin. Do a microphone check and test its volume, view your slides on the
computer you will be using, check any weblinks, play videos to test their sound, or make a call to test
the phone connection prior to your teleconference. Your audience will get restless quickly if they
arrive and are expected to wait while you fix a technical problem. This will also make you seem
disorganized and hurt your credibility as an authoritative speaker.

During the Presentation

You’ve organized your presentation with great visuals and you are ready to present. You now have
to deliver your presentation. How do you effectively deliver your presentation calmly and clearly?

Managing Anxiety
Studies have been done to assess how nervous or stressful people typically get during presentations,
by examining people’s physiological responses at three intervals: one minute before the presentation,
the first minute of the speech, and the last minute of the speech. They discovered that nervousness
usually peaked at the anticipation stage that occurs one minute before the presentation. They further
found that as the speech progresses, nervousness tends to go down. Here are some things you can do
to help you manage your anxiety before the presentation:

• Practice/rehearse in similar conditions/setting as your speech

• Be organized
• Think positively
• Analyze your audience
• Adapt your language to speaking style

During the presentation, there are four main areas where you can focus attention in order to manage
your anxiety:

1. Your body’s reaction

2. Attention to the audience
3. Keeping a sense of humour
4. Common stress management techniques

Your Body’s Reaction

Physical movement helps to channel some of the excess energy that your body produces in response
to anxiety. If at all possible, move around the front of the room rather than remaining behind the
lectern or gripping it for dear life (avoid pacing nervously from side to side, however). Move closer
to the audience and then stop for a moment. If you are afraid that moving away from the lectern will
reveal your shaking hands, use note cards rather than a sheet of paper for your outline. Note cards do
not quiver like paper, and they provide you with something to do with your hands. Other options
include vocal warm-ups right before your speech, having water (preferably in a non-spillable bottle
with a spout) nearby for dry mouth, and doing a few stretches before going on stage. Deep breathing
will help to counteract the effects of excess adrenaline. You can place cues or symbols in your notes,
such as “slow down” or “smile”, that remind you to pause and breathe during points in your speech.
It is also a good idea to pause a moment before you get started to set an appropriate pace from the
onset. Look at your audience and smile. It is a reflex for some of your audience members to smile
back. Those smiles will reassure you that your audience members are friendly.

Attention to the Audience

During your speech, make a point of establishing direct eye contact with your audience members. By
looking at individuals, you establish a series of one-to-one contacts similar to interpersonal
communication. An audience becomes much less threatening when you think of them not as an
anonymous mass but as a collection of individuals.

Keeping a Sense of Humour

No matter how well we plan, unexpected things happen. That fact is what makes the public speaking
situation so interesting. If things go wrong, try to have a sense of humour and stay calm. The audience
will respond better if you stay calm than if you get upset or have a breakdown.

Stress Management Techniques

Even when we use positive thinking and are well prepared, some of us still feel a great deal of anxiety
about public speaking. When that is the case, it can be more helpful to use stress management than to
try to make the anxiety go away. Here are two main tools that can help:

• Visualization: imagining the details of what a successful speech would look and sound like
from beginning to end; a way of hypnotizing yourself into positive thinking by using your
mind’s eye to make success real.
• Systematic desensitization: Gradual exposure to the thing that causes fear—in this case, giving
a speech—can ultimately lead to decreased anxiety. Basically, the more practice you get
speaking in front of people, the less fear and anxiety you’ll have about public speaking.
Organizations like Toastmasters that help people confront their fears by providing a
supportive environment to learn and practise is a good option if you have a true phobia around
presenting or public speaking.

Focus on Verbal Communication Techniques

• Pitch: Use pitch inflections to make your delivery more interesting and emphatic. If you don’t
change pitch at all, your delivery will be monotone, which gets boring for the audience very
quickly.
• Volume: Adjust the volume of your voice to your environment and audience. If you’re in a
large auditorium, speak up so that people in the back row can hear you. But if you’re in a
small room with only a few people, you don’t want to alarm them by shouting!
• Emphasis: Stress certain words in your speech to add emphasis to them, that is, to indicate
that they are particularly important.
• Pronunciation: Make sure that you know the appropriate pronunciation of the words you
choose. If you mispronounce a word, it could hurt your credibility or confuse your audience.
Your pronunciation is also influenced by your accent. If your accent is quite different from
the accent you expect most members of your audience to have, practise your speech in front
of someone with the same accent that your audience members will have, to ensure you are
pronouncing words in a clear, understandable way.
 • Fillers: Avoid the use of “fillers” as placeholders for actual words (like, er, um, uh, etc.). If
you have a habit of using fillers, practise your speech thoroughly so that you remember what
you want to say. This way, you are less likely to lose your place and let a filler word slip out.
• Rate: The pace that you speak at will influence how well the audience can understand you.
Many people speak quickly when they are nervous. If this is a habit of yours, practice will
help you here, too. Pause for breath naturally during your speech. Your speaking rate should
be appropriate for your topic. A rapid, lively rate communicates enthusiasm, urgency, or
humour. A slower, moderated rate conveys respect and seriousness.

Focus on Non-verbal Communication Techniques

• Gestures: You can use your hands or head to help you express an idea or meaning, or reinforce
important points, but they can be distracting if overused. If the audience is busy watching your
hands fly around, they will not be able to concentrate on your words.
• Facial Expression: Rehearse your speech in front of a mirror to see what facial expressions
come across. If you are speaking about an upbeat topic, smile! Conversely, if your topic is
serious or solemn, avoid facial expressions that are overtly cheerful, because the audience will
be confused by the mixed message. In North American culture, the most important facial
expression you can use is eye contact. Briefly catch the eye of audience members as you move
through your speech. If you can’t look your audience members in the eye, they may view you
as untrustworthy. You’ll want to avoid holding eye contact for too long with any one person,
as too much can be unnerving.
• Posture: Try to stay conscious of your posture and stand up straight. This gives the audience
the perception that you are authoritative and take your position seriously. If you are slouching,
hunched over, or leaning on something, this gives the impression that you are anxious, lacking
in credibility, or not serious about your message.
• Silence: Silence is a powerful technique if used well. Pauses are useful for emphasis and
dramatic effect when you are speaking. Some speakers are reluctant to pause or use silence
because they become uncomfortable with the dead air, but sometimes your audience needs a
moment to process information and respond to you.
• Movement: You can use your body movements to communicate positively with the audience.
Leaning in or moving closer to the audience helps to bridge the space of separation. Moving
from one side of the room to the other in a purposeful way that supports your content is a
useful way to keep your audience engaged; their eyes will track your movements. However,
pacing rapidly with no purpose and no support to your message may quickly distract from
your message.

Coping with Mistakes and Surprises

Even the most prepared speaker will encounter unexpected challenges from time to time. Here are a
few strategies for combating the unexpected in your own presentations.

Speech Content Issues

What if a notecard goes missing or you skip important information from the beginning of your
speech? Pause for a moment to think about what to do. Is it important to include the missing
information, or can it be omitted without hindering the audience’s ability to understand your speech?
If it needs to be included, does the information fit better now or in a later segment? If you can move
on without the missing element, that is often the best choice, but pausing for a few seconds to decide
will be less distracting to the audience than sputtering through a few “ums” and “uhs.” Situations like
these demonstrate why it’s a good idea to have a glass of water with you when you speak. Pausing
for a moment to take a sip of water is a perfectly natural movement, so the audience may not even
notice that anything is amiss.

Technical Difficulties
Technology has become a very useful aid in public speaking, allowing us to use audio or video clips,
presentation software, or direct links to websites. But it does break down occasionally! Web servers
go offline, files will not download, or media contents are incompatible with the computer in the
presentation room. Always have a backup plan in case of technical difficulties. As you develop your
speech and visual aids, think through what you will do if you cannot show a particular graph or if
your presentation slides are garbled. Your beautifully prepared chart may be superior to the verbal
description you can provide. However, your ability to provide a succinct verbal description when
technology fails will give your audience the information they need and keep your speech moving
forward.

External Distractions
Unfortunately, one thing that you can’t control during your speech is audience etiquette, but you can
decide how to react to it. Inevitably, an audience member will walk in late, a cell phone will ring, or
a car alarm will go off outside. If you are interrupted by external events like these, it is often useful
and sometimes necessary to pause and wait so that you can regain the audience’s attention. Whatever
the event, maintain your composure. Do not get upset or angry about these glitches. If you keep your
cool and quickly implement a “plan B” for moving forward, your audience will be impressed.

Reading Your Audience

Recognizing your audience’s mood by observing their body language can help you adjust your
message and see who agrees with you, who doesn’t, and who is still deciding. With this information,
you can direct your attention—including eye contact and questions—to the areas of the room where
they can have the most impact. As the speaker, you are conscious that you are being observed. But
your audience members probably don’t think of themselves as being observed, so their body language
will be easy to read.

Handling Q&A

Question-and-answer sessions can be trickier to manage than the presentation itself. You can prepare
for and rehearse the presentation, but audience members could ask a question you hadn’t considered
or don’t know how to answer. There are three important elements to think about when incorporating
Q&As as part of your presentation:

1. Audience Expectations
At the beginning of your speech, give the audience a little bit of information about who you are and
what your expertise on the subject is. Once they know what you do (and what you know), it will be
easier for the audience to align their questions with your area of expertise—and for you to bow out
of answering questions that are outside of your area.
2. Timing of Q&As
Questions are easier to manage when you are expecting them. Unless you are part of a panel, meeting,
or teleconference, it is probably easier to let the audience know that you will take questions at the end
of your presentation. This way you can avoid interruptions to your speech that can distract you and
cause you to lose time. If audience members interrupt during your talk, you can then ask them politely
to hold on to their questions until the Q&A session at the end.

3. Knowing How to Respond

Never pretend that you know the answer to a question if you don’t. The audience will pick up on it!
Instead, calmly apologize and say that the question is outside of the scope of your knowledge but that
you’d be happy to find out after the presentation (or, suggest some resources where the person could
find out for themselves). If you are uncertain about how to answer a question, say something like
“That’s really interesting. Could you elaborate on that?” This will make the audience member feel
good because they have asked an interesting question, and it will give you a moment to comprehend
what they are asking. Sometimes presenters rush to answer a question because they are nervous or
want to impress. Pause for a moment, before you begin your answer, to think about what you want to
say. This will help you to avoid misinterpreting the question or taking offense to a question that is
not intended that way.

A final tip is to be cautious about how you answer so that you don’t offend your audience. You are
presenting on a topic because you are knowledgeable about it, but your audience is not. It is important
not to make the audience feel inferior because there are things that they don’t know. Avoid comments
such as “Oh, yes, it’s really easy to do that…” Instead, say something like “Yes, that can be tricky. I
would recommend…” Also, avoid a bossy tone. For example, phrase your response with “What I find
helpful is…” rather than “What you should do is…”

Summary
Good presentation skills are important to successfully communicate ideas in business. Make sure your
presentation has a clear topic with relevant supporting details. Use verbal and non-verbal
communication techniques to make your presentation engaging, and don’t forget to practice!
What is the Importance of Using Visuals When Giving a Presentation?

April 8, 2020

While preparation and delivery are critical components of a successful presentation, the
visuals you use throughout your presentation are equally important. Science and research
suggest that nearly 75% of learning occurs through sight, which is why visuals are a
necessary tool for effective presentations. When used properly, visual aids can help your
audience connect to the topic and understand its message. There are many types of visual
aids including slideshows, videos, handouts, and props, all of which can help reinforce your
main message. Here are a few reasons why visuals play such a significant role in
presentations.

Enhance Your Presentation

Listening to a speaker talk for a lengthy period of time is enough to put anyone to sleep.
Visuals help to add that extra element of interest to the presentation. No matter the topic,
you can always make it more interesting with visuals. Visual aids help to grab the audience’s
attention by enabling them to see colourful representations of your message.

Maintain Audience Attention

In a world where just about everyone has a cell phone or tablet with them at all times, it can
be extremely difficult to capture and maintain people’s attention. With the swipe of a finger
they can be checking emails, browsing the web, or checking sports scores so it’s incredibly
important to do everything you can to capture their attention. High quality visuals can
significantly increase the chances of your audience paying attention to you rather than
staring at their phone.

Images Help People Understand

When you throw mountains of text at your audience, it can be nearly impossible for them to
understand the material. Images are important because they help to clarify your points. Our
brains process images much faster than text, meaning that the best way to help your
audience understand the material is through visual aids.

Visuals Help with Long-Term Memory

Visual images make a long-lasting impression on our minds, increasing the chances that
your audience will remember the information. Research shows that the combination of
visuals along with text increases one’s ability to remember the information for a longer period
of time. If you want audiences to remember your material long after your presentation ends,
it’s best to incorporate some good visuals.

Visuals Can Inspire

The ultimate goal of any presentation is to inspire your audience. You want them to take
something away from your presentation and actually do something with the information you
give them. Visuals resonate with people in a way that text and words alone cannot. Great
visuals have the power to move people and inspire them.

(adapted from https://www.presentationtraininginstitute.com/)

Bruce R. Gabrielle

Speaking PowerPoint
The new language of business
The business leader's guide to boardroom-style slides

Insights Publishing, 2010

 

The New Language of

21st Century Business

I  ,     named Andrew applied to Arizona State University
for a football scholarship. ASU students on the scholarship committee were divided into three
groups and each was given the hopeful Andrew’s high school football statistics.
The first group rated Andrew’s application 4.5 out of 7; the second group rated it 5 and the third
group rated it 6. All of the groups were made up of similar students, and each student evaluated
the exact same statistics. But something was different about the application the third group saw
and rated so highly.

1
2 SPEAKING POWERPOINT

What was it about the application that made group three more likely to approve it? And is it
something you can use the next time you propose a new business idea? Or when you’re coaching
your team on how to convince another department to support your project? Or when you’re selling
a consulting engagement to a new client?
All three groups saw the same statistics, but each group saw them in a different format. The
first group saw the data as a table in a text document. The second group saw it as a chart in a text
document. The third group saw the data as an animated chart in a PowerPoint slide.

This study was conducted by three ASU researchers, including Professor Robert Cialdini, author
of the book Influence. After seeing the results, he repeated the study with three groups of sports
fans used to reading a player’s statistics and found the same results. What he learned so impressed
him, he resolved to use PowerPoint more in his own consulting work.
You hold in your hands a book that will change the way you think about driving business
decisions in the 21st century. Using the old rules is like selling ideas to groups 1 and 2. But when
you learn how to use the new tools effectively, it will be like selling ideas to group 3.
Fast forward six years. In 2006, I was a senior marketing manager at Microsoft leading a global
brand advertising campaign for Windows Mobile smartphones. If I had known of this study, and
other studies you’ll read about in this book, I would have sold my ideas differently.
At the time, our ad campaign was focused on business professionals who needed to check
email on their phones when they were travelling. I uncovered a segment of email users we were not
focused on, a group much larger than the mobile professionals, and told my manager about this
surprising market.
At the meeting, I showed her my findings in a table, just like the one seen by group 1 of the ASU
study. And like that group’s lukewarm reaction, my manager did not agree with my recommendation
to divert some of our multi-million dollar campaign to this new segment. She couldn’t see this
audience as potential email users.

Images used in this book can be seen in color at www.speakingppt.com

 CHAPTER 1: THE NEW LANGUAGE OF 21ST CENTURY BUSINESS 3

Later that summer, a young MBA intern independently discovered the same audience. He also
recommended directing some of our massive advertising budget, but rather than show his idea as
a table, he made a colorful and slick-looking bubble chart in PowerPoint, illustrating with the size
of the bubbles this untapped audience was larger than the mobile professional audience. Soon,
Microsoft meeting rooms were buzzing with this discovery. The elegant bubble chart helped people
see things his way.
A few months later, RIM released the Blackberry Pearl, a stylish email device aimed at young,
trendy hipsters. RIM had seen the same audience we had seen, but they were able to move faster.

Winning in the idea marketplace

Businesses are idea marketplaces where business managers compete for attention, budget and
headcount by selling their ideas. Successful business managers, those rewarded with promotions,
teams and bigger budgets, are the people who know how to sell their ideas effectively.
PowerPoint is no longer just a visual aid for presenters. In fact, more and more companies are
shifting to PowerPoint and away from text for day-to-day business documents. PowerPoint has
become one of the business leader’s most important tools for winning in the idea marketplace.
How important? Increasingly, strategic discussions begin as PowerPoint decks, are circulated
among stakeholders for input and come to represent the consensus view. Since major strategic
decisions usually involve a presentation to executives, it makes sense for these strategies to begin
life as PowerPoint decks.
In March 2010, Sarah Kaplan of the University of Toronto released a paper entitled PowerPoint
and Strategy. She observed how one technology company used PowerPoint to drive strategy and
concluded that PowerPoint had become not only the document that chronicles business decisions,
but the battleground where new ideas advance, warring ideas duel, and champions prevail. Those
who knew how to use PowerPoint effectively wielded an advantage over their peers.
PowerPoint has three central roles for driving strategic decisions, says Kaplan:

1. PowerPoint facilitates collaboration. The slides externalize assumptions, often through

diagrams, where they can be debated and discussed leading to consensus. PowerPoint is
modular, so one department can insert a few slides and so contribute to an ongoing discussion.
2. PowerPoint makes ideas “real”. Ideas rattling around in someone’s mind, or even composed
in a text document, have not gone through the collaborative process of discussion and
debate. More than that, as the ASU study shows, PowerPoint just makes ideas seem more
credible. PowerPoint formalizes and legitimizes ideas.
3. If you control the deck, you control strategy. Important strategic recommendations always
culminate in a presentation to senior management and represent the stakeholders’ consensus
4 SPEAKING POWERPOINT

view. If your slide is not included in the final presentation, it is not considered by management
and does not influence strategy.

In her report, Kaplan told of one manager, newly promoted to team leader, who rushed to
prepare a PowerPoint deck for an important meeting. But the meeting stalled and a decision could
not be reached because of his ad-hoc PowerPoint style. That manager lamented later that his lack
of PowerPoint skills damaged his reputation as a leader.
PowerPoint, used well, can be your secret weapon to winning in the idea marketplace. First
of all, as I’ll demonstrate throughout this book, visual communication is a superior way to drive
strategic decisions. Whether convincing others with a standup presentation, or standalone reading,
visual communication is more effective than text.
Second, visuals lead to more productive decision making meetings because they externalize
assumptions where they can be evaluated, debated and modified. And visuals help to depersonalize
conflict because attention becomes focused on a shared visual rather than directed at other speakers.
Researchers at the University of Lugano, Switzerland found that visuals lead to more productive
meetings. Conflict in those meetings is more likely to be amicable, focused on strategic issues and
based on finding a common ground. In contrast, when visuals were not used assumptions remained
hidden and conflicts were more likely to be resolved through argument and personality clashes.
PowerPoint, used well, focuses discussions outward and leads to more productive meetings.
Third, visuals help executives understand complex problems and make better decisions. There
is more data available than ever before, and more tools available on business managers’ computers
for analyzing that data. Displaying that data is done most effectively through charts and diagrams.
Executives live in a world of complexity and information overload, and time is a scarce resource.
Clearly showing complex information to executives makes best use of that scarce resource.
The shift to PowerPoint from text documents makes sense, given the complex environments of
many businesses. And, in theory, it should lead to the best ideas winning in the idea marketplace.
But in practice, PowerPoint is not used effectively often enough. Too often it seems that good
ideas are passed over while obviously flawed ideas find sponsors, only because this flawed idea is
easier to understand, more persuasive and rolls off the tongue more easily.
Business leaders who want the best ideas to survive in the idea marketplace want their people
to know how to use PowerPoint effectively. Executives who sponsor weak strategies will be at a
disadvantage when they face tougher competitors powered by strong strategies. Executives who want
the best ideas to be recognized and supported will want their managers to know how to compete in
the idea marketplace. Those who develop the 21st century skills to use these new tools effectively
will have an advantage in the idea marketplace as well as the broader global marketplace.
This all points to an important conclusion: PowerPoint is not just software for presentations,
but the new language of business and a critical business skill. Said Clarke L. Caywood, associate
professor of integrated marketing at Northwestern University in a January 2003 Chicago Tribune

Images used in this book can be seen in color at www.speakingppt.com

 CHAPTER 1: THE NEW LANGUAGE OF 21ST CENTURY BUSINESS 5

article, “No one in business today could pretend to be facile in business communications without
PowerPoint. It’s like being able to read.”
This is a book about competing in the idea marketplace by explaining ideas clearly, persuasively
and simply enough that they can spread. In the 20th century, we’ve used a certain set of tools, the
same tools used to sell ideas to groups 1 and 2 of the ASU experiment. But the new 21st century
tools, the tools used to convince group 3, can increase your odds of spreading ideas and winning
in the idea marketplace.
Business communication has changed forever. In the 20th century, typical business communication
happened through text documents, fax machines, phone calls and standup presentations with a
few expensive visual aids. That era is fading away along with eight-track cassettes, drive-in movie
theaters and Cabbage Patch Dolls.
Increasingly, effective business communication is visual. Those who master visual communication
will be more effective driving business strategy in the idea marketplace. This is not a fad, but a
fundamental shift that businesses and business schools are learning they need to embrace.

The secret to selling ideas in the boardroom

While the technology has changed, one thing hasn’t changed: the way people think. In the end,
all success depends on changing human behavior: buy my product, invest in my business, approve
my proposal. Winning in the idea marketplace means understanding how the human brain works;
what makes ideas more understandable, more persuasive and more memorable.

To start, let’s take a look at an elementary classroom where two groups of third grade students
are reading the same storybook. When they have finished reading, they take a test to see how many
facts they can remember and what they think will happen next in the story. Group 1 does well
remembering facts and guessing what will happen next. But group 2 remembers twice as many
facts and is twice as good predicting what happens next.
6 SPEAKING POWERPOINT

What makes group 2 understand the story so much better than group 1? Is it a technique you
could use to help make your ideas more clear?
Or let’s look over the shoulders of university students at the University of Minnesota, listening
to a speaker trying to encourage them to attend a workshop on time management. One group of
students leaves the room less likely to attend the workshop than when they came into the room.
Another group leaves the room more likely to attend the workshop. What did the second group see
that the first group didn’t?
Or let’s go back to 1984, when students at a major U.S. Midwestern university were asked
to view Yellow Page advertisements for several common industries: plumbing, automotive repair,
construction and so on. They were then asked to recall all the companies that fit into each category.
They were not told in advance they would need to remember. One group remembered nearly twice
as many companies as the other group.
Two times better recall? What technique can make twice as many people remember your idea?
The difference in all of the studies mentioned above was the use of visual imagery. Among the
elementary students, group 2 was asked to visualize what was happening in the story while group
1 was just asked to remember it. Among the University of Minnesota students, they became more
interested in the workshop when the speaker’s presentation included visuals. And it was the Yellow
Page ads with words and pictures together, rather than words alone, that students found twice as
easy to remember.
This is called the picture-superiority effect and has been well-known for at least 40 years. Advertisers
know pictures make you more likely to notice, read and recall their advertisements. Instructional
designers also know students learn better when pictures are part of the class materials.
Why do pictures make ideas easier to understand, easier to agree with and easier to remember
later? The answer, according to some, is that most people, if not all people, think in pictures. Th ink
of anything—the White House, Mariah Carey, the San Diego Chargers—and an image pops into
your head.
For instance, neuroscientists using brain scanners report that when we read a novel we are
actively converting sentences into pictures. You may be familiar with this phenomenon, reading
a story of a pair of convicts being chased by dogs through the woods at night you can probably
conjure up images of their panicked expressions and the thick branches tearing at their orange
jumpsuits while they race away from the rising sounds of yelping hounds in the distance. You can
see all this in your head.
A 1989 U.S. study had fifth grade students read poems aloud. Researchers stopped them along
the way to ask if they had an image in their minds, and 60% of the time the students did.
Why does an image pop into your head? Can you understand and reason without the picture
in your head?

Images used in this book can be seen in color at www.speakingppt.com

 CHAPTER 1: THE NEW LANGUAGE OF 21ST CENTURY BUSINESS 7

Aristotle, one of the great thinkers of all time, said images were necessary for thought. He wrote
in On The Soul, “To the thinking soul images serve as if they were contents of perception…that is
why the soul never thinks without an image.”
Rudolf Anheim expounded on this theme in the book Visual Thinking, saying without pictures
there is nothing for the mind to work with. He said further that seeing and thinking are the same
function. “There is no basic difference…between what happens when a person looks at the world
directly and when he sits with his eyes closed and thinks.”
This is a remarkable statement! Our brain uses the same process to see the world as it uses to
think about it? What does the brain science have to say about this?
Scientists were amazed to find that the area of the brain responsible for processing visual
information—the visual cortex—is also active when we are thinking. This means that there is more
than one way to project an image in our mind: pictures can come from outside through our eyes,
but pictures can also come from inside the brain, using our imagination. Our brain does use the
visual system to think.
Think about the metaphors you use to describe understanding. Do you see what I mean? Look at
it this way? I don’t think we see eye to eye on this. I can’t quite picture it. What’s your view? What’s
your perspective? What’s your outlook? What’s your vision? Isn’t it amazing to realize we use words
that describe seeing when we mean thinking and understanding?
Brain science is difficult because one cannot see what is happening in the brain. Thinking is
an invisible process, so it’s difficult to prove this theory conclusively.
But here is an experiment I use in my workshops to test the theory. Make a list of five things
you want for your birthday. But if the thing you are writing down pops into your mind as an
image, you must strike it from your list. You can only write down things that you cannot see in
your mind. Go ahead, give it a try. Put down this book, get a pen and write out five things you
want for your birthday.

1. _________________________________________
2. _________________________________________
3. _________________________________________
4. _________________________________________
5. _________________________________________

Were you able to write out five things? How often did you have to cross items off your list
because they popped into your head as images?
When I run this workshop exercise, people sit stock still in their seats, battling the impulse to
imagine. They end up writing and striking out items constantly.
8 SPEAKING POWERPOINT

When they are done, I ask if they were able to complete the exercise. Many cannot; they aren’t
able to suppress images from coming to mind. Others are able to list five things. But when I ask,
“Is this a good list? Is this what you really, really want?” they concede it’s not a great list; it was a
Herculean mental effort just to suppress the images.
Professor Richard Mayer, author of Multi-Media Learning, has conducted dozens of empirical
studies showing university student remember more and understand better when they learn from words
and images rather than words alone. Mayer postulates that words are processed in one part of the brain,
images in another, and they are integrated together at the end to create meaning. When one or the other
is missing, the brain has difficulty with the integration step and some of the meaning is not retained.
But this theory is controversial because some people report they do not see images in their head.
Instead, they see words. Or they report seeing nothing at all.
Data on the number of picture thinkers versus word thinkers is slim. Research in the Netherlands
by Linda Kreger Silverman finds 30% of the Dutch population thinks primarily in pictures, 25%
thinks primarily in words and 45% thinks in both. Only a minority of the word-thinkers think
exclusively in words, suggesting a vast majority think in pictures at least some of the time. Albert
Einstein, for one, insisted he only thought in pictures and not in words.
If it’s true that most of your audience thinks in pictures, you can encourage them to see things
your way if you give them the picture.

A lack of skills and training

At this point you may be convinced you would be more effective at winning in the idea marketplace
if you could use visuals. But PowerPoint? There are so few examples of good PowerPoint and many
arguments against it: I’ve seen what people can do with PowerPoint. And most of it is awful.
And you may be correct that most PowerPoint is awful. But does it have to be? Couldn’t it be
better with better visual communication skills?
Despite its important role in strategy-making, most business managers do not know how to
communicate clearly through PowerPoint. They struggle to create coherent slides, often turning to
ornamentation to dress up otherwise unimpressive slides. If PowerPoint is so important in business,
then where is the training?
It is not offered in business schools. Corporations offer training on the mechanics of PowerPoint
but not on how to communicate complex information effectively. There are books on how to use
PowerPoint for stand-up presentations but not for collaborating with colleagues to shape strategy
and for boardroom presentations to drive complex business decisions.
There is no doubt we need better PowerPoint skills for driving smarter strategic decisions.
PowerPoint’s critics have been plentiful and vocal.
One of PowerPoint’s most-quoted critics is Edward Tufte, a Yale professor and author of several
pioneering books on information display. Tufte’s The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint knocked the

Images used in this book can be seen in color at www.speakingppt.com

 CHAPTER 1: THE NEW LANGUAGE OF 21ST CENTURY BUSINESS 9

software because it “reduces the analytic quality of serious presentations.” He continued the criticism
in a Wired Magazine article entitled “PowerPoint is Evil” where he compared PowerPoint to a drug
that is supposed to make you beautiful but instead makes you stupid.
Like Tufte, military leaders also argue that serious decisions are made with crudely constructed
slides consisting of clip art and sound effects that over-simplify complex issues.
In July 2009 a senior officer in Israel’s defense ministry, Brigadier General Erez Weiner,
blasted the use of PowerPoint, saying “I believe the use of presentations has made the level of
discussion, and the depth of study, more superficial.” And in the U.S., Retired Marine Colonel
T.X. Hammes continued the attack, saying PowerPoint “is actively hostile to thoughtful decision
making” because of its over-reliance on half-formed bullet point thoughts. Former U.S. Marine
Sgt. David Goldich didn’t pull any punches when he said, “PowerPoint has largely become
affirmative action for the inarticulate.”
Educators also debate PowerPoint’s merits. José A. Bowen, a dean at Southern Methodist
University, attracted national attention in 2009 when he advised his faculty to teach naked. What
he meant was without PowerPoint, saying professors are using it “as a crutch rather than using it
as a creative tool.”
In business, PowerPoint is derided through editorial cartoons in business magazines, mocking
YouTube videos, online satires showing the Gettysburg address as a PowerPoint deck, and by self-
proclaimed presentation experts. It’s hard to find the PowerPoint supporters.
Most of the criticism is aimed at the thoughtless use of PowerPoint, and especially following
the defaults that encourage bullet points and artless use of color and clip art. The criticism tends
to fall into four categories:

1. Unclear messages, especially an over-reliance on half-formed thoughts delivered as bullet

points, or unclear slide organization without a central message.
2. Incoherent slides jammed with information that overwhelms the reader.
3. Amateurish slides that elevate form over content, often caused by over-enthusiastic use of
clip art, colors, effects and animations that buries the message in ornamentation.
4. Inappropriate use of slides during presentations, such as reading bulleted lists to the audience.

The most common defense is that the user, not the software, is to blame. The poor carpenter
always blames his tools.
If people are using PowerPoint wrong, then what’s the right way? Where are the classes? Where
are the textbooks? Where are the answers to the critics’ arguments?
They are in this book. Let’s discuss all four concerns, and the skills that answer those concerns.
14 SPEAKING POWERPOINT

Section Three: Design

While creating your slide, you need to decide what you want to highlight. If everything is
important, then nothing is important, and the reader has to spend extra time trying to prioritize the
information on your slide. You can make it easy for the reader to see things your way by directing
their attention.
We cover the brain science behind attention, and especially the impact of color and decorative
elements. We especially spend time on charts, one of the most common visuals used in business.
We’ll learn why the default settings in programs like Microsoft Office Excel may actually hurt
your ability to compete in the idea marketplace, and suggest a process for taking control of your
business graphs.

The Mindworks Method does not depend on artistic skills. I’m writing this book assuming
you will never be a good graphic designer and don’t aspire to be one. I have a lot of admiration for
those who can whip up gorgeous slides with lovely color and perfect placement. But that’s not me.
I assume most people in business, and most people reading this book, are like me—smart but not
very artistic. This book was written for you.

Summary
1. PowerPoint is a critical business skill. PowerPoint has moved beyond being just presentation
software and is now a critical tool for driving strategy in large companies. Businesses are
idea marketplaces and selling ideas requires knowing how to communicate effectively with
PowerPoint.
2. PowerPoint uses the power of visual thinking to make ideas clearer and more persuasive.
This has been proven over the past 40 years and is called the picture-superiority effect. But
business managers have not been trained how to communicate visually.
3. PowerPoint has not made it into the training curriculum of business schools or most
corporate training rooms. What training exists is for simple slides that will be presented
to a large audience, not for displaying complex data in a boardroom. The critics note four
problems with our skills today: unclear message, incoherent slides, amateurish design and
using slides poorly during presentations.
4. The Mindworks Method attempts to close the skill gap for business managers and address
the critics’ concerns. Based on cognitive science, it describes the most proven and effective
strategies for communicating clearly and persuasively in business. There are three stages:
craft a clear story, create coherent slides and use graphic design to organize information
and improve aesthetics.

Images used in this book can be seen in color at www.speakingppt.com