Recently, I had the pleasure of participating in internal company training sessions, which led me down the rabbit hole of trying to find out how to present a couple of different topics in the most optimal way possible.
In the spirit of sharing knowledge, I’ve decided to document my own process of executing a presentation. While I’ve drawn a lot of inspiration from presentation skills and storytelling, I’ve also developed my own style over the years.
If Your Presentation Were a Product, Would Anyone Buy It?
I think of presentations as a product that people will consume at the moment I present it to them. This forces me to observe it from a user (audience) perspective and aim for the following goals:
- Does it solve a problem, and/or does it have a value?
- It is simple to understand, but at the same time covers diverse use cases?
- Is its time-to-value short so that takeaways are immediately applicable?
- Does it have a soul – a combination of honesty and sincerity to attract attention?
Focusing on these goals deepens my need to understand who the audience is and what “problem” the presentation is meant to solve. Their expectations shape how I frame the story and determine how broad or specific I should make it.
It All Starts with the Audience
My rule of thumb is that even if the topic is the same, but the audience is different, my presentation should be uniquely adapted for them. That doesn’t mean just having different slides. It also means you should think of different examples, framing things in a more relatable way, and my favorite – using different analogies to drive a point.
Here are some questions I ask myself even before I start doing a presentation:
- Who is my audience? – technical vs business vs other, experience level in the topic, online vs in person, their past experiences, mixed or similar?
- What are their challenges? Will they solve their challenges with a specific framework, mindset change, or something else?
- What are their expectations? – Do they want a solution to their problem, a new way to think about it, or something entirely different?
- Do I need to be very specific or general? – Depending on the topic and the level of support the audience may expect from me.
Answering these questions helps me reverse-engineer the presentation. Starting with the audience ensures the content is relevant, focused, and aligned with their expectations. It also sharpens my own understanding of the problem I’m addressing. Now, let’s look at an example.
Don’t Forget About Yourself – Who You Are Determines How You Present
Just recently, I did an internal company-wide course titled “Level Up – Leadership Lessons from Video Games”. While the title sounds fun and interesting, it was really challenging to create something that makes sense and is useful.
Let’s use this as an example to show how my process works. Before I go into details, a quick disclaimer – this is just what works for me. You’re welcome to try it, but it might not give you the same results. The best approach is to adapt it to your own style. And to do that, start with a simple question: what kind of presenter am I?
You Do You
Take me, for example, I don’t have an artistic bone in my body. That means my slides are never going to be beautiful, nor do I aim for them to be. Instead, my strength is in making topics relatable through personal stories. I’ve found that I’m more confident speaking from experience than theory. People often say, “It takes courage to share your own experiences,” but for me, it feels more natural than being abstract.
And yes, while presentations should start with the audience, they also reflect the presenter. A good presentation isn’t just about getting the topic right; it’s also about the storytelling and delivery aspect that comes from you as an individual.
Great Presentations Don’t Start with Slides — They Start with Framing the Problem
It’s important to feel confident in what and how you present things. This confidence comes from writing things down and grouping them in my own way. These are the notes I made for myself before I started the course I mentioned above. I wanted to approach the topic as best I could and narrow down the focus.
What is the presentation about?
In this specific example, it was how to correlate gaming with leadership. The main challenge was a very diverse group of people. I had to consider how to talk about gaming without going too deep into it because of the audience’s different gaming knowledge and experience. Why does it matter? Remember, it needs to be relatable to the majority. You don’t want to clog the storytelling with too much context; it needs to be easily understandable with as few words as possible.
Repeating the message
I believe presentations are, at their core, information dumps. That’s why repetition is key – but it should focus on just one message you want your audience to remember. In my presentation, the main goal was to raise awareness about past gaming experiences and the lessons they offer. I wanted people to reflect more deeply on those experiences and how to draw from them. So, the central theme I repeated throughout was self-reflection.
Possible engagement activities
Presentations should naturally be engaging. Part of it depends on how interested the audience is in the topic, and part depends on how effectively you engage them through discussions and activities. Your slide delivery influences whether the activity is serious or fun, and whether it’s led by you or the audience.
Scalability matters too. Some activities are good for smaller groups while bad for larger. The important thing is how you want to engage people and where their focus should be during the activity. For example, asking people to speak one by one works in small settings, while using chat responses is better for larger groups to keep focus and reduce pressure.
Keep in mind that the kind of questions you ask is very important. Open-ended questions are generally the best fuel for conversations. Look into what other types there are (9 Types of Questions to Ask Your Audience) and use them when needed.
Topics
Since the presentation is focused on building leadership skills, I asked myself: which of these have I developed through gaming—and which can I turn into relatable stories even for people who don’t know much about gaming?
I started by listing key skills and brainstorming how they connect to games and the messages I want to share. The result was messy and uneven, but getting everything on paper helps me organize my thoughts. This step is crucial—it gives me clarity and builds my confidence in the core idea I’ll be presenting.
Slides framework
After settling in on subtopics of the presentation, I go through the process of conceptually building the blocks, both the talking and the slide ones. It is like building an essay framework starting from an intro, chapters, and then a conclusion. In this process, I crystallize what I will talk about, which stories to tell, and how my slides would look.
If I get stuck and can’t progress, it’s a sign that I need to reassess whether the topic I’ve decided on before fits the narrative. I group the content logically and topically and think about how to adapt it to the audience. I start with keywords and develop them into full messages, connecting everything with storytelling and my own experiences.
This all might seem like a lot, but to circle back, it’s my process that makes me more confident and helps me create slides quicker. Let’s now jump into making a presentation itself.
To sum up
Designing a presentation is not about chasing perfection — it’s about being intentional. When you treat your presentation like a product, you start to focus on what really matters: delivering value, creating clarity, and connecting with your audience. It’s not just about the visuals or the content, but about how the experience feels for the people on the receiving end.
Your slides won’t carry the message on their own — you will. So lean into your strengths, adapt your process, and don’t be afraid to share your personality through storytelling. Iterate, gather feedback, and keep refining. The more aligned your message is with your audience and your own style, the more natural and impactful your presentation will be.
In the end, a great presentation doesn’t just transfer information — it starts a conversation, sparks curiosity, and stays with people long after the slides are gone.
