Presentations
Helping technical people give confident, engaging and impactful presentations
Public speaking is par for the course in any technical career, be that talking at conferences, meetings or job interviews. The most successful communicators are those who come across as confident, competent and engaging, even when presenting technical content.
But most of us aren’t natural public speakers. I remember at the beginning of my scientific career feeling terrified of such events, and anxious that it would hold me back in my career.
Fast forward a few years, and it’s how I earn my living. Because the good news is that public speaking is a learnt skill; everyone is capable of feeling comfortable giving strong presentations, with a little bit of theory and practice.
This workshop is designed to give you the same.
Workshop content
Before the training
Part 1: Storytelling Foundations
Before we meet in-person, you’ll be given access to our Storytelling Foundations online course. This will give you all the theory you need to write compelling, memorable and engaging presentations.
By giving you this content before the workshop, you’ll have time to write and reflect on how you want to communicate your work. It frees us up to spend the maximum possible time concentrating on solving your presentation problems.
On the day
Part 2: Theory and Warm-Ups
Although presentation skills can only really be gained by doing it, there are some principles which we can learn to improve our presentations. So, in the workshop, through theory and warm-up exercises, we’ll cover:
Content
Controlling nerves
Body language
Voice
Slides
Stagecraft
Fielding questions
Part 3: Practice
The only way to improve is by doing it! So, this is a highly practical second-half where participants will present a number of times to the group, and receive feedback from me and their peers.
FAQs
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This training is for anyone who has to communicate technical content verbally, such as academic or industrial researchers, or people working in applied technical industries.
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Ten. Because this is a highly practical course, and because public speaking is a skill improved through practice, I like to keep numbers low in order to give everyone a fair chance to practice and receive feedback. If you want more than ten people to come, I'll arrange for another trainer to join us.
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Absolutely! I'm used to catering for a group that covers a range of experience levels. We will address how to overcome feelings of nervousness, and attendees of this workshop always say that the atmosphere is low-stakes and supportive.
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Absolutely! I'm very used to training groups that have people with a range of experience levels. Even for those who are already confident public speakers, there's always room for improvement!
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Yes. The reason I keep the group sizes small is to allow time for each person to present at least once and receive feedback from me and from the group.
Testimonials
“This was honestly one of the most useful (if not the most useful) skills training sessions run by any of the universities I've worked at over the past 10 years. Usually academic skills sessions are so generic that they're of minimal use. This session was anything but. All of what was presented was super useful, and I can see how it will have a tangible impact on how I present.
Anna was wonderful - I guess it's to be expected that her presentation skills are fantastic, but she also created a lovely, warm atmosphere in the room. She established this in the first session (which was more present-y), which made the afternoon session (more workshop-y) flow really well: the atmosphere was warm, trusting and supportive, which is so helpful when publicly practising presentation skills.
I've been to similar public engagement workshops before when employed at a different institution and this was far far better. I could have happily carried on for another few hours.”
Participant from the University of Warwick, Sept 2024
