Stop Reading Your Slides Like a Robot

Your presentation slides aren't your script — they're your enemy if you're hiding behind them. Most conference presentations bomb because speakers become slide-reading robots instead of storytellers. Here's how to own the room with your presence, not your PowerPoint.

Transcript

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Welcome to Lee with Confidence. I'm JP Warren. Every episode we take a theme from our Monday morning leadership call and apply it to real life scenarios. So you can build your confidence, crush your imposter syndrome, and step into the leader you actually want to be. Short, real, straight to the point. Let's get into it. Welcome back to a new Lead with Confidence podcast. I'm your host, JP Warren. And if you're just discovering this podcast, we are releasing about five to 10 minute uh real skill sets, real tools, real frameworks that you can use to build your soft skills. After all, soft skills are 85% of our career success. So let's hey, let's start strengthening your soft skills. And this week we'll be covering the concept of if you ever have to get up and give a presentation in front of a group full of people, we all know the converse the presentations that put us asleep, that people check their phones, that really we're just trying to actually just push through until the end of uh end of the break. So this is really kind of a just kind of an overview on how to actually deliver uh better uh presentations uh with intention, right? Because you got to think about this. Whenever you walk into a room, you have an opportunity to showcase who you are or who your company is. And a lot of times people follow the same formula and dive into kind of like this zone of comfort where they're let's talk about them, they're talking about their features, they're talking about their history. At the end of the day, no one really cares. So before I kind of get off on the weeds on that, this is to help you, and this is also to help everyone out there at conferences. If you know someone coming up presenting, please share this with them because uh we'll be covering this this entire week on how to actually prep and deliver presentations that actually stick. And this topic of today is stop reading your slides like a robot. Nothing is worse, nothing is more disgenuine than sitting there and just using your slides to read off of. And that kind of puts people out, disconnects people, and you're really ruining the opportunity to step up and kind of present your company, your team to further the conversations. Okay. So let's kind of dive into this uh this day. So last week we talked about kind of our, and I love these stats, okay? I'm gonna keep on going over these stats uh repeatedly times. A lot of times our presentations are slides, right? And we are focused on only 7% of how we communicate. That's right. So it's not the body language we're focused on, it's not the showmanship, it's not the pitch, it's not the tone, it's not the cadence of our voice we're focused on. We are so worried about the slides or the words that are on the slides, following that script word for word. And what happens is you start reading it like a robot. It becomes very monotonous, it comes very monotonous. And we have this percent of pressure. We were started in this uh, you know, this uh part of the country in 1971, and we have four. It's boring. It disconnects people, okay? So let's kind of bring some energy to this and kind of make it something that sticks with your audience, all right? So the reality is this, okay, okay, let me get back to that. So 7% is words on how we communicate. We're so focused on the 7%, right? But 55% of how we communicate is our body language. 38% is our pitch, our tone, our cadence, the pauses that we utilize, right? So again, let's not focus on that 7%. Let's kind of work in the rest of the 93% to really land something that hits with your audience. And what's the problem here, right? The problem is a lot of people use their slides as their security blanket. They're hostage to their slides. They stay up there reading the slides, they don't want to miss any information, and they're thinking if I miss this information, it's not going to convert the audience. So the audience won't understand what I'm talking about. So I need to stay with my slides. This is my comfort zone. This is my safety blanket, right? And what happens? The energy drops, the connection drops. You're peeling your eyes away from the audience and looking at your slides behind you. And so the just the energy, everything, the message, energy, connection, um, the showmanship, it all stops and fades. All right. Another, another problem is that I've, you know, work with groups and all that stuff, you know, when it comes to kind of like, you know, presenting luncheon learns or kind of technical presentations. And a lot of times there's so much time and energy spent on the development of slides. I would kind of argue, look at some of the successful product launches, for example, in the tech space, right? Let's look at Apple. Apple's slides, if you look at them, they are historically minimalistic. They have like three to four words or three bullet points on per slide, and that's it. They are you, they are telling a story with a slide as kind of the support, not the driver. Okay. So stop perfecting the slides. Make them clean, make them minimalistic, and just use it as kind of a launch point should you kind of lose your message. Okay. And the third problem is that people get up there and they deliver it with just this monotone. They're so, I'm not sure. Listen, I get it. I got nerves, I got imposter syndrome, I don't like public speaking, but that's what I do. And every time I'm nervous, every time there's so much anxiety behind me, but I remember this put myself in their shoes, right? What if I walked in there and I remembered my slides, I've remembered the script and I'm doing it word for word, word for word, and I'm not delivering it with any of that 38% or the 55% we're talking about, the body language, the cadence, the tone, the pitch, the storytelling, it's gonna disconnect a lot of people. All right. So let's talk. And what happens? What happens? First off, it's very risky for you to go up there and deliver a presentation that flops. Number one, you have an opportunity in front of people to actually kind of communicate who you are, to have those further conversations after your presentation. Please make it rememberable. Don't bore people to death where they're just not gonna remember your slide, or they do, they're like, Yeah, they're not gonna remember if you if your company presented up there because it's gonna be put them to sleep. So, again, let's think about this in a whole new light, right? Let's pretend that every single one of these are these Apple product launches where you have to go in and deliver that energy. All right. So here's the framework we're talking about today. Let's talk about the message over the slides, okay? So, first thing that you got to do is first off, when you put your slides together, move away from the words. Nobody really wants to sit up there and read slides because if you're talking, right, we've all been there. Think about this. If you're in a if you're in a conference and a presentation, someone's talking, they put up a slide with a lot of graphics, a lot of data, a lot of words, you're not listening. Now you just shifted your focus to the slide and you stay at the slide reading that, okay? So I say this build your presentation, minimum words. The next thing you need to do, think about the one message you want people to walk out with, right? Practice that message, practice that story and do it standing up. Don't practice your presentation sitting down because think about this. You're not gonna be sitting down when you're delivering your presentation. Stand up, get behind your desk, use your body, start flowing, start getting that energy moving, all right? The second thing is use your slide as props. Don't use your slide as kind of the structure on where you're gonna hang your pictures. Use it as a foundation. Remember, you're telling a story, you're building this in front of them. Don't have your slides give away kind of your message, your story, or anything like that. Use it as kind of a as a resource, as a kind of a, if you're, if you lift weights, use it as a spotter, all right? You don't want it doing the heavy lift for you. All right. And the third thing is this is have some empathy, right? What do you, what would you want to remember from your presentation? What message do you want to get across? You're delivering this to a room full of people. You're delivering this to people, right? So, what kind of experience do you want? Do you want up there just sitting there reading and listening to drone on and on a monotone slide, looking back, turning your back to the audience and reading? No. Please have some empathy, have fun with it, okay? Because at the end of the day, no one's gonna remember it if it's a very boring monotone slide. But chances are people will remember your energy, your effort, and your excitement, um, and just kind of your message if you actually do this with intention and have some fun behind it, okay? Listen, you have two directions to do this. Number one, you can be very nervous, you can be very scared, very timid, which that is a very normal, normal uh reaction about getting on stage and having these public um presentations. You can take that same energy and just get excited with it. Hey, listen, I'm gonna be nervous, I'm gonna be anxious, but you know what? I'm gonna have fun with this, okay? So switch it to that. So I will say this some application steps, and then I'm gonna have a challenge for you. So the first step, next time you present, next time you have a presentation come up, give a couple dry runs without looking at the slides at all. What's the story you want people to kind of take away from your message? What is the message you want people to take away from your slide deck? And obviously, don't have too many slides uh in your deck. Um, another thing is stop reading word for word on your slides, okay? Stop turning your back to the audience, breaking that connection and not looking at people in the eye as you engage your audience. All right. Another thing is think about this. What is the one thing? What is the one piece of information you want people to take away? All right. That should be kind of the main focus where everything kind of wraps around. That should be the story circles on how you're delivering your message, all right? So I challenge you about this if you have an upcoming presentation, which we all do. All right. And use it as practice, right? We're not gonna nail that first present, but the more we get up and the more uncomfortable we are, and we live in those uncomfortable zones, the better we're all gonna be. Okay, that's where we gain our confidence. All right. So remember this your audience is going to hear you. They're not going to read your slides. And if slides could deliver your message, then chances are, why are you in the room? Why are you on stage delivering this to the audience? All right. So go out there, get that confidence, stay in those uncomfortable positions. And remember, nobody likes public speaking. I think more people are being more people are scared of public speaking than being eaten by a shark. So go out there, have fun, and tell your story. I'm JP Warren. Lead with confidence.