How to make presentation

Before you even give a presentation, there are a few things you have to do:

• Choose a topic.

• Submit your topic to a show to management. (and get it accepted!)

• Create presentation from the topic.

• Give the presentation.

Contrary to poular belief, each of these may be as hard as all the others. Choosing a topic for some may be easy, based on their expertise, while those comfortable with public speaking may have trouble designing the slides, and so on.

In many cases, you can choose your topic based on the area of expertise you have. If you're a known (or unknown?) expert on Windows, you can give a presentation on WIndows.

Unfortunately, these are things you'll have to think about and decide on your own. Your best bet is to think of a generic enough subject, and change it based on your audience (we'll get into this later on). If you're talking to advanced audience, you can give a more advanced presentation, whereas newbie groups can get a introductory style presentation. The basic idea is to keep the intended audience in mind at all times.

Once you have the basic idea of what you want to present, you have to get it accepted by groups and get the opportunity to show it. Audience feedback is cruicial, especially if you have not done a presentation before.

Assuming your presentation has been selected, try and get some information about the location, dates, time, and so on. This will have a lot of bearing on how your presentation is laid out. A presentaton using printed slides will appear different on screen than one with an LCD projector that connects to your laptop. In some cases, you will need to bring your own laptop to the presentation.

There are a number of programs for creating presentations. What you use should really be a personal preference. However, there are a few choices for you to use, and one of the most popular in MS Power Point :)).

So how do you create the your content? First, you'll want to have some introductory information. Your first slide should contain the title of the presentation, your name, and who you're representing (if anyone). Remember that it's good form to include the name of the organization that is paying for your trip, even if they're not who you're representing.

Your second slide should contain the agenda for the remainder of the presentation. This serves two purposes - it not only tells the audience what to expect, but serves as an outline for you as you create the slides.

Your third (or forth, depending on how big the agenda is) should contain some information about you. This sets your credibility with the audience as to your expertise with the subject matter.

After that, it is up to you to start creating your slides. However, here's a few hints to keep in mind as you go along:

1. Make the text of the slides big, and the amount of text small. You want everyone to be able to read what is on the slide.

2. There is no real need to write in full sentences. You will want to make short points, since your talking will fill in the details.

3. If you use backgrounds in your slides, make them of light colors. Dark colors will contrast the text when they are printed out as handouts for attendees.

4. Stick to one topic per slide. You can have multiple slides per topic, just title them "Topic", "Topic (cont'd)", or number them.

   Before you give your presentation to a group of people, give it a test run to a friend or SO. This lets you know how well the flow of the presentation is, plus may give ideas for improvement.

   If you have never taken a public speaking class, or given presentations to large groups, the first few times you do this it may seem unnerving. As I mentioned earlier, it may be easier to start with your local LUG and get used to talking to groups of people - the local LUG will be filled with a friendly audience and you will be more at ease.

   When talking to a large audience, keep the following in mind:

   1. Don't just read the text on the slides. Anyone can put slides up and read the text on it. You are an expert!

   2. Keep eye contact with the audience. Every now and then, look up from your screen and scan the audience. If this makes you nervous, look across the tops of the heads. From the perspective of the audience, you're looking at them. Look up, and scan from one side of the room to the other, then look back at your screen.

   3. Feedback from microphones can cause headaches for all around. Test your microphone setup before talking.

   4. If you do not have a microphone, try and face your audience as much as possible. Your voice will carry better.

   5. Do not let yourself get sidetracked. Stay on the topic. If a member of the audience tries to get you off topic too far, offer to discuss it after the presentation. Others who are interested can take part then.