I’ve had a fair amount of experience preparing speakers for audio conferences, webinars and in-person events. Over the years I’ve learned a few tricks of the trade. Here are a few of them.
Get an outline early
If you’re organizing a presentation, you have some sense of what you want the speaker to say. You need to make sure you and the speaker agree on that.
Many speakers wait until the last minute to do their slides, but they are usually willing to give you a simple outline early, which is a good way to compare notes on the content of the presentation. Think about the key points you want the speaker to cover and make sure you mention them and where you think they’ll fit in the outline.
Getting an outline early is especially important when you have multiple speakers. In addition to the points above, you want to make sure there’s no duplication.
Ask the speakers to come up with one or two key takeaways from their session
This helps the speaker focus the presentation. Most attendees expect to get one or two actionable items from the session. Make sure the speaker knows he has to deliver on that promise.
If you’re not confident of the speaker, do the session as a Q&A
It’s best to get a speaker you’ve heard before. It’s awful when you’re half-way through a webinar or in-person session and you realize your speaker is too quiet, says “um” all the time, rambles, or has some other distraction. (There are lots of ways to ruin a public presentation.)
Speaking on the phone can help diagnose some of this, but it’s not a good enough test run for a public speaker.
If you’re using a new speaker, try a Q&A — with you asking the questions. The speaker can provide the questions in advance, but this format gives you a little more control so you can compensate for problems.
Get a print-out of the slides and establish timing expectations
If the talk will be 45 minutes, divide up the content into 10- or 15-minute increments so you can make sure things are moving along at a decent pace. You don’t need to be a time Nazi, but you don’t want to get in a situation where you have 5 minutes left and have only done half your presentation, or have 30 minutes left and have breezed through all your slides.
Review the slides ahead of time
The people in the audience know how to read, so the speaker should not read the slides. Look for signs of that in the slide deck and remind the speaker not to do it.
Sometimes it’s better to have slides with simple headlines or pictures — with very few words.
The exception, of course, is if the presentation includes practical tools, like checklists. That stuff is golden, so by all means include those in the slide deck. Just remind the speaker not to read them.
Break up the monotony of one voice
Some people are very interesting speakers, but it’s usually difficult to listen to the same voice for a long time — especially when you can’t see the person’s face.
Break things up. Have a couple speakers take turns, or make sure the presenter solicits questions throughout. You can also ask some of the questions yourself.