Mike Blechar of Gartner is a powerful speaker. He recently sent me this note after he read one of our Presentation Pointers on the subject of how to point to data on slides.
It seems he has programmed his arm and hand to gesture to slides, which is something that he and I debated years ago. I based my recommendation on the Principles of Cognitive Guidance, one of which stipulates that words and pictures that are contiguous on the slide are more effective than information that is not contiguous. I theorized that a speaker that is interacting with the information he is talking about will get better cognitive outcomes than a speaker who remains at a distance from his slides.
Anyway, after that long intro, here’s Mike’s email to me.
I was presenting to an audience of about 1000 when the lights went out in the hotel (and stayed out for the entire presentation). Rather than waste everyone’s time, I decided to press on with my presentation in the pitch black darkness from memory (and it went pretty well).
But the funny thing was as I was “presenting” by visualizing the sequence of slides in my mind, I found myself hand-pointing in the dark to the screen every time the “slide changed in my mind”.
By hand-pointing, Mike means pointing with his whole hand, not with just one finger.
By the way, this is just one presentation skill that we cover, and a granular one at that. We don’t specialize in the granular mechanics of public speaking. We also craft messages, prepare executives to tell compelling stories, and develop presence and authenticity in high stakes moments.
Sims Wyeth & Co. provides public speaking courses, executive speech coaching, presentation skills training, voice and speech training, speech writing, and courses that address stage fright, body language, presentation strategy, and effective use of PowerPoint, all of which contribute to greater executive presence and personal impact.