Tag Archives: Confidence

Don’t Hand it to Your Audience

By Phil Stella | Published: May 1, 2013

What do you do with your hands as you continue harnessing your physical power on the platform? I get that one a lot. Your maker endowed you with two wonderful visual aids – and what you do, and don’t do, with them says a lot about your confidence and credibility as a presenter.

This month, we’ll summarize ‘Gesturing ‘Worst Practices’ – it should be interesting and mildly amusing trip, unless it sounds like I’m talking about you. Next month, we’ll move on to ‘Best Practices’. Sound like a plan to you?

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Stand & Deliver

By Phil Stella | Published: February 1, 2013

Audience-Centric presenters harness the Physical Power of their bodies by standing and delivering with credibility and confidence. Because your audience only knows what it sees, your body can be a great natural visual aid. It can also show nervousness or lack of confidence very quickly and clearly. So … look the part you’re playing – a confident and credible presenter.

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Hand it to Your Audience

By Phil Stella | Published: August 31, 2012

In a recent LinkedIn Discussion Group, I responded to a question about gestures in presentations. Here’s a summary of some of the basic points I shared that often come up in my presentation skill workshops and executive coaching engagements.

  • Gestures are normal, natural and human. Authentic ones usually work well. But some gestures are ineffective and reduce the credibility and illusion of confidence presenters work so hard to project.
  • Gesturing too much or using repetitive gestures can become distractions for the audience.
  • Nervous gestures – rubbing hands together, gesturing with hands down at your sides, playing with the remote or pen – also send out a negative non-verbal message about confidence … or the lack thereof.
  • Putting both hands in your pockets rarely hide the nervous fidgets and often appear too casual.
  • Hands together in front in the ‘fig leaf’ stance don’t add any value either and direct the audience’s eyes to that part of your body – bad idea.
  • Hands behind your back remove the potential power of gestures and look subordinate to the audience – also a bad idea.
  • Gesturing while holding your notes can be very distracting and increases the chance of dropping them. This is especially important when using 3 x 5 note cards – really a bad idea.

So, when presenting, hand it to your audience with style and confidence.