Why There's No Time Like Show Time

They didn't win that engagement, but Blum learned an important lesson about consulting capability presentation pitches that he has tried to follow ever since. "We should have kept it short, maybe do the whole thing in five slides," he realizes. Following the mantra "Keep it short — Shorter — Even shorter still" has paid off many times since that fateful presentation. When a prospective client allotted two hours for each competing firm's capabilities presentation, Blum's team wrapped up the formal presentation part in just 25 minutes (and nobody fell asleep). "That opened up a lot of time for real questions and discussion," he says. And his team won the engagement.
Technology vendors are rushing to provide consultants with the latest hardware and software tools to produce killer presentations — lighter, brighter, multimedia-capable projectors; dazzling on-screen graphics, embedded video, animation, and sound; sophisticated on-line conferencing; and more. Although the tools and technology can help a consulting firm stand out, in the end successful presentations succeed or fail primarily on the intellectual content of the presentation and the skill of the presenter. The best technology cannot mask poor ideas and weak presenters for long.
"The challenge is not the technology, but knowing how to present well," says Jerry Cahn, principal, Presentation Excellence, Inc., a New York–based presentation training firm. If anything, the widespread availability of great presentation tools and technology only puts more pressure on the presenter to deliver impressive content well, since everybody, good presenters and bad, can have equally slick graphics projected with stunningly vivid colors and detail.

Presentations have become a way of life for consultants, and not just when pitching capabilities to prospective clients. "Presentations are the way to present information. Nobody writes a proposal anymore; it's always a presentation. Even engagement deliverables are often accompanied by a presentation," says Blum.
Today, with the emphasis on presentations, effective consultants need to know how to use visuals and audio as they combine their spoken message and media in an effective presentation. "Clients will evaluate you on your presentation style as well as your content," Blum observes. "A great presentation of a weak proposal can beat an excellent proposal presented poorly, especially with an inexperienced audience," he continues. Experienced audiences, on the other hand, often discount the presentation dazzle and pizzazz and are able to focus on the content.
Despite the sophistication of the new presentation tools, the basics of a good presentation haven't changed. "You want one objective and three goals, and you want your graphics to support what you are saying," advises Cahn. Too often, presenters simply read the text on their slides or allow the graphics and visual pyrotechnics to steal the spotlight, ultimately undermining their message.
"Use the graphics to explain rather than dazzle," adds Blum. Today's corporate audiences are increasingly hard to dazzle anyway. They have already seen all the slick capabilities provided by Microsoft PowerPoint and the popular add-ons.
Although there is no formula for a successful presentation other than, maybe, "Keep it short," there definitely are killer mistakes consultants should avoid. These include: putting too much on the slide, using too much color in too many combinations, and failing to interact with the audience. To interact with the audience, for example, Blum will stop the presentation altogether and step over to a white board. "With the white board, we can become more interactive, and it lessens the formality," he says.

Despite the continued importance of the presentation content, the technology of presentations indeed plays an important role. The old overhead projectors are becoming as rare in the corporate setting as adding machines. The consultant today will be presenting from his or her laptop computer and projecting it on the conference room screen or wall.
The laptop, then, has become the essential core presentation tool. A lightweight Windows-capable laptop running Microsoft Office, which includes PowerPoint, the de facto standard for presentation software, with a large (14-in., 15-in.) LCD high-resolution color screen, is the required minimum equipment. The laptop is used both to create the presentation and then to run it. There may be a consultant who doesn't already have such a laptop, but he or she would be very rare indeed.

Although a laptop alone is sufficient for basic presentation chores, more is usually required. The consultant who is going to give the presentation to more than one or possibly two people — the number who can squeeze in front of the laptop screen — will also need a projector to take the screen image, enlarge it, and display it on a big screen or wall for viewing by a group.
Where most consultants are intimately familiar with laptops, readily comparing features in airport waiting lounges, far fewer are familiar with projectors. Typically, they use whatever the firm has or whatever is available in the client's conference room. Still, some familiarity with projectors can make life easier for the consultant who spends considerable time on the road.
Four words used to sum up everything a consultant needed to know about projectors: smaller, lighter, brighter, cheaper. "That's not the case anymore. The industry hit the wall in weight and size," reports Art Feierman, CEO, Presenting Solutions, LLC, a distributor of projectors based in San Clemente, CA. Three-pound projectors are about as light as they come these days "but they aren't selling that well," he says. Slightly larger and heavier 5- to 6-lb. projectors quickly grabbed 40% of the market when they first appeared, and most buyers don't appear willing to pay more or accept less brightness for the lighter models, he notes. The lighter projectors tend to use DLP (digital light processing) technology, while their larger counterparts are more likely to employ older LCD (liquid crystal display) features.

The real issue today is brightness, which is measured in lumens. Typical portable projectors produce 1,000 to 1,200 lumens. The smallest models, and low-cost ones, may put out only 600 to 800 lumens. High-end models and large, nonportable projectors can put out 2,000 to 3,000 lumens or more. How many lumens does a consultant need? "If you saw only 800 lumens in a conference room, you'd think it was dynamite — until you saw more," says Dave Gormley, CEO, Ad-Tech Systems, Inc., a projector distributor based in Wayland, MA.
Price is another issue. Projectors aren't cheap. New ones run $2,000 or more. A few are available under $2,000. "The average cost is $3,000," notes Gormley. The less expensive models offer less brightness and lower resolution. To find a projector below $1,000, you will probably have to look at refurbished or used ones. When buying a projector, he adds, look for a warranty that provides overnight replacement. If the projector fails, the vendor immediately ships another to arrive within 24 hours. (It takes your broken one back, fixes it, and sells it as refurbished.)
The leading projector vendor in terms of units sold is InFocus, which is followed by Epson and NEC, Feierman reports. Plus Corp. is the leader in 3-lb. units, adds Gormley.

The next trend in presentations, however, seems to be upstaging projectors altogether. "The Web conference is the future," Cahn points out. In Web conferences, the consultant delivers his presentation through an on-line service, such as WebEX or PlaceWare. The audience, which can be located anywhere in the world with phone and Internet connections, logs on to view the presentation and dials in by phone to listen and talk. The consultant still controls the flow of the presentation, and it can be as interactive as the presenter allows.
With Web conferencing neither the consultant nor client has to travel, which saves time and money. This may work for presentations during the course of an engagement, such as a periodic update on a project, but it doesn't appeal to consultants for initial presentations and when the relationship is just getting underway, notes Cahn. At that early stage, face-to-face contact is considered essential. Web conferencing is young, and many business people are still unfamiliar and uncomfortable with it. Interest spiked following September 11 when businesses cut back travel, but widespread acceptance has been slow.

The low-budget, do-it-yourself approach entails sending the PowerPoint presentation via e-mail to the client in advance. The consultant then calls the client by phone to talk through it, with each party running the presentation on his or her own desktop. Cahn himself has used this approach when working with a client in Israel: "It's cheap, except for the long distance phone call."
Whether giving a presentation in person or over the Web, presenting well remains an important consulting skill, and the basics of effective presentations still apply. And with all presentations, consultants still face the "high-tech, high-touch problem," says Cahn. High-tech — lightweight projectors, dazzling presentation graphics, and other advanced technologies — certainly helps the consultant to shine, but in the end, high-touch — establishing a strong personal rapport with the audience — makes for the most convincing presentation.