Effective Presentations: 12 Tips for

Engineers (Dont Laugh)

Posted by Matt Napolitan on Feb 27, 2013 5:00:00 AM

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As an engineer myself, I was struck recently by fresh evidence of the pervasive challenge
of communicating technical information effectively. I attended a building conference where
the focus is designing better buildings and one common thread emerged. Death by
PowerPoint is alive and well in the building and design industry.

Common Communication Problems

All the 1-1/2 hour presentations I attended were in PowerPoint formatyou know, click on
the button, the slide changes, the presenter talks about the slide, he or she clicks again
andwell, you get it. They all had solid technical content and a high level of applicability to my
job. Four out of those five, however, had fair to poor presentations. The slides were either not
engaging, way too busy (also known as chartjunk), illegible (because the fonts were so small)
or served simply as the presenters script. Couple that with a dimly lit room and inadequate
ventilation (we WERE in a hotel, after all) and you can imagine what ensues.
Pervasive Communication Problem
Ive had the same feeling every year I attended this particular conference over the last 5 years,
and I can remember only a handful of effective presentations at national conferences over the
years. Now Im no presentation guru, but neither am I a sommelier yet I know when a wine
tastes good, and I know when a presentation misses the mark. If, as an industry, we are going
to advance building performance, energy efficiency and sustainability, we need to communicate
more effectively with each other as well as non-technical audiences.

12 Presentation Tips for an Engineer from

an Engineer
1. DONT - READ YOUR SLIDES! Oh, sorry, did I yell that? Well, I meant to. I read aloud to
my 4 year old because he cant do it himself yet; I can. Use your slides as talking points,
perhaps to compare a few things with a graph, or to highlight the main points you
want to cover.
2. DO Prepare notes from which to speak that only exist in your hand. This will let you
look away from the slide and engage with your audience.
3. DONT Put up a slide thats simply a white background and black text. Cmon folks,
Power Point has dozens of canned templates that, if nothing else, add a splash of color
or some texture. Additional time = 2 minutes. If thats a little too much to do, use some
other font than Times New Roman and make the text a different color.
Somethinganything!
4. DO Use photos or sketches to describe your talking points. We all like picture books
whether we want to admit it or notsame thing applies to presentations. Photos are
great cause theyre real. Every presentation Ive attended that uses photos always
seems to keep the audiences attention.
5. DO Use graphs. All the folks at this conference have the technical aptitude to
understand a graph. Graphs are a simple way to compare A to B to C and they can add
a splash of color.
6. DONT Use graphs that have so many data points and compare so many things that
looking at them starts to make me say whoa man, whatd they put in that lunch
buffet?.
7. DO Use graphs to illustrate a point by summarizing or showing an indicative section
of the data. Keep the font legible and the number of data points to a minimum.
8. DONT Show me a screenshot of the ENTIRE SPREADSHEET you used to perform a
complicated analysis or to compare umpteen options and then start by saying this
isnt meant to be legible. No kidding?!
9. DO Show me a section of that spreadsheet and summarize the headings on the top
and side. Youre giving me an idea of what you did, not presenting the detail of the
findings.
10. DONT Stand behind the table or podium if you can at all help it. I know, public
speaking is not a strong point for many people and thats perfectly acceptable. Just
step around the physical barrier that is between you and your audience. I dont expect
you to be that person who walks around the room and gets to know half the audience,
but removing the barrier is another step to keeping my attention.
 11. DO Look the audience in the eye. If you cant do this, which is understandable, look at
their hair. I learned that somewhere and you know what, it works. You can do an
entire presentation without making any eye contact and still convince the audience
you were looking at them.
12. DO Practice your presentation and get your colleagues input ahead of time. Were all
busy, believe me I know. But I paid to attend this conference and I expect a little more
than a presenter who stumbles though their presentation because they werent
familiar with the content of the slides. Yes, that happened. He even said sorry, Im not
totally familiar with this presentation. Folks he was the guy the program listed; it
wasnt a surprise to him he was presenting.

So thats my 2 cents on what these presenters could have done better to engage me which, I
assume, is what would engage you or most anyone else. Whats your favorite tip (or resource)
for more effective presentations?

Resources
PowerPoint Does Rocket Science--and Better Techniques for Technical Reports (Edward Tufte)

Harvard Business Reveiw Guide to Persuasive Presentations - Nancy Duarte

Mastering Prezi for Business Presentations Anderson-Williams Russell