The Elephant in the Room

Presentation Skills

You have to talk about the ‘elephant in the room’ – the big thing that everyone knows but doesn’t want to talk about. But if you do that, the colossal animal becomes so much smaller.

For example: If I, as a speaker, know that there is anxiety in the room: verbalise the anxiety. If there is a conflict in the group – tell me you know about it. If someone thinks I’m too old for my position: mention it, preferably with a twinkle in my eye, as when President Biden recently said that he “although it doesn’t show, been around for a while”.

This was one of many simple techniques we talked about during two half-day workshops on presentation skills at Lund Municipality. Thank you for the trust – and good luck in your important mission in the service of citizens.

Ordrum // Nyheter, tips & tricks // The Elephant in the Room

Other news

AI as a speaker coach

If you want to practise your rhetorical skills, there are plenty of useful tools available. One of our favourites is Google Gemini. You can ask the AI to analyse a…

Slides, manuscript and documentation

A recurring pattern emerges, particularly in academia: manuscripts, documentation and slides become intermingled. Rather than making use of their three different functions: DOCUMENTATION should be readable by someone who wasn’t…

Storyselling – when you go from selling a product to selling a service

Philips sells light, not lamps. SKF sells rotation, not ball bearings. Rolls-Royce sells power per hour, not aircraft engines. It is becoming increasingly common, and there are good reasons, for…