Learn to Make Effective Presentations

Contributed by Charles Humble

Difficulty level: Easy

The vast majority of technical people have to give a presentation at some point in our careers, and most of us don’t do it well. While we’ve been taught about the nitty-gritty of data structures, writing code, and how to use an IDE, we were likely never taught public speaking.

Drawing on almost 20 years of public speaking experience and mentoring, including at Devoxx, GOTO, and QCon, in this Shortcut I will provide you with some useful techniques to help you craft better presentations. My aim is that when you next have to speak in public, you can make it a better experience for both you and your audience.

We’ll talk about the importance of knowing your audience, the role of story, working out what to say, and how to make better slides. This is purely practical advice; we’re not going to spend time on communication theory.

Preparation is Paramount

In the extremely useful book, Presentation Patterns, Neal Ford, Matthew McCullough, and Nathaniel Schutta say that, “Preparation is paramount to a successful talk, and the key to being prepared is knowing all you can about the event. Be an informed participant: learn as much as you can about your audience.”

We’ve talked about the importance of personas earlier in this series, and that advice applies equally here. A brilliant presentation delivered to the wrong audience is a bad presentation. Taking even a few minutes to research the event pays ...