I saw a presentation hijacked yesterday because a well-meaning assistant decided to hand out material right in the middle of the speech. What happened? The audience stopped listening, talked among themselves, ruffled paper, and then perused the handout rather than listening to the presenter. Disaster!
Also if you give the audience a handout prior to your talk they will spend the entire time flipping through rather than listening. And...importantly....they may get to your conclusion before you do on stage.
A better idea is something I witnessed a while back: The presenter started his presentation saying, "I know you want to take notes and that's fine, however everything that I talk about today, including my PowerPoint, cheat sheets and notes will be emailed to your address by the end of the day. That way you can save a digital copy if you wish and print off the parts that you'll find helpful." So what happened there? Everyone sat forward and listened, asked questions and participated.
0 comments:
Post a Comment