As a hospital or health system executive, you are likely to find yourself having many opportunities — or requirements — to provide presentations. These presentations may be to small groups or large groups, fellow executives or community members, experienced staff or new employees. Regardless of the scenario, you may think the most important aspect of the presentation is what information you provide to attendees.
In truth, the "what" may be the second most important aspect of the presentations. The first is probably the "how": how you deliver the information in your presentation. If the manner in which you provide the information is not effective, the impact of and message behind the information is likely to be hindered, if not lost.
What we know to be true is the average person will likely only retain one-third of the information from a presentation. You can help ensure the presentation has positive staying power and attendees come away with a better understanding and appreciation of the topic you were speaking on.
Here are six common mistakes hospital and health system executives make during presentations and public speaking.
1. Too much focus on content. Healthcare executives are often too focused on delivering specific content and getting through a number of key points during a presentation. But doing a presentation should not simply be reading a memo; attendees should not be able to glean the information in the presentation and accomplish the "information transfer" intended by reading on their own (if given the option).
Verbal communication — presenting vocally — is its own art, its own system that needs to be approached differently than simply an information transfer. Consider what impact you wish to have on your audience. Impact is distinct and separate from information transfer. The more powerfully you present as a speaker, the more effectively you will convey your content and message. Achieving this desired impact requires dedication to the craft of public speaking and working to improve your performance in this area (which is discussed further later in this column).
2. Hiding behind a title and role. If you're a C-suite member who is presenting, you automatically bringing a certain amount of professionalism to the table. It comes with your title and role, which attendees likely know about even before you begin to speak. Simply presenting as a CEO or CNO and only focusing on delivering information that reflects the narrowness of your professional title and role can oftentimes end up communicating rigidity, stiffness and coldness — a sterility you likely do not actually intend to communicate.
In order to effectively communicate information verbally, think about bringing your own personal ethos to the table. What makes you unique as a speaker? There are very specific strategies to bring in one's own personality, whether through time-and-place appropriate humor, personal anecdotes, a carefully timed story, etc. Don't be unprofessional in a public speaking setting but try to humanize yourself to the audience and connect with them in a manner outside of your title and role.
3. Lack of awareness or appreciation of core tenents of public speech. As noted earlier, presenting vocally is an art form. It involves appropriate physicality and gestures; not over-gesturing or under-gesturing; an appropriate use of vocal variety; tone and intonation appropriately varied; and making sure other verbal and vocal mechanics — like pausing and volume — are appropriately used. When combined effectively, these core tenents of public speaking help capture the listeners' interest and support effective information transfer.
When a speaker is only focused on delivering content and is hell-bent upon getting through bullet points, the best practices of public speaking get pushed to the wayside when they should be as critical to the presenter as the content presented.
4. Failing to prepare adequately for a talk. One method of speech preparation doesn't work for everyone, so it's important for an executive to learn what approach is most personally effective. For some executives, the best approach may be to have the complete script in front of them. For others, they may be better off with bullet points that highlight key talking points.
By the same token, to truly feel comfortable, some leaders should devote significant time preparing for a talk to make sure they're well-rehearsed and comfortable. For others, so much preparation may actually increase anxiety, and they may end up feeling over-rehearsed and look and sound more mechanical as a result.
The bottom line: In order to understand how to effectively prepare for a presentation, executives need to know where they are at with their core public speaking skills. There's no single "magic bullet" — it all depends on the skill set and comfort level of each leader.
5. Relying solely on visual aids. A PowerPoint presentation or other visual aid should be just that: an aid, a reference that enhances a talk. A speaker should never take the audience through a presentation by reading slide after slide after slide.
6. Not seeking feedback. Our firm started with the mission of coaching high school students in competitive speech and debate to championships across the country. In addition to our coaching, these students constantly received feedback — both praise and criticism — from adult critics during speaking competitions. This constant flow of feedback is essential to the growth for these young people of their public speaking skills.
Once we're adults assuming a professional role, we lose such built-in mechanisms to receive speaking feedback. Leaders, whether they're completely green or super seasoned speakers, do not seek feedback often enough (if at all) on their public speaking engagements, which hinders growth in this area. Therefore, executives must step out of their comfort zone and seek feedback from those around them.
When you finish a speech, ask a few audience members questions about your presentation. What they get out of your talk? What was the take-home message? How did the talk make them feel? If you're only critiquing yourself and self-reflecting, you cannot effectively determine whether your talk was successful. This feedback process doesn't occur in a vacuum. Public speakers need to remember to seek feedback from their listeners and use this information to improve future presentations.
Jason J. Davidson is founding principal of PicketFenceConsulting, which develops physicians, healthcare leaders and front line staff into engaging, dynamic and compelling communicators. He believes in a model built on innovation, collaboration and education.