Can everyone on your team deliver a great presentation that will land a new client or grow a customer relationship? Can they get approval for a critical enterprise initiative? If the answer is no, then something needs to change: their presentation delivery. Too often, people focus so much on slides and handouts that they overlook this critical element that drives positive outcomes.
Why does the delivery of a presentation matter? Consider what happens when it’s poor. Weak delivery reduces the credibility of the presenter (and their team) and negatively impacts impressions of their company. When your audience lacks confidence in you, your team and your company, it influences decisions to move forward – or not.
At Point Road Group, we help companies make better brand impressions with prospects and customers. Strengthening communications is our guiding star and one way we do this is by training people to deliver highly effective and impactful presentations -- every time they step in front of an audience.
While content is of course important too, we focus on the nuances of how to communicate the message effectively. This includes working with a wide range of people - those with little time to prepare or rehearse, dislike or fear presenting, lack experience or are out of practice – even those who don’t know the subject matter well. In all situations, delivery can be the difference.
Here’s a quick peek at how this has helped some of our clients.
A private equity firm faced a two-fold challenge that was hurting their growth. First, principals had become a bit complacent over the past few years and weren’t bringing the charisma and energy needed when meeting with companies they were looking to invest in. In competitive bidding situations, their presentations lacked a “wow” factor. This hurt their firm’s chances from the outset.
Second, they faced a skills gap among rising top performers. Senior associates lacked presentation experience and needed to hone delivery skills to present effectively before investment committees and as contributors in meetings with potential acquisitions. If the firm didn’t address this soon, they were going to see a negative impact on their pipeline.
Through interactive group workshops and individualized coaching, we trained employees to meet the comprehensive standards we’ve developed and avoid common mistakes that impact credibility, no matter what they were presenting on. Many were not even aware of the bad habits they displayed, let alone how to fix them, such as:
In a safe learning environment with hands-on, personalized guidance (including live and video practice sessions), we helped experienced and inexperienced presenters alike. In the end, all knew how to inspire confidence and trust any time they were in a conference room or on Zoom with a potential company to invest in or investment committee. This enabled them to grow the pipeline and close more deals.
A global biotech firm had a dedicated department leading critical enterprise transformation initiatives, yet a growing number of their staff lacked confidence and influence when presenting to executives across the business. Their objective was to obtain the buy-in needed to move projects forward, but these employees were failing to gain support because of how they communicated.
Things like poor eye contact with decision makers and using too many um’s and uh’s when discussing project costs/timing were increasingly derailing their efforts. This group was actually slowing down projects vital for the company to lower costs, increase efficiency and remain competitive.
We met with team members and executives to understand their challenges and identify weaknesses and areas for improvement. We then led a series of training sessions that targeted pain points and provided ongoing support to help this team gain the added skills and confidence they needed to be persuasive, generate support and move critical projects to completion. This allowed the company to evolve infrastructure with innovative programs that ultimately increased revenue.
Helping employees improve how they deliver presentations is a smart business strategy due to the immediate and long-term benefits. A highly skilled team drives more revenue, grows client relationships and moves projects forward faster and more effectively.
Adding to these benefits, when a company invests in employee development, people feel more valued. This is important to company culture as it fosters loyalty and motivates the team to contribute actively to growth.
Find additional tips and strategies to improve presentation delivery below:
How To Get In Sync & Deliver Impactful Team Presentations
