The Presentations Japan Series

It is not often that we get a front row seat to watch a group of very senior businesspeople compete with each other when presenting.   If you like blood sports, then this is right up your alley.  Thi…

Our presenter was vivacious, sparky, bright and engaging. She works in a cool area of business and has the opportunity to see what works and doesn’t work in many industries.  This enables her to pull…

Foreign companies often want to appoint a Japanese person to be the head of their Japan operation.  This is done on the basis that they will know what is best for the business.  This proclivity has m…

The Lord Mayor of London covers the whole con-urban spread of greater London and the Lord Mayor of the City of London covers 1.12 square kilometres of the financial district with a population of near…

“Will It Blend” was a genius idea from Blendtec, kicked off with a $50 budget in 2006. The campaign saw Tom Dickson’s videos go viral and take a boring blender manufacturer into the pantheon of marke…

We are usually asked to speak at events by some hosting organisation and these can be breakfast, lunches or evening occasions.  Each has its challenges.  Not that many people seem to be great in the …

I am terrible.  I procrastinate about starting the assembly of my presentation.  Invariably, by holding off starting, I create time tension, which forces me to elevate the priority of the presentatio…

I was in a recent debate with the Dale Carnegie organisation about approving the publication of my new book “Japan Leadership Mastery”.  There were concerns about copyright, because I was drawing on …

Almost 100% of presentations that I see in Japan are one directional.  The audience sits there passively and the speaker presents to them.  There is no interaction with the audience.  I was watching …

TikTok, Reels, Shorts, etc., are video snippets training everyone to micro absorb information and stimuli.  If it doesn’t grab our attention in three seconds, we are off that screen and scrolling for…

Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is a bad idea and yet so many presenters do it.  I was attending an Annual General Meeting event and the organisation President gave a short talk.  The conte…

What a double act they were. Two economists giving us some insights into where the markets are going and making sense of the world we face.  Anytime you see an event where there is going to be some c…

Value is a difficult thing to pin down.  In any audience, there is bound to be a wide range of interests, needs, and wants.  How do we decipher that array into a presentation which meets all expectat…

We love another acronym, not!  It is a handy memory jogger though, so let’s persevere with yet another one.  Whenever you are in a situation where you need to get collaboration,  support, funding or …

Where is the line between referencing our experiences and insights and just talking about ourselves?  I attended a talk recently where the speaker had a perspective to share with the audience, to add…

I was recently reminded of the importance of openings and transitions when presenting watching a new speaker in action. They were using the occasion to establish their business here in Japan.  Like t…

When we are planning our talk, we have to decide what is the purpose of this presentation?  In business, typically, we most often deliver the “inform” type.  We will pass over information we have com…

Navigation is critical in presenting.  This is how we keep the audience with us and keep reinforcing our key messages.  Years ago, I attended a speech by a serious VIP.  He had jetted in from the US …

Does introducing emotion when presenting mean sharing a good weep with the audience?  No, that is way over the top in a business context and would be the death knell of the speaker’s credibility.  We…

I was reading an interesting LinkedIn post about how at the start of your presentation in Japan you need to have slides on your background and credentials to get the trust of the audience.

Let me quo…