How to make a good presentation

Think about the presentation beforehand. It is short-changing the organisers of the event and your audience if you only think about what you're going to say the day before or while travelling to the event. If necessary, clarify with the organisers exactly what is required of you and what facilities you will require.

Do use PowerPoint if the facilities are available.

Face your audience at all times even though the screen to which you are speaking is behind you. So that you know what your audience is viewing at any given time in the presentation, either have a computer screen on a desk in front of you showing the presentation or print off the slides and use the paper copies as a speaking aid.

Be very clear about how much time you have - and stick to that time in preparing and delivering your presentation. It's very difficult to 'cut' a PowerPoint presentation at the event itself, so it's a great mistake to run out of time. Most presenters prepare too much material; but nobody ever complains that a presentation was too short.

Be very clear about your key message - and ensure that everything in your presentation is both consistent with, and supportive of, that key message. You should be able to articulate the message in a phrase or a sentence and indeed you might want to use that phrase or sentence in one of your first slides, or one of your last, or even both.

E-mail your presentation to the event organisers in advance. Ask them to load it onto a laptop, run it through, check that it looks fine, and confirm that with you. Then you don't have to worry about the technology when you arrive at the venue; you can concentrate on the delivery of your material.

Ensure that the slides look good. This does not necessarily mean that they look flashy - although suitable pictures or illustrations are very effective - but it does mean using a consistent format and typeface and readable colours and a chronological number.

The first slide should announce the title of your presentation, the event and date, and your name and position.

The second slide should seize the attention of your audience for your presentation. It could be the central proposition of your presentation or a conventional wisdom that you wish to challenge or a relevant or witty quote from a leader in your field.

The third slide should set out the structure of your presentation. The default structure should consist of three themes that you intend to examine. For a very short presentation, there might only be time for two; if you want to look at more than five areas, write a book instead.

Each theme should be the subject of a small number of slides. Again, a good working assumption is that three slides for each theme is about right. Less than two and it isn't substantial enough to be a separate theme; more than five and it should probably be broken up into two themes.

Each slide should have a clear heading. A question is often a good way of winning attention - but, in that case, make sure you answer the question in the body of the slide.

Each slide should normally contain around 25-35 words, unless it is a quote or contains an illustration (when you will probably use less). Too many words and your audience will have trouble reading the material; too few words and you're likely to be flashing through the slides and spending too much time clicking the mouse.

Each bullet point should consist of an intelligible phrase, rather than merely a word or two that is meaningless on its own or conversely a complete sentence that is better delivered orally.

Make appropriate use of pictures. It's a good idea to break up text with illustrations and it is true that a picture is worth a thousand words.

The last slide should set out all appropriate contact details: certainly e-mail address, any personal website if you have one.