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78 views174 pages

(Ebook) Scientists Must Speak, Second Edition by Walters, D. Eric Walters, Gale C ISBN 9781439826041, 1439826048 2025 Download Now

Educational material: (Ebook) Scientists Must Speak, Second Edition by Walters, D. Eric; Walters, Gale C ISBN 9781439826041, 1439826048 Available Instantly. Comprehensive study guide with detailed analysis, academic insights, and professional content for educational purposes.

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second edition

scientists
must speak
second edition

scientists
must speak
D. ER ic walters gale c. walter s

Boca Raton London New York

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Contents

Preface xiii
Introduction xv
It begins with attitude! xv
Why does it matter? xv
When do I need these skills? xvi
How can I improve? xvii
What will this book do for me? xviii
Some key messages from the introduction xviii

Part I
Preparation 1

1 Target your talk 3


Introduction 3
Who is your audience? 4
What brings them together? 4
Ask questions about the audience in advance 5
How technical is this audience? 5
What does the audience want from this presentation? 6
What do you want to accomplish? 7
Learn from the experts 8
How can you meet your listeners’ needs and accomplish
your goals? 9
A brief, dynamic introduction to your presentation 10
Your regard for the audience 10
Your obvious enthusiasm for the topic 11
v
vi Contents

Emphasis on significant conclusions 11


Words that reach every person in the audience 12
Minimize details about techniques and methods 13
A succinct, clear summary and reiteration
of the take-home message 14
Allow 5 to 10 minutes for questions 15
Summary 15
Exercises 16

2 Organize your presentation 19


Introduction 19
Five formulas for structuring the presentation 19
Introduction–body–conclusion formula…
­or tell, tell, tell 19
The introduction 20
The body 21
The conclusion 23
Transitions 24
Four other formulas for organizing your presentation 25
Question and answer 25
AIDA 25
Borden’s ho-hum method 26
The motivated sequence 27
Collecting, arranging, and focusing your ideas 28
Outlining 29
Mind mapping 30
Start at the end and work backward 32
Storyboards 34
Revising and refining your talk 34
Flow 35
Zing 36
Timing 37
Summary 38
Some key messages from this chapter 39
Exercises 39
Contents vii

3 Visual aids 41
Introduction 41
What should and should not be in a visual aid 41
Types of visual aids 42
Advantages and disadvantages
of different kinds of visual aids 43
Projection technologies 43
Write as you go 46
Models or products 47
Handouts 48
Designing and preparing visual aids 49
Presentation software makes it easy—too easy? 49
Layout 50
Using text on your visual aids 51
Graphs and drawings 51
Special effects 54
Using visual aids 55
Summary 57
Some key messages from this chapter 58
Exercise 58

4 Practice, practice, practice 59


Introduction 59
Let the words flow 59
Watch your timing 61
What about notes? 61
Get feedback 62
Integrate your visual aids 63
Get comfortable with your setting 64
And now for something really scary… 64
Summary 65
Some key messages from this chapter 65
Exercises 65
Speaker evaluation guidelines and checklist 66
viii Contents

Part I I
Delivery 67
5 Take control of the situation 69
Introduction 69
Before you start talking 70
Check the room setup 70
Talk to the people who arrive early 70
Take a few moments for mental preparation
and relaxation 71
Have your opening sentences firmly in mind 71
As you begin talking 71
Have we been introduced? 72
What should they expect from you? 73
What do you expect from them? 73
Throughout your presentation 73
Attitude 73
Make eye contact 74
Watch the time 76
Give a strong ending and then stop talking 76
Summary 76
Some key messages from this chapter 77
Exercise 77

6 Voice and language 79


Introduction 79
Voice 79
Volume 79
Pacing 81
Vocal variety 82
Language 84
Choice of words 84
Pronunciation 86
Back to Babel 86
Language issues—you are not speaking
your native language 87
Language issues—members of your audience
are not native speakers of your language 88
Contents ix

Summary 89
Some key messages from this chapter 89
Exercises 89

7 Body language and gestures 91


Introduction 91
First impressions 91
The importance of nonverbal communication 92
Facial expression 92
Posture 93
What to do with hands and arms 94
More ways to be interesting to watch! 95
Summary 95
Some key messages from this chapter 96
Exercise 96

8 Handling question-and-answer sessions 97


Introduction 97
Tell everyone what the rules are 97
How to handle questions 98
How to handle hostile questions and questioners 100
Think about your audience 102
Summary 102
Some key messages from this chapter 103
Exercise 103

Part II I
Special situations 105

9 When the unexpected happens 107


Introduction 107
Extemporaneous speaking 107
When the extemporaneous situation strikes 107
Can you practice for an extemporaneous talk? 108
The job interview as an extemporaneous situation 109
x Contents

When crisis strikes 110


Stay calm 110
Plan ahead 110
Deal with the situation as directly as possible 111
Summary 111
Some key messages from this chapter 111
Exercise 112

10 Adapting material from one situation to another 113


Introduction 113
What has changed? 113
Adapting written material to an oral presentation 114
Adapting a talk from one audience to another 115
Adapting a long presentation to a shorter one 118
Summary 118
Some key messages from this chapter 119
Exercises 119
Adapting material: a checklist 119

11 Organizing a program with several speakers 121


Introduction 121
Coordinating the messages 121
Choosing the speakers 122
How many? 122
Symposium program 122
Technical sales program 122
Departmental seminar program 123
Organization 123
Chairing a program 125
In preparation 125
How to introduce a speaker 125
Running the show 126
After the show is over 127
Summary 128
Contents xi

Some key messages from this chapter 128


Exercise 128

Concluding remarks 129


The speaker’s bookshelf 130

Index 133
Preface

Eight years have passed since the publication of the first edition of
Scientists Must Speak. We are delighted that so many have found
our book useful, and we want to make sure that the book contin-
ues to be relevant. The most dramatic change over the last 8 years
has been in presentation software and computer projection. What
was once a risky endeavor, beset with glitches and incompatibili-
ties, has become quite routine. It has also produced more options
to consider when preparing a presentation and more details to
which to attend. In light of this development, Chapter 3 has been
completely rewritten.
The reason for the book’s existence remains the same. In
face-to-face discussions, scientists and other technical people
invariably radiate fascination and excitement about their subject
matter, but that enthusiasm often fails to come out in formal oral
presentation. We passionately believe that the cutting-edge sci-
ence, discoveries, and breakthroughs that will shape our future
should never produce deadly serious recitations when presented
to an audience.
Most of the books about oral presentation skills are aimed
squarely at business and salespeople. Even those few books tar-
geted toward scientific presentation sometimes seem a little too
subdued. We want to show you how to present your technical sub-
ject matter in a way that not only projects your scientific credibility
and rigor but also shares with your listener the passion you feel for
your work.

xiii
Introduction

It begins with attitude!

Why are so many technical presentations so dull? There are several


reasons. When you speak on a scientific or technical subject, your
presentations must be precise. The data, equations, graphs, chemical
structures, diagrams, blueprints, or formulas that might be neces-
sary to support your key points must be accurate. The presentation
must cover material that a lay audience might consider esoteric. You
will have to use words that are not part of everyday conversation.
As a professional, you want your listeners to take you seriously.
Does this mean that your talk is destined to be boring and lifeless?
Absolutely not! Presumably, there is a reason why you are inter-
ested in the topic to be discussed. Why did you choose to study
this subject? Why did you work on this project for the last 3 years?
Something about the topic got you interested and excited. The key
is for you, the speaker, to convey that excitement to your listeners.
If you can get your listeners to feel the same enthusiasm that you
do about your subject, your presentation will come to life!

Why does it matter?

In your scientific or technical career, you probably spend only


a small percentage of your time in formal speaking situations.
However, these situations can have a tremendous impact on your
career. If you speak well, you enhance your credibility. If you com-
municate clearly, you increase your visibility within your organiza-
tion and in the larger professional community. Good presentation
skills can show others why your work is important or exciting.
xv
xvi Introduction

An oral presentation is interactive, providing immediate opportu-


nity for you to clear up questions or misunderstandings about your
work. Best of all, you have the opportunity to make your work
come to life for the listener. People will be much more influenced
by your 20-minute description of your research than by your
20-page paper on the same subject.

When do I need these skills?

In addition to the occasional formal presentation, you will find


numerous other situations where speaking skills increase your
effectiveness. Do you update your supervisor on your progress at
departmental or research group meetings? Do you present in-house
seminars or lead journal club discussions? Are you preparing for
a thesis defense? Are you involved in teaching or training? It is
particularly important to be able to communicate technical work
to people who do not have highly technical backgrounds. You may
have to gain support for your project from a corporate vice presi-
dent or a research foundation or calm customers’ fears about the
safety of one of your company’s products; you may be invited to
speak to a junior high school science class.
Many speaking opportunities call upon you to talk about your
work informally and without preparation. Do you do technical
sales or support work? Do you talk about your work with your
colleagues over lunch? Do you ever interview for a new posi-
tion, either inside or outside your current organization? Suppose
the vice president of Research and Development drops by with
a visitor and asks you to tell the guest about your project. You
must be able to describe concisely what you do and explain why
it is important and exciting. You must also quickly assess your
listener’s level of comprehension and choose the appropriate
level of detail. For many people, this is an intimidating situa-
tion. If you have practiced your speaking skills, you will find
such a situation far less stressful. It becomes an opportunity to
make a favorable impression, not only on your visitor but also
on your boss.
In all situations, if you are an effective communicator, you greatly
enhance your professional image. Unfortunately, the converse is
true: An excellent technical professional who cannot communicate
ideas may hide his or her talents and fail to be taken seriously.
Introduction xvii

How can I improve?

The first step in becoming a better speaker is really simple: You


must decide that you want to be better. Once you have made this
decision, you will look at speaking situations in a completely dif-
ferent light. If you sincerely want to communicate with your audi-
ence, your sincerity will show, and sincerity alone goes a long way
toward getting the audience on your side.
Another change takes place when you consciously decide to become
a better speaker. You begin to notice the strengths and weaknesses of
other speakers. You pay attention to the techniques that contribute
to clear, informative talks. You notice things that detract from good
communication. This is a hidden benefit of working on your speak-
ing skills: You will never have to be bored during a speech again!
If the topic of the talk is not interesting to you, you can study the
speaker’s presentation skills. What is being done well? What could
be improved? Is the material well organized? Do the visual aids sup-
port the message? Has the speaker chosen clear language? You can
learn something from every speaker to whom you listen! It’s also an
excellent opportunity to support the development of other speakers.
After a presentation, if you are in a position to have a private
conversation with the speaker, praise specific aspects of a presen-
tation that you appreciated. If you can identify what would have
helped you enjoy the presentation even more, you may consider
offering constructive suggestions as well. For instance, suggesting
that a particular slide might have carried more impact if it were
divided into two slides can assist the speaker in reaching the audi-
ence. If you are interested in the business and art of making presen-
tations, your enthusiasm will be contagious. Communication will
improve, and that is desirable for all involved.
To become “you at your best” from a speaking perspective,
you must practice, practice, practice. This means rehearsing your
formal presentations, and it means looking for opportunities to
speak. If you are having difficulty finding opportunities to practice
speaking, find a local chapter of Toastmasters International (www.
toastmasters.org). Toastmasters clubs bring together people from
many different professions with the goal of helping people improve
their speaking skills in a supportive atmosphere. Members practice
giving speeches and they practice giving constructive evaluations of
their fellow members’ speeches. The Toastmasters club is a terrific
forum for beginners and experts to build their speaking skills.
xviii Introduction

What will this book do for me?

This book resulted from our experiences with scientific presenta-


tion situations in corporate and academic settings. We have had the
good fortune to learn from many excellent teachers and speakers.
We have also learned a great deal in recent years from working
with students in our course, “The Art of Scientific Presentation.”
We videotape our students’ presentations on the first and final days
of class; then, we sit with each student to compare the “before” and
“after” presentations. There is always tremendous progress in the
clarity and organization of each talk. More importantly, there is an
obvious change in the confidence of each speaker. Students who are
not native English speakers learn to overcome language barriers
and communicate their points clearly.
This book will show you how to prepare for your presentation
and improve your speaking style. It will help you to prepare good
visual aids and use them effectively. It will describe ways to over-
come language barriers and deal with stressful situations such as
question-and-answer sessions. It will prepare you to go out and
speak and gain speaking experience.
With experience come confidence and positive comments from
people who have been listening to you. You may even find that you
are invited to speak more often or that people show enthusiasm
when they hear that you are to be the speaker at an event. Soon,
you will find yourself looking forward to speaking opportuni-
ties. You may still experience nervousness, but it will feel more
like excitement and anticipation than dread. It will be especially
gratifying to find that when you work hard to share what you
know with an audience and help them feel your excitement about
the subject, they will enthusiastically share what they know with
you. Your speaking situations will trigger new discussions, new
insights, new collaborations, and new friendships. You will have
become a communicator!

Some key messages from


the introduction

• Your peers will be much more influenced by your 20-minute


description of your research than by your 20-page paper on
the same subject.
Introduction xix

• An excellent technical professional who cannot commu-


nicate ideas may obscure his or her talents and fail to be
taken seriously.
• Your speaking situations will trigger new discussions, new
insights, new collaborations, and new friendships. You will
become a communicator!
Part I

Preparation

This section of the book deals with the preparation you do before
a presentation. These preparation steps are important in making
your presentation clear, but they have another positive result. They
direct your energies away from worrying about yourself and in
the direction of giving something useful to the audience. Focusing
your attention outward is one of the secrets of dealing with “stage
fright” and of putting the audience on your side.
Start your preparation early. Once you start organizing your
talk, you will find out that there are things you need to research.
When you start practicing your presentations, you may discover
that some of your visual aids need to be revised. You may find that
your talk is too long or too short or that it needs to be substantially
modified. If you wait until the last minute, your audience will sense
your lack of preparation and may feel that you are not sincerely
interested in them.
This section contains four chapters. We have chosen the order of
these chapters deliberately. Speakers are often tempted to start with
one or more graphs or pictures showing the key results and then
build a talk around those pictures. We believe it is most important
to go through the targeting process first (Chapter 1). Find out about
your audience and decide what you want to tell them. Targeting
leads you to your key message, which makes the organization pro-
cess (Chapter 2) very easy to do. Third, you can decide what, if
any, visual aids should be prepared to illustrate and support your
talk (Chapter 3). The final step, practice (Chapter 4), will help you
refine your message and will prepare you for your presentation.
Chapter 1

Target your talk

Introduction

If you decide to build a house and you make an appointment


to talk with a builder, does the builder come to the first meet-
ing with truckloads of lumber, concrete, carpet, and roofing? Of
course not! First, the builder has to find out what kind of house
you want. Where will it be built? Will it be a ranch, a split-level,
or a two-story house? How many bedrooms, bathrooms, closets?
Brick exterior or aluminum siding? Decisions have to be made, and
there has to be a plan. It is necessary to know what the target is.
Similarly, if you are planning to give a talk, you have to determine
some things beforehand. To whom are you talking? What is your
audience expecting from you? What do you want the outcome to
be? In short, what is your target? In this chapter, we look at the
following questions:

Who is your audience? What do its members want from this


presentation?
What do you want to accomplish? What is your intended take-
home message for the audience?
How can you meet your listeners’ needs and accomplish your
goals?

Once these questions have been answered, your talk will be much
easier to prepare. You will know what your target is, and your pre-
sentation will become more than simply a recitation of facts.

3
4 Scientists must speak, second edition

Who is your audience?

The first focus should be on your audience. If you can understand


who its members are and what they need, it will be much easier for
you to communicate effectively with them.

What brings them together?


What brings these people together in this place at this time? What
common interests do they have? Are they all members of the same
department or organization? Are they interested in a product or an
idea that you are promoting? Are they evaluating you as a potential
employee or co-worker? Are they hoping to learn something spe-
cific from you? Answering these questions will help you to under-
stand their needs and expectations.
What is the occasion for this presentation? A small weekly
group meeting may lend itself to a very informal style. Your
audience may expect to hear your recent results and may want
to participate in discussion of that work. Such a talk may be
less structured and more interactive. On the other end of the
spectrum, your Nobel Prize acceptance speech may be quite a
formal lecture. The nature of the event will have a bearing on
the style you employ and on the expectations that your audience
brings to your talk. If the audience happens to be your everyday
co-workers or a classroom full of students who have met some
specific prerequisites, it may not be too difficult to assess your
listeners properly.
But other situations may not be so clear-cut. In a job interview
situation, you may be asked in advance to prepare a formal talk
about your previous work, or you may be asked on the spur of the
moment to give a 20-minute discussion of your current project;
you will almost certainly have occasion to talk one on one about
your technical topic. On other occasions you may be invited to
speak to a group whose interests are quite different from yours.
An example would be the computational chemist who was asked
to speak at a conference on applied mathematics. He had always
considered himself to be “just a chemist”; it had not occurred to
him prior to that moment that he was an expert in applied math-
ematics! For each situation, you should assess who your audience
is before you start talking.
Target your talk 5

Ask questions about the audience in advance


How do you get a good understanding of who the audience will be?
The answer is to ask. Ask the person who arranged the event. Ask
the person who invited you to participate. Ask the people who will
be in the audience, ask people who have spoken to this group previ-
ously, ask anyone and everyone who may have any information at
all about your audience. Just as you might ask for a second opinion
before having major surgery, you should ask more than one person
about your audience. You will get a broader perspective and will
have a much clearer picture of who will be listening.
Ask very specific questions. When you ask who will be in the
audience, you may get a nonspecific answer such as, “Oh, just
the engineers in our department.” Ask for names and ask about
their backgrounds. What kinds of engineering are they involved in?
What interests do they have besides engineering? You should also
ask if there will be nontechnical people in the audience. If so, what
will be their reasons for attending?
Ask some more questions about your audience. Find out how
many people are likely to be present. This will help you in your
mental preparation for the event. If you anticipate speaking to
10 people and suddenly face a full auditorium, you may feel over-
whelmed. Conversely, if you expect a big crowd and only a few
people show up, you may feel disappointed; however, you would
certainly not want your disappointment to convey the impression
that you are unhappy about being with those who came.

How technical is this audience?


How much does your audience already know about your topic?
Will they have some prior knowledge of your work? Will they be
familiar with your competitors’ work? Will they have strong opin-
ions on the subject—pro or con? These questions are important in
targeting the technical level of your presentation. If it is too techni-
cal, you lose your audience immediately; if it is too simplistic, you
risk sounding condescending.
It would be easy if audience members all had identical back-
grounds, of course. In reality, you will often have some experts
and some novices in your audience. The key is quickly to review
the basics (without being too simplistic), get everyone to some
6 Scientists must speak, second edition

reasonable level, and then go on from there. It is far more common


for scientific and technical speakers to overestimate the audience’s
familiarity with their subject and to assume everybody knows
the basics because they forget how hard they worked to become
familiar with their topic. You instinctively fear that others know
a lot more than they do. But they’ve all been working hard to get
familiar with their favorite topics—not yours. It is better to err
on the side of starting at a simpler level. Those who are already
very familiar with the material will assume that you are doing this
for the benefit of others who know less than they.

What does the audience want


from this presentation?
Now that you have an idea of who your audience is, it’s time to
look at what listeners want from you. What are their expectations?
What are their needs? Why are they coming to hear you speak? You
may be surprised to learn that they are expecting “a good show”!
According to Carl Sindermann, technical and scientific audi-
ences are basically the same as any theatrical or sports audience.
They have a fundamental interest in the event at hand; they often
have made financial, time, and other sacrifices to be present; and
they expect a professional performance. They could get the facts of
your subject more quickly and accurately by reading your publica-
tions. They are coming because they want to feel your experience,
to know something about you, and to hear your perspective on the
subject. In addition, they may wish to ask questions to clarify their
understanding of your subject.
What are the specific expectations of your audience? A meet-
ing with the manager of the Engineering Department could require
preparation of drawings and succinct reasons or arguments for your
plan. On the same project, the president of the company may only
want to see the budget proposal for the installation of the machin-
ery depicted in the drawings and an overview of the general differ-
ences between the new machinery and what is being replaced.
This brings up another good detail to investigate. Does the audi-
ence expect graphs or other special visual aids or a product dem-
onstration? Imagine the disappointment of the marketing group
if they expect that you are bringing a sample of your latest food
ingredient breakthrough, but instead you bring the formula on a
Target your talk 7

piece of paper. Similarly, if full-color graphs of weekly progress are


customarily used at the Monday meetings, but you throw together
impromptu freehand drawings on a transparency, your presenta-
tion may appear unprofessional. If you are convinced that a depar-
ture from the usual style will be effective, you may need to find a
clever way to introduce your listeners to the new way of present-
ing information.
What is your status likely to be at the presentation? The speaker is
not always the honored guest at a speaking occasion. There are times
when the speaker is expected to sell an idea, a project, or a product.
You might be required to defend a technical or scientific opinion or
you might be asked to provide informed commentary on a contro-
versial topic. Special thought and preparation should be given to the
types of questions that may be asked when the audience is likely to
be uninformed, skeptical, angry, or emotional in some other way.

What do you want to accomplish?

Now it is time to focus on the second question: What do you hope


will happen as a result of your talk? Identify your objectives and be
able to summarize your message in a single, clear sentence. In your
role as a speaker, you have both the opportunity and the responsi-
bility to determine what the take-home message is. Many technical
speakers succumb to the temptation to tell everything they know
about a subject. The key points become buried under a mountain
of detailed descriptions of experimental procedures. The speaker
tries to present as much information as possible, hoping that listen-
ers will select what they want from it. This cafeteria-style approach
usually produces one of the following results:

• Annoyance: what is the point of this talk?


• Bewilderment: what is the point of this talk?
• Boredom: what is the point of this talk?

Certainly, circumstances or occasions may put constraints on


what that message is to be. If you have only 20 minutes to talk
about peptide antibiotics, you can’t afford to spend very much time
reviewing the history of antibiotic discovery. Listeners cannot possi-
bly come away from your 20-minute talk knowing everything about
8 Scientists must speak, second edition

your topic in as much detail as you do. What is the central thing you
want them to remember an hour, a day, or a month after your talk?
What is your take-home message? What do you want your listeners
to know, think, feel, believe, or do as a result of your talk?
This is a particular problem for the young scientist preparing
a presentation for a job interview. You want to show how much
work you did in your research project. But it is much more impres-
sive to give a clear presentation of one aspect of your work. You
can allude to other parts of the project in your introduction and
discuss the rest of your work at other points in the interview pro-
cess. Your audience will really be impressed when they find out you
did more work than you could possibly cover in a 40-minute talk.
Start preparing your presentation by going to the end of it: What
do you want your listener to come away with? Whether the goal of
your talk is to sell, teach, train, inform, persuade, or entertain, it
should be possible to summarize your take-home message in a sin-
gle simple sentence. Practice identifying the key sentence for your
presentations and for other lectures to which you listen. If you are
selling a line of laboratory equipment, your message may be, “the
Cornell line of moisture analyzers will provide increased accuracy
at a lower cost per sample and in one-fourth the time.” In a job
interview presentation, your message might be, “I am a creative,
productive, and persistent experimentalist.”
Of course, you wouldn’t use that as a title of your talk because
that would be too obvious. But if that is the message you really wish
to convey, you can describe your research on earthworm socializa-
tion in ways that show just how creative, productive, and persistent
you were in carrying out that work. The presentation that is built
around a well-chosen message and is strongly supported by a few
significant facts will benefit both speaker and listener. Once you
have a succinct key message, the rest of your task of preparing a
presentation becomes much easier, as you will see in Chapter 2.

Learn from the experts


Presidential debates and other political speeches can teach us a
great deal about preparing for our presentations. In the typical
debate or press conference, it appears that the speaker is able to
talk extemporaneously in response to every question. This is not
really a miracle, though. In reality, the speaker has anticipated
Target your talk 9

most of the topics that are likely to be raised, rather than worrying
about all possible questions on all possible topics.
For each topic, the speaker has committed to memory a specific
message that can be summarized in one sentence. That message
could be something very precise, such as, “I am asking Congress
immediately to pass Bill 963, imposing $1 million fines for toxic
waste dumping.” Or it could be something as light in content as,
“My party continues to stand for traditional values.” It matters
not; whatever the question asked is, the speaker will be able to
construct an answer around the key message, which has been
worked out in advance. The speaker will also probably conclude
the answer with the one-sentence thought that he or she wants the
listeners to remember.
These key messages become the basis for the ubiquitous “sound
bites” that appear on television news programs. If interviewers feel
that they are not getting a real answer and they persist in asking
questions about this topic, the speaker simply uses the opportunity
to repeat and reinforce the key message. Nothing stands in the way
of delivering the key message!
We could look at this as cynical manipulation of the media. But
these speakers know that listeners will not remember long passages
of speech. Instead, they expect that listeners will remember a key
sentence or idea. Effective speakers have worked to identify the
goal of the speaking occasion, to put a key idea into a concise and
memorable form, to build a talk around it, and to highlight and
reinforce that idea throughout the talk. Take the time to identify
the key message with which you want your listeners to go home.
Your presentation will be much more focused and you will be bet-
ter prepared to answer questions in a way that keeps you in control
of the presentation opportunity.

How can you meet your listeners’


needs and accomplish your goals?

Now we have to look at targeting the presentation in such a way


that both you and your listeners will be pleased with the results.
With a little effort, you can usually find a way to make the outcome
quite satisfying for everyone involved. The recipe for any successful
presentation will need to include several ingredients.
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