The Biggest Mistake Presenters Make in Structuring Their Presentations

Are you someone who starts your presentations with facts about you or dives directly into the facts that form the content of your presentation? I was that person for many years. But this is one of the biggest mistakes presenters can make!

Brenda’s Experience with Presentations

I vividly recall the first presentation I did almost 30 years ago. I was a very good securities lawyer, unfortunately, I had never given a public presentation and had no training on how to present. My boss came to me and said “You wrote this policy, you need to go talk to industry about it.” So, there I was, standing looking up at a sea of faces at SFU Harbour Centre in Vancouver, B.C. All were securities industry professionals. I thought I should tell them about the policy, and I did in excruciating detail. While I spoke, my audience was sleeping or discussing lunch. They were paying no attention to me.

In the years after that first presentation, I did many more presentations while I was working in various legal and executive positions at the BC Securities Commission. My presentations were still not memorable. At that time, I wasn’t familiar with scientific research on how people actually learn and remember.

After that first horrible presentation, I took a number of steps to get to where I am now. I joined Toastmasters so I could speak often and get constructive feedback. I also took training and did research on how people learn and remember.

Don’t start your presentation with facts

So what did I do wrong and what do many presenters do wrong? I started with facts. Do you?

What is the problem of starting with facts?

Why you shouldn’t start with facts

Not only does starting with facts not get the audience’s attention, science proves that it may even be counterproductive, if you are trying to get your audience to change in some way.

In his book The Secret Language of Leadership, Stephen Denning refers to scientific research saying that people tend to ignore information contrary to what they previously believed.

One study indicated that people on opposite sides of a contentious question found ways to interpret what they were shown to support their original positions even when what they were shown refuted their original position.

Another study showed that when people considered information contrary to their original position, the reasoning centre in their brains did not light up at all but their emotional circuits did. Even more startling, once the participants figured out a way to interpret the contrary information as supporting their original position, the part of the brain involved in reward and pleasure lit up. This massively reinforced their original position.

Confirmation bias

This phenomenon is known as confirmation bias. It means we favor information that confirms our assumptions, preconceptions, and hypotheses. Our immediate reaction to information indicating the opposite of something we think is true is to jump to the conclusion that there is something wrong with the source.

What is the best way to start your presentation?

So, if starting with facts doesn’t work, how should you start your presentation?

The first step is to get the audience’s attention. To get the audience’s attention, you need to engage their emotion. The best way to engage their emotion is to start with a story.

This approach to structure is based on Stephen Denning’s book The Secret Language of Leadership referred to earlier.

What if you don’t engage your audience right away?

If you don’t engage your audience by starting with a story, they are unlikely to remember your key messages. If they don’t remember your key messages, how can they follow your suggestions to make changes. If they don’t remember, they are also unlikely to become a client or to purchase what you’re offering.

If you’re not sure on how to find stories to use in your presentations, what story to use, or more generally how to give a memorable presentation, don’t go at it alone. Seek help!

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