Planning your presentation

When you start planning your presentation, ask yourself the following questions:

Why are you doing it?

There could be a number of reasons including:

• Introducing a topic at a seminar or tutorial
• For an assessment
• Presenting your research findings (from a group or individual project)
• At an interview
• As part of your extra-curricula interests, e.g. voluntary work.

What do you want to achieve?

Again, there could be a mixture of purposes including:

• Explaining a subject or topic
• Initiating a discussion
• Demonstrating your presentation skills
• Showing others how to do something
• Persuading and convincing others.

Have you got what you need?

Make sure you have the information you need, such as guidelines from your school or module including:

• How long should your talk last?
• What format or presentation style should you use e.g. will MS Powerpoint be appropriate?
• The equipment that will be available?
• What level of prior knowledge should you assume your audience will have, and to what extent should you use subject-specific terminology with/without explanation?
• What will your audience want from your talk?
• Will there be questions afterwards?
• If you are being assessed - what are the marking criteria?