How to get better at presenting in public

What do you need to do to get better at presenting in public?

The first step, if you have not already taken it, is to believe that public presentation effectiveness has very little to do with innate talent and is overwhelmingly about study and practice.

If you find it difficult to believe this, read the book Mindset by Carol Dweck.

Here's a video:



and a nice graphical summary.

Okay, with that out of the way how exactly should you study and practice?

What to Study

The books I recommend:

• Beyond Bullet Points
• Everything by Garr Reynolds: His blog, Presentation Zen, Presentation Zen Design, The Naked Presenter
• Everything by Nancy Duarte: slide:ology, Resonate

Presentations and presenters I recommend you observe:


Dick Hardt demonstrating the "Lessig style":

• TED talks (not all are good but it's useful to understand why)
• Ignite talks (not all are good but it's useful to understand why)
• I also hear that Steve Jobs fellow was a good presenter
• Also pay attention to how presenters are presenting in user groups and conferences

How to Practice

Record and critique yourself.  Most presentation software has the ability to record an audio track and you can use this to switch roles from presenter to audience.  For the best effect, do the Stephen King thing and wait a while so that you forget all the tacit knowledge you had as the presenter.

Clean up your word whiskers.  Word whiskers are the "ums" and "ahs" that people use to fill in the silence when they are thinking.  You want to train yourself to be comfortable with silence.  Someone told me that the way they did this was to ask someone to point out every time you use word whiskers.

Presenter's workshop.  The Pattern Languages of Programming conferences use something called a writer's workshop which is essentially a session where authors critique each others work.  I've thought that a similar presenter's workshop might also be useful.  Imagine each presenter in turn doing a 5 minute presentation and then listening to critique from the others.

Toastmasters.  Not something I've done myself, and I believe they are more about public speeches than presentations, but a number of people I know seem to like it.

Just Do It

Internal presentations.  The safest place to start is with your own team.  They'll be more forgiving and the numbers will be smaller.  This can be "lunch-and-learn" sessions and official meetings.  Depending on the size of your organisation, you can scale this up as you get more confident.

User groups.  Also relatively safe depending on the size of the group and how well you know everyone.

Ignite or Pecha Kucha.  Ignite tends to be more technology-focused and is 20 slides, 15 seconds per slide.  Pecha Kucha tends to be more architecture-focused and is 20 slides, 20 seconds per slide.  The constraints really force you to be on your game.

Conferences.  I see conferences as being like really large user groups but they may be seen as more stressful due to increased numbers, people paid to come, etc.