Delivering a Powerful Presentation

 

The following is an excerpt from Powerful Presentation Handbook - a book that can serve as a guide whenever you are making a presentation whether it is given in or out of a courtroom.

CRAFTING THE CONTENT OF A PRESENTATION

There are three guiding principles for selecting and designing the content of your presentation: (1) a purpose and passion; (2) suitable to the audience; and (3) engage and entertain.

1. PURPOSE AND PASSION 

First, have a passion and a purpose. As Danielle Kennedy says, “The speaker’s objectives are like the writer’s thesis statement. What are you trying to say? Accomplish? What is the purpose of the speech? It’s mission statement? If you don’t know, should the audience guess?” Selling the Danielle Kennedy Way, Danielle Kennedy (1991)

What are you going to talk about? What are you trying to say? Accomplish? Is the subject of your presentation decided by others or is that left up to you? Usually, you will be asked to speak on the subject because you are knowledgeable about it. However, you might be assigned to speak on a subject upon which you are not well versed. 

No matter how you arrive at the assigned subject, you want to make the subject your own—to know what you want to get across to your audience—your purpose. When the subject of your talk is your own and you have a purpose, you will have a passion for your subject, enabling you to speak from your heart and mind to your audience. If you can’t make the speech your own, don’t give it.

Nothing is more dynamic than a person who has purpose and a passion for the subject and wants to deliver the message from the speaker’s heart to the hearts of people in the audience. In Chapter 3 “Lessons in Eloquent Rhetoric”, we can tell from their speeches that Reverend King, Oprah Winfrey, Abraham Lincoln, Barack Obama, and Gerry Spence each had a purpose and passion for their subject matter. Each of them radiated their purpose and passion to the audience. 

2. SUITABLE TO THE AUDIENCE

The second principle for crafting the content of a successful presentation is to make sure that the audience needs and wants to learn about the subject. If the presentation does not meet listeners’ needs and wants, it is not worth giving. 

The topic must fit what the audience wants and needs. Sometimes, while the audience members may need to learn about a subject, they do not want to listen to a talk on the subject. If that is the situation, they are not going to learn much. If the audience needs to learn about a subject but does not naturally want to learn about it, you must create the desire to know. 

Creating a want to know in the audience can be accomplished by explaining to the audience why they should care about the subject of your talk. For example, when I worked at the National Advocacy Center in Columbia, South Carolina, every week a new contingent of state and local prosecutors came to Columbia to receive training at the Center. They were there to become better prosecutors. What did they want? They wanted practical information that would help them perform their job. 

While the attendees at the Center needed a presentation on prosecutor professionalism—legal ethics—to become better prosecutors, a lecture on the subject was not one they, as a matter of course, were looking forward to and wanted.  Because the attendees did want practical information, it was important for the presenter to explain, with the aid of every-day practical examples, that ethics violations can result in mistrials and reversals of convictions. An ethic’s presentation framed around this practical information coupled with advice concerning how to avoid professional responsibility pitfalls was one that the prosecutors wanted in the lecture on prosecutorial professionalism.

3. ENGAGE AND ENTERTAIN

The third principle for selecting and crafting your powerful presentation is—find material that will engage and entertain the audience. Yes, entertain them. To accomplish this, the speaker must do the necessary brainstorming and research. Where do we get the material to include in the presentation? The first and best source is your creative mind. When you are motivated by either glee or fear that you are going to give a talk, ideas will start flowing. 

The ideas may include a joke, a story, a demonstration, a personal experience, an anecdote, and so on. Get out of the way and do not pass judgment on the ideas that come to you because you are brainstorming. Do not initially reject a train of thought because on later reflection what you initially thought was not a good idea, could indeed be usable.  

Write down your ideas.  Put them in a file on your computer. Label the file with the date of your talk and title of the presentation. When an idea comes to you, put it in the file. Keep a tablet by your bed or a phone so you can record the ideas when they come to you in the middle of the night.

Here are some notions that are winners:

• Naturally, anything supporting the message you want to impart to the audience.

• Stories: Use stories to make a point. 

• A joke that is pertinent to the topic.

• Quotations: They are useful to drive home a point. A quote is good if it is from a well-known, respected figure. 

• Transcript: If the subject is trial work, an excerpt from a trial transcript could fit in the talk. 

• Extended anecdotes work well. 

• Demonstrations: Demonstrations can highlight a point you want to make.

• Rhetorical devices, such as an analogy, simile or metaphor, which will be discussed in the next chapter.

The topic of your talk will dictate to you what research you need to do. Discuss your talk with the person who asked you to make the presentation; find out what the person wants to get across to the audience. Read everything can get your hands on about the subject. Talk to people who are knowledgeable on the subject. 

If you are interested in reading more of the book, you can locate it on Amazon by clicking here. It is only $7.99 in paperback and free on Kindle Unlimited.

Cross-Examining Trump

Trial lawyers think differently from other human beings when they evaluate a person. First, they evaluate what the person has to offer in the case in the context of the rules of evidence. The trial lawyer ponders whether or not what the witness has to offer is admissible in evidence. If the witness hurts the case, the lawyer may move to keep the witness off the stand or exclude part of the witness’s testimony as inadmissible under the rules of evidence. If what the witness offers is helpful, the lawyer comes to court prepared to argue it is admissible under the rules.

Second, the trial lawyer evaluates what the witness has to offer in terms of whether it helps or hurts the case. Obviously, if it hurts, the lawyer turns to the rules of evidence in hopes of being able to keep the witness off the stand or exclude the harmful part of the witness’s testimony. Conversely, if what the witness offers is good for the case, the trial lawyer will want the witness to take the take the stand and get the evidence the witness can provide admitted into evidence.

With those two concepts in mind, consider Donald Trump’s involvement in the E. Jean Carroll case in which the jury awarded plaintiff Carroll $83.3 million. Defense counsel called Trump to the stand, and he testified for around three minutes. 

Let’s evaluate Trump as a witness from the plaintiff’s lawyer’s perspective utilizing the two criteria—admissibility of the evidence and whether or not the evidence is helpful or harmful. Regarding admissibility of the evidence, to the extent that Trump wanted to continue denying he sexually assaulted Carroll, the plaintiff’s had the court’s ruling on the evidence that that issue had been resolved during the first trial and that testimony that the sexual harassment did not happen would not be allowed. 

Second and most fascinating is how the two sides evaluated what Trump contributed to the case in terms of whether it was good or bad. It’s hard to fathom why defense counsel put him on the stand and let him behave the way he did in the courtroom. He offered little during his three minutes on the stand.

Plaintiff’s counsel were delighted by Trump’s performance and gave it high marks for helping the plaintiff’s case. As they have said in public interviews after the trial, the plaintiff’s themes for the case were that Trump was a bully who thought the rules did not apply to him, and Trump’s courtroom behavior offered corroboration for those themes. Trump not only spoke loudly so the jury could hear him when he should not have done so, and he walked out the courtroom during opposing counsel’s closing argument, which is a breach of courtroom decorum. 

The court probably instructed the jury to evaluate a witness’s testimony in terms somewhat along these lines:

"In considering a witness's testimony, you may consider these things: the opportunity of the witness to observe or know the things they testify about; the ability of the witness to observe accurately; the quality of a witness's memory while testifying; the manner of the witness while testifying; any personal interest that the witness might have in the outcome or the issues; any bias or prejudice that the witness may have shown; the reasonableness of the witness's statements in the context of all of the other evidence; and any other factors that affect your evaluation or belief of a witness or your evaluation of his or her testimony." (Emphasis added)

Also, the jury was considering punitive damages - what it would take to stop Trump from defaming Carroll - and his demeanor and behavior didn't help him.

Clearly in the minds of E. Jean Carroll and her lawyers, Trump’s demeanor and behavior helped their case. Short cross-examination if any was called for.