Many teachers of presentation skills will quote the fact that the communication of a message is composed of 55% visual - images, posture, body language, dress, facial expression etc - and of 38% vocal impact - tonality, volume, rhythm etc. (The remaining 7% accounts for the actual words spoken.)
While some will argue with the actual percentages, the undeniable fact is that the visual aspects of any presentation have tremendous power.
Communicators need to be aware of this, and then carefully consider how to best use the visual to improve the impact of their message.
(It must be stressed that simply using a tool such as PowerPoint does not count as a good use of the visual.)
As a training company, pearcemayfield are always disappointed to hear of training courses that consist of delegates sitting through hours of lectures complete with literally hundreds of slides, which in turn are made up entirely of bullet-pointed text after bullet-pointed text. It brings the industry into disrepute!
It's boring - and we have banned boring.
At last week's Best Practice Showcase in London we ran a series of workshops, and in order to bring out the best in the groups and the sessions, we used a strongly visual approach. Here's my colleague, Richard Rose, looking very pleased with the results (although for the sake of full disclosure, it should be said that this drawing was the work of my other colleague, Patrick Mayfield).
The power of the visual cannot be over-stated. The next time you are on a course or at a presentation, why not critique it for its use of the visual...?
