How To Give A Good Group Presentation

Your goal has to be to deliver a cohesive group presentation
Your goal has to be to deliver a cohesive group presentation
Image Credit: Ben+Sam

When it comes time to deliver a presentation, we don’t always do it alone. Sometimes we are called upon to participate in a group presentation. These can be tricky to do correctly. No matter who the presentation is going to be given to, we need to realize that the most important thing about the presentation is that it has to give the impression that it was all put together by a single person in order to deliver the importance of public speaking. This is the challenge that you face every time you get asked to participate in a group presentation.

The Challenge Of Creating A Group Presentation

When we stand up in front of an audience and deliver a presentation, we can accomplish a great many different things. However, it turns out that a group presentation that has been created with a single cohesive point-of-view and one that the team has taken the time to carefully prepare can offer a number of advantages over what a single person can accomplish.

The power of a group presentation comes from the fact that a well done presentation can cause the audience to have more faith in the team. During such a presentation, different members of the team can take the opportunity to discuss their areas of expertise. Having multiple people give a single presentation reduces the chance that the audience will be bored by the monotony of listening to one person. Finally, when multiple people are delivering a presentation they can use the opportunity to play off of each other’s energy and ideas.

Generally speaking, group presentations are often considered to be higher quality presentations than individual presentations. Since there will be multiple people involved, each person who is a part of the team that will be delivering the presentation will have less that they will be required to memorize and rehearse. This should result in a better overall presentation. There can be problems with group presentations. If the presentation lacks a single collective point-of-view things can go wrong. Members of the team may have the same topic that they’ll be speaking on; however, when they go to present they will have different messages. When you are part of a group presentation, you need to make sure that you have a single point-of-view and that you can deliver a polished performance.

How To Create A Group Presentation

The next time that you are asked to participate in a group presentation, you need to understand that preparing for it will be different than when you prepare to give an individual presentation. One of the most significant differences that you will encounter will be the amount of time that will be required. As an individual speaker, for a big presentation we often need roughly a month to prepare to give it. When you are working as a part of a group, this is all going to take longer in part because you are going to have to take the time to schedule meetings with the other people on your team. It will also take longer for the team to make decisions and to rehearse the presentation. Getting ready to give a good group presentation often takes between one and three months.

In order to make a group presentation come together, you are going to have to have to pick a person to be your organizer. This person could be a part of the team that will be making the presentation or they could be an outside person who will be impacted by the presentation. You’ll need to determine if the team will do a better job of responding to suggestions from someone who is on the team or who is on the outside. This person will have a number of different responsibilities that will contribute to creating a successful presentation. These responsibilities include creating a timeline that includes the team’s major milestones and then making sure that the team stays on their speech creation schedule.

Since the goal of any team presentation is to be able to share a collective point-of-view with your audience, one of the first things that the team is going to have to do is to take the time to create an outline for the entire project. When the team sits down to create this outline they are going to have to answer the most important question first. This question is what the ultimate goal of giving this presentation is. You are going to have to make sure that you know what your call to action is for this presentation. The last thing that you’d want to do is to start at the beginning and hope that there is some way to find your way to the end. The involvement of multiple people is going to make getting to the end that much harder to do. Once you’ve been able to hash out an outline with your team, then this is the time to assign each portion of the outline to the team speaker who can best deliver it with both knowledge and enthusiasm. Once this is done, everyone can work on their part individually. Make sure that each speaker knows how much time they have for their part so that they create a finished product that will fit into the speech.

What All Of This Means For You

Most speakers feel comfortable when they are called on to create and deliver a speech by themselves. They have done this before and they know the steps that they have to go thorough to create a high quality presentation. Where things can be a bit strange is when you are asked to give a presentation as a part of a group. All of a sudden the way that you create and deliver a speech can’t be used and you need to find a way to work with these other people to deliver a cohesive speech that will deliver the benefits of public speaking. What’s the best way to go about doing this?

The best group presentations have a single cohesive point-of-view. A presentation by a single person can be powerful; however, a well done presentation by a group of people can be even more powerful for a number of different reasons. The problem that you can run into with a group presentation is that when the individual people make their presentations, they all may have different messages for the audience. In order to prevent that from happening, make sure that you realize that creating a group presentation is going to take longer because of coordination meetings and decisions that have to be made. It can help to pick a single person to act as an organizer for the team. This person will plan the team’s activities. The best way to makes sure that everyone on the team is working towards the same goal is to have the time to work together to create a joint outline.

Group presentations can be powerful ways to communicate information to an audience. Having multiple people work together can allow different experts deliver their message and can boost an audience’s acceptance of the message. However, creating a group presentation can take longer and requires more coordination between team members. It can be done, it just takes time. The next time you are asked to give a presentation as a part of a team make sure that your team has enough time to work together to create the best presentation possible!

– Dr. Jim Anderson
Blue Elephant Consulting –
Your Source For Real World Public Speaking Skills™

Question For You: How many people do you think should participate in a group presentation? How many is too much?

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Note: What we talked about are advanced speaking skills. If you are just starting out I highly recommend joining Toastmasters in order to get the benefits of public speaking. Look for a Toastmasters club to join in your home town by visiting the web site www.Toastmasters.org. Toastmasters is dedicated to helping their members to understand the importance of public speaking by developing listening skills and getting presentation tips. Toastmasters is how I got started speaking and it can help you also!

What We’ll Be Talking About Next Time

By now I’m pretty sure that most of us are somewhat comfortable with the concept of giving a speech by ourselves. Yes, it can be a very nerve racking thing to do, but over time we get used to the process of understanding the importance of public speaking and accepting the opportunity, creating a speech, practicing it, and then finally giving it. However, it turns out that this is not the only way that speeches get given. There is also a variant called the group speech. This is exactly what it sounds like: a group of people get up on the stage and they all work together to deliver a single speech. These can be great speeches to both give and listen to; however, they require special techniques to build them correctly.