Every Sunday morning it is my job to train a group of clients who are not motivated to learn the training materials, are quick to give harsh feedback and mostly find the whole exercise boring. Last year I managed to make this group of clients happy and successful and most gave me 5-star reviews! Read on to find out who they were and what I learned from this experience.
Routine meetings like daily standups and planning could be boring. I make minor tweaks to keep people engaged. Not 100% successful yet. I play the cop sometimes and call out randomly "So John, what do you think of what Chaitali just said?" And the most common answer I get is "Sorry, can you repeat that please?" 😂
As I'm in my building stage, I can use 3 Ps, time management and involving audience whenever I give presentation or talk :)
Curious to ask - should we have to be formal or informal (can crack jokes in between, which help us to engage people and they can also enjoy) while presenting or giving a talk. Does it depends on the type of environment or audience?
Thank you for sharing this, Chaitali! definitely helpful content for presentations.
Do you also have any advice on how to keep the content of presentations succinct? I sometimes fall in to trying to present visuals since they may get more attention than just text (and because of the saying that one image is worth a thousand words) but sometimes the image can be interpreted in many ways not intended or it also becomes hard to represent ideas visually.
I personally like visuals over text especially for slides so I definitely recommend that. If you are creating new visuals I've found it useful to ask opinions from a few people to refine them for clarity before the actual presentation. Besides this I've taken courses and follow a few visual artists on LinkedIn to get visual inspiration. Lastly, if there is a chance the presentation will be read offline then I also try to include more information in the speaker notes.
What timing! I was just thinking about this topic earlier today.
I joke that the only time the entire team is paying attention is when it's time to say "Bye"!
Haha yes that's true! Would love to hear your examples of how you make meetings lively.
Routine meetings like daily standups and planning could be boring. I make minor tweaks to keep people engaged. Not 100% successful yet. I play the cop sometimes and call out randomly "So John, what do you think of what Chaitali just said?" And the most common answer I get is "Sorry, can you repeat that please?" 😂
Thanks Chaitali for these valuable tips.
As I'm in my building stage, I can use 3 Ps, time management and involving audience whenever I give presentation or talk :)
Curious to ask - should we have to be formal or informal (can crack jokes in between, which help us to engage people and they can also enjoy) while presenting or giving a talk. Does it depends on the type of environment or audience?
Definitely read your audience! The things mentioned here always apply but your content - jokes or serious - will vary based on the setting.
Thank you for sharing this, Chaitali! definitely helpful content for presentations.
Do you also have any advice on how to keep the content of presentations succinct? I sometimes fall in to trying to present visuals since they may get more attention than just text (and because of the saying that one image is worth a thousand words) but sometimes the image can be interpreted in many ways not intended or it also becomes hard to represent ideas visually.
Thanks Marcos!
I personally like visuals over text especially for slides so I definitely recommend that. If you are creating new visuals I've found it useful to ask opinions from a few people to refine them for clarity before the actual presentation. Besides this I've taken courses and follow a few visual artists on LinkedIn to get visual inspiration. Lastly, if there is a chance the presentation will be read offline then I also try to include more information in the speaker notes.
Hope this helps!