Presenting Without Slides or Notes - EP:091

Presenting without slides or notes can happen by accident or on purpose, but how do you do it? It’s not about memorization, but internalization. With memorization, you’re thinking about which word comes next. Internalization, however, is about remembering which concept comes after which concept.

When it comes to presenting without slides or notes, there’s a golden rule you should always go by. If it’s too much information for you to remember, it is definitely too much information for your audience to remember. That means you need to scale back the information you put in your presentation to the point that you can internalize it without notes. That way we know our audience can also internalize our message.

How do you simplify your message? Anchor it to the kinds of things we all remember: what do people want? Why do they want it? And what do they do as a result? You can translate these questions into pieces of the Red Thread. Use the Goal, the Problem, the Truth, the Change, and the Actions to address all three of these questions and make your message clear.