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December 1, 2022

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How To Prepare a Meeting Presentation - 10 Practical Tips

Many of us will likely be required to give a presentation in a meeting at some point in our careers. And while it may be intimidating to stand in front of a group of people at 9 am and plainly state your thoughts, if done well, it can help skyrocket your confidence, credibility, and of course, career.

What's Inside?

But meeting presentations are just so easy to screw up. After all, compressing complicated business topics into a short series of slides is a challenge in itself. But then you also have to go and present those ideas to a group of people in such a way that they will understand and get on board with your ideas.

However, when delivered successfully, presentations may be a powerful tool for spreading your ideas. But not just that. A powerhouse presentation will also instill within the audience a fresh perspective on the presenter's authority and credibility.

And for that very purpose, here at Decktopus, we have put together a list of some of the most effective strategies you can use to plan, deliver, and follow up on your meeting presentation, so the next time you feel a bit overwhelmed, you can still get out there and captivate the audience!

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Know Your Audience

Before you put pen to paper, you first need to know to whom you will be presenting your ideas. And this means much more than knowing the names and credentials of each audience member.

A successful presenter must know her audience in excruciating detail. This includes their level of grasp on the subject, education, sense of humor, what they ate last night, and all other idiosyncrasies you can use to increase their immersion in the presentation.

Think of yourself as a second-hand car dealer. If a client came in wearing a Prada suit, you wouldn’t show them the Reliant Robin that’s been lying around for the last twenty years with rust patterns beginning to resemble famous prophets. No, you would direct them to the shiny new Mercedes that just came in yesterday.

This is because, even though you might want to sell a particular car, the client may not be interested in that specific design. And as a successful dealer, you must consider what your customer may be interested in beforehand and offer them the exact car or, in this case, presentation they want.

Use the information you have on your audience to structure your approach. For instance, you don’t want to use strings of big words if the audience isn’t as knowledgeable on the subject as you.

And similarly, decide on how much conversation grease you need to use depending on how much you think they will be invested in the presentation. For example, if you catch someone yawning, it might be just the opportunity to break the fourth wall and joke with them about the time they passed out on the copy machine.

It’s a complex recipe to make, but when you get it right, you’ll not only secure your audience’s attention but also make your message all the more memorable.

Do Your Research

A successful meeting begins before it even begins. The better your meeting preparation, the more effective your meeting will be.

When you arrive unprepared for a meeting, it shows that you aren't giving the meeting — or, more frustratingly, its audience — priority.

The good news is that everyone can deliver captivating presentations to their audience with careful research.

To be ready for queries, you must be knowledgeable in your subject. However, you also need to know how to mold it to convey the message you want the audience to take away.

Know the presentation's goals inside and out, and try to determine what the audience will find most interesting rather than what you are most eager to share with them.

Share the statistics that will have the biggest influence on your audience and that best support your arguments. To help make your point, use graphs, charts, or other visual materials.

Also, don’t forget to prepare a list of questions in advance. You'd be surprised at how impressed the audience would be to learn that you have done your research before the meeting.

Outline Your Presentation

As we mentioned in ‘Top Presentation Statistics for 2022’ most people consider ‘the story’ the most important and memorable part of a presentation. This means that your meeting presentation has to follow a well-structured narrative.

For most purposes, a modified version of the simple three-step presentation structure will be a suitable foundation to deliver a message successfully. Let’s go into more detail on how to make good use of each step.

Introduction

In any presentation, the primary objective of the introduction is to present the topic of discussion and the key message of the presentation itself. Some phrases you can use in this section are:

• 'Today I would like to talk about a very critical issue with our...'
• 'It is vital to understand that...'
• 'I believe this can be solved by...'

This section of your presentation supports your primary message. Each of your main points should be discussed in a clear and logical order. As you go, be sure to explain how these points relate to one another and to your main point. Phrases like the following may be beneficial:

• ‘Firstly, we must consider…’
• ‘As I mentioned before, this will enable us to…’
• ‘We must keep in mind the effects of…’

The ending of your presentation is an excellent chance to go over your key messages and their significance. In this section, you may benefit from a heavier use of literary techniques if the context is suitable to do so. Some typical phrases from the conclusion sections are:

• ‘Having seen the data, I am sure that you will agree with me when I say…’
• ‘And remember…’

This simple template should provide a suitable basis for you to expand according to the specificities of your presentation.

For example, it is common to see some meeting presentations require a much larger introduction section if the topics explained include many complex components. On the other hand, some may find it more beneficial to keep it short and punctual to evoke emotion in the audience.

Create a First Draft

“It doesn’t matter if it’s good right now, it just needs to exist.” — Austin Kleon

Most of us who are not in the antiques and collectibles industry can probably agree that the first version of something is usually not the best. The same principle goes for preparing meeting presentations as well.

The great thing about first drafts is that they give you the chance to visualize all the material you have developed thus far. Once you can see all your ideas in one place, you can start building off them, making additions where they may be helpful or omissions where necessary.

It will also serve as a creative playground. A solid practice among writers is to write down everything that comes to your mind and then pick and choose the sections that you think will be the best for the slide.

Design Your Presentation Slides

To most of us, a presentation’s graphic design side may seem a bit of a hassle. And according to Northern Illinois University , ‘Poorly designed presentation materials’ is one of the areas that students struggle with the most.

This is an important aspect of any successful presentation. Because, no matter how interesting your message is, if your audience is unable to keep up with the presentation, they are unlikely to be immersed in the content. The key to a successful presentation design is to structure it in such a way that it supports the message with eye-catching imagery while remaining simplistic.

There are several tried and tested tactics you can use to calibrate your visuals for this exact purpose:

• Avoid huge blocks of text
• Present one key point per slide
• Use quotes, images, and infographics
• Choose a font size that is visible when projected
• Keep the number of fonts to a minimum

Rehearse a Lot, Rehearse Aloud!

Rehearsal is critical for delivering an effective presentation. Rehearsing boosts your confidence, ensures you fully understand your material, and allows you to hone your presentation skills before the big meet.

It is critical to practice delivering your speech as well as using your visual aids, as many bits of hardware have a nasty tendency to malfunction right in the middle of a presentation.

This way, you will be better prepared for the actual presentation and get specific insights about its current state that you can use to tweak certain areas. For example, if the presentation takes a bit too long in your rehearsal, you will know, and be able to shorten it before actually getting in front of the audience.

Also, you might want to take this chance to choose and refine your mimics and gestures too, as these also play a prominent role in successfully conveying the desired message.

Prepare Written Notes

Generally, most people tend to believe that if they are delivering a presentation or a speech, they must be able to do so entirely from memory, without the use of notes. They seem to believe notes are cheating or make them appear unsure of their material. But it could not be further from the truth!

As a matter of fact, many public figures oftentimes make use of small notes in their speeches or presentations. This shows that they know the importance of sticking to your predetermined flow structure, and are aware that without a little reminder, it is entirely possible to lose track in the moment.

And what better way to remind yourself of your next topic of discussion than a small note?

Below we listed two of the most common types of notes used in speeches and presentations.

A4 Sheets of Paper

For more complex or longer topics, placing your notes on sheets of paper may work much better than other types of notes, simply because it allows you to write down so much more information. Just imagine trying to fit a 40-slide presentation into cue cards!

Advantages:

• Much more room for more detailed notes
• Can read verbatim in the worst-case scenario
• Can serve as a script if the presentation format allows it

Disadvantages:

• Looks very unprofessional if the presenter is standing
• Much larger and easy to drop

These little cards are an absolute wonder for many public speakers, but can also be used very effectively when doing a meeting presentation.

There are different ways to use cue cards, but the most effective way seems to be to note down the topic of discussion for that duration of the presentation and a sentence transition to move on to the next topic. Cue cards are also notoriously slippery. So don’t forget to number them just in case.

• Much smaller and easy to carry
• Barely visible, and doesn’t hurt your credibility
• Very limited space to write notes
• Can cause confusion if numbered/ordered incorrectly

Engage The Audience

According to the University of Minnesota Extension , "Tasks and processes that engage group members will help create more effective meetings and good results." Now, this should not come as a huge shock. Because if you think about it, the more you manage to engage your audience with the content, the more immersive and memorable it will be for them.

By giving your audience a chance to go beyond listening, and interact with your content, you will be establishing a basis for discussion around the topics in your presentation. This will not only make people more interested and invested in what you have to say but also work actively to find points of discussion within it.

Also, if you've ever been nervous in front of an audience, you'll understand how much of a difference it makes in terms of atmosphere when you can get the audience engaged right away. It not only helps you to gain confidence and calm your nerves, but it can also significantly improve the impact of your words.

Start Your Presentation Right

8 seconds. You have that much time to capture the interest of your audience. Between 2000 and 2015, decreased by about a quarter, and our ability to focus has since fallen behind that of the notoriously ill-focused goldfish, who are able to focus on a task or object for 9 seconds.

So clearly, the opening of your presentation has to pique the interest of your audience. Here are some ways to do that:

• Tell a story: You must engage your audience if you want to ace a presentation. The easiest approach to achieve this is to include a little story that relates to your presentation and the reason you are discussing that subject. If appropriate, you can draw the audience's attention by sharing brief, memorable anecdotes from your own experiences.

We are more likely to listen and remember information when it is presented in this way because the human brain enjoys a good story. Additionally, we are more responsive and less skeptical to the information that is about to be conveyed.

• Ask a question: Questions are one of the most interactive ways to start a presentation. You can pose a question and ask for a show of hands to maximize audience engagement.

Questions trigger a mental reflex known as “ instinctive elaboration .” When asked, they take over the mind and that may be a strong starting point for a meeting.

Typically, rhetorical questions are designed to grab the audience's attention and nudge them toward forming an opinion. Just make sure the inquiry leads them to concur with the main point of your presentation.

• Use a short icebreaker activity: Icebreakers are a creditworthy method of engaging your audience.

Our brain is very sociable and loves to engage with others. So, prepare a little icebreaker to get everyone chatting. Although they might not be crucial in terms of content, they play a crucial role in engagement.

Leave nothing to chance and be sure you thoroughly prepare your opening because it could set the tone for the rest of the meeting. A strong start to your presentation will rouse the interest of the audience while a lackluster opening invites blank stares.

Encourage Questions and Discussions

There might not always be time for questions but you should always be prepared to be broiled just in case. No matter how bad it sounds, receiving questions means that your audience is listening.

What’s more, questions allow you to clarify anything that was unclear and to expand on a specific topic that your audience is interested in or that you forgot to cover.

Try to not go through the facts in your presentation in its entirety. Instead, give your audience ample opportunity to ask questions. You can then address any issues or further explore any concepts they don't comprehend in this way.

Since the audience typically asks questions out of genuine interest rather than to trip you up, think of it as a great opportunity to consider how you may expand your work.

Making the audience active participants by encouraging questions and discussions also makes it simpler for them to remember what they've learned.

And here's something that might help if you're anxious about answering questions: If there's someone in the audience you know and trust, ask them to ask you a question. Even better, give them the question they’ll be asking. That way, you can get things started and boost your confidence.

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How to Give a Killer Presentation

• Chris Anderson

For more than 30 years, the TED conference series has presented enlightening talks that people enjoy watching. In this article, Anderson, TED’s curator, shares five keys to great presentations:

• Frame your story (figure out where to start and where to end).
• Plan your delivery (decide whether to memorize your speech word for word or develop bullet points and then rehearse it—over and over).
• Work on stage presence (but remember that your story matters more than how you stand or whether you’re visibly nervous).
• Plan the multimedia (whatever you do, don’t read from PowerPoint slides).
• Put it together (play to your strengths and be authentic).

According to Anderson, presentations rise or fall on the quality of the idea, the narrative, and the passion of the speaker. It’s about substance—not style. In fact, it’s fairly easy to “coach out” the problems in a talk, but there’s no way to “coach in” the basic story—the presenter has to have the raw material. So if your thinking is not there yet, he advises, decline that invitation to speak. Instead, keep working until you have an idea that’s worth sharing.

Lessons from TED

A little more than a year ago, on a trip to Nairobi, Kenya, some colleagues and I met a 12-year-old Masai boy named Richard Turere, who told us a fascinating story. His family raises livestock on the edge of a vast national park, and one of the biggest challenges is protecting the animals from lions—especially at night. Richard had noticed that placing lamps in a field didn’t deter lion attacks, but when he walked the field with a torch, the lions stayed away. From a young age, he’d been interested in electronics, teaching himself by, for example, taking apart his parents’ radio. He used that experience to devise a system of lights that would turn on and off in sequence—using solar panels, a car battery, and a motorcycle indicator box—and thereby create a sense of movement that he hoped would scare off the lions. He installed the lights, and the lions stopped attacking. Soon villages elsewhere in Kenya began installing Richard’s “lion lights.”

• CA Chris Anderson is the curator of TED.

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How to Conduct Effective Meeting Presentations?

Learn the art of conducting effective meeting presentations with our comprehensive guide.

How to Present During a Meeting?

When presenting during a meeting, utilize a visually appealing presentation template to impress your audience. Whether it's a business update, proposal pitch, or board meeting, a customizable PowerPoint or Google Slides template can keep your presentation persuasive and your audience engaged. Download popular templates for an intuitive and bold visual impact.

Craft infographics, charts, and graphs to communicate data effectively. Introduce speakers, analyze key points, and address stakeholders with an eye-catching design.

Pro tips: keep your presentation concise, address department KPIs, and be ready to communicate action items. Make your next meeting visually compelling, fully customizable, and ready for success.

What are the essential components of a successful meeting presentation?

The essential components of a successful meeting presentation encompass a blend of visual appeal, concise communication, and strategic engagement. Begin with a well-designed presentation template, whether in PowerPoint, Google Slides, or Keynote, to set a visually impressive tone. Craft a compelling agenda that outlines key updates, proposals, or pitches, ensuring your meeting presentation aligns with the overall goal. Utilize charts, graphs, and infographics to present data clearly and persuasively. Keep your presentation customizable, allowing for adaptability to different audiences. 

Address stakeholders, introduce speakers, and analyze departmental insights with a persuasive narrative. Engage your audience with eye-catching graphics, bold visuals, and an intuitive flow. Edit lengthier content, appeal to the CEO or board of directors, and pay attention to key performance indicators (KPIs). Enable collective participation by outlining action items, hosting a productive meeting, and keeping your team updated with impactful visuals.

Key slides to include in your meeting presentation

In crafting a comprehensive meeting presentation, several key slides are essential to convey information effectively. Begin with a title slide that sets the tone and introduces the topic. Follow with an agenda slide outlining the meeting structure. Utilize an updated slide to present key information succinctly, keeping stakeholders informed. Incorporate charts and graphs for visual impact in a data slide, providing a clear representation of metrics or performance.

For proposals or pitches, a persuasive slide detailing the proposition and benefits is crucial. An interactive timeline slide can visually map out project progress or plans. Engage the audience with infographics, showcasing complex data in an accessible manner. Conclude with a summary slide, recapping key points and opening the floor for discussions or questions. These key slides collectively create a dynamic and informative presentation, ensuring your message resonates with the audience.

Tips for creating an engaging meeting presentation

Creating an engaging meeting presentation involves a strategic blend of content, visuals, and delivery. Begin by understanding your audience and tailoring your content to their interests and needs. Craft a compelling narrative that follows a logical flow, ensuring clarity and coherence. Utilize visually appealing slides with graphics, charts, and minimal text to maintain audience interest. Incorporate interactive elements like polls or Q&A sessions to actively involve participants.

Practice your delivery to ensure a confident and engaging presence during the presentation. Keep the content concise, focusing on key points to avoid overwhelming your audience. Utilize storytelling techniques to make your presentation memorable and relatable. Invite questions and discussions to foster participant engagement, turning your meeting presentation into a dynamic and interactive experience.

How to customize a meeting presentation template

Customizing a meeting presentation template allows you to tailor the content to your specific needs and style. Begin by choosing a template that aligns with the theme and purpose of your presentation. Update the title slide with your presentation's title, date, and any relevant branding. Modify the agenda slide to reflect the meeting structure and topics. Replace placeholder text and images with your content, ensuring clarity and relevance. Adjust the color scheme and fonts to match your brand or personal preferences. Add or remove slides as needed to suit the presentation's flow. Incorporate your logo and other branding elements for a professional touch.

Don't forget to review the template for consistency and coherence after customization. By personalizing each aspect, you transform a generic template into a unique and impactful meeting presentation that effectively communicates your message.

Why PowerPoint is a popular choice for meeting presentations

PowerPoint remains a popular choice for meeting presentations due to its user-friendly interface, versatility, and widespread accessibility. The software provides a straightforward platform for creating visually appealing slides, allowing presenters to integrate text, images, and multimedia seamlessly. With a plethora of built-in templates and design tools, PowerPoint enables users to craft professional-looking presentations without extensive design skills.

The compatibility of PowerPoint files across different devices and operating systems ensures easy sharing and collaboration. Its robust features, including animations, transitions, and speaker notes, enhance engagement and convey complex information effectively.

As a staple in business and educational settings, PowerPoint's familiarity and integration with various technologies make it a go-to tool for delivering impactful meeting presentations that captivate audiences and facilitate effective communication.

Pro tips for delivering an impactful presentation

Delivering an impactful presentation requires a combination of preparation, confidence, and audience engagement. Start by thoroughly understanding your content and audience. Craft a compelling narrative with a clear structure, focusing on key messages. Utilize visuals effectively, incorporating charts, graphs, and images to enhance understanding. Practice your delivery to ensure a confident and natural presentation style.

Consider the pacing of your speech and maintain eye contact to connect with your audience. Use gestures and body language to emphasize key points. Be prepared to adapt to audience reactions and questions, fostering interaction. Manage nervousness by focusing on your message and the value you bring. Lastly, seek feedback for continuous improvement. By incorporating these pro tips, you can deliver presentations that captivate and leave a lasting impact on your audience.

How can I create an effective meeting presentation template?

Creating an effective meeting presentation template involves thoughtful design and consideration of your audience and content. Begin with a clean layout that aligns with your brand or theme. Use a consistent color scheme and fonts for a professional look. Include placeholders for titles, text, and visuals, ensuring flexibility for various content types. Integrate your logo and branding elements to enhance recognition.

Prioritize simplicity, allowing for easy customization while maintaining visual appeal. Test the template's functionality and coherence, adjusting as needed. By focusing on clarity, consistency, and adaptability, you can craft a versatile meeting presentation template that streamlines the creation process and enhances overall visual impact.

Choosing the right template for your meeting

Choosing the right template for your meeting is crucial for creating a visually appealing and cohesive presentation. Consider the nature of your meeting, whether it's a formal business gathering, a creative workshop, or an educational session. Select a template that aligns with the overall theme and purpose of your presentation. Pay attention to color schemes, fonts, and layouts that complement your content and brand identity. Evaluate the template's structure, ensuring it accommodates your agenda and content flow.

Prioritize simplicity and clarity to enhance audience comprehension. Customizability is key, allowing you to adapt the template to your specific needs. By thoughtfully choosing a template that resonates with your meeting's objectives, you set the stage for a visually engaging and impactful presentation.

Customizing a meeting presentation template to fit your needs

Customizing a meeting presentation template is essential to tailor it to your specific needs and enhance its effectiveness. Begin by replacing the default content with relevant information, ensuring clarity and alignment with your presentation goals. Adjust the color scheme and fonts to match your brand or personal preferences, fostering a cohesive and professional look. Add or remove slides as necessary to accommodate your agenda and content structure. Incorporate your organization's logo and branding elements for a personalized touch. 

Fine-tune the layout to optimize visual appeal and maintain consistency throughout the presentation. Pay attention to spacing, imagery, and the overall flow to create a polished and engaging template. By adapting each element to your requirements, you transform a generic template into a powerful tool that effectively communicates your message and resonates with your audience.

Utilizing PowerPoint or other presentation software for your meeting

Leveraging presentation software like PowerPoint for your meeting provides a dynamic platform to convey information effectively. With user-friendly interfaces, these tools allow you to craft visually engaging slides that incorporate text, images, charts, and multimedia elements. PowerPoint, in particular, offers a vast array of templates, design tools, and animation features, streamlining the creation process.

The ability to customize layouts, fonts, and colors ensures alignment with your branding or theme. Presentation software enhances audience engagement through visual aids, facilitating clearer communication of complex ideas. Additionally, compatibility across devices and easy sharing options contribute to seamless collaboration.

Whether it's PowerPoint or alternative software, utilizing these tools empowers presenters to deliver polished, professional, and impactful meetings that resonate with participants.

Tip for incorporating visual aids into your meeting presentation

Incorporating visual aids into your meeting presentation enhances engagement and reinforces key messages. Begin by aligning visuals with your content, ensuring they complement rather than distract. Use high-quality images, charts, and graphs to convey complex information. Maintain a consistent design theme for a polished look. Limit text on each slide, emphasizing concise, impactful points. Integrate animations sparingly to enhance transitions and maintain audience focus. Ensure readability by selecting appropriate fonts and font sizes. Practice your presentation with visuals to refine timing and delivery. 

Be prepared to explain each visual, providing context for better comprehension. Utilizing well-designed visual aids not only reinforces your message but also captivates your audience, making your meeting presentation more memorable and impactful.

Popular templates for meeting presentations

Popular templates for meeting presentations cater to diverse needs, providing versatile options for various occasions. Business professionals often opt for clean and professional templates with minimalist designs, featuring sections for agenda, key points, and data visualization. Creative templates are favored in brainstorming or design-oriented meetings, offering dynamic layouts and space for innovative ideas.

Educational templates include interactive elements and areas for instructional content. Board meetings benefit from structured templates with designated sections for reports, updates, and discussions. Google Slides, PowerPoint, and Keynote offer an extensive array of popular templates that users can customize.

Regardless of the theme, the best templates facilitate a seamless flow, maintain visual appeal, and contribute to a cohesive and impactful meeting presentation.

What are the best practices for presenting during a meeting?

Best practices for presenting during a meeting involve thorough preparation, starting with a clear understanding of your audience and content. Craft a compelling narrative with a structured outline. Utilize visuals judiciously for clarity, and practice your delivery to enhance confidence and fluency. Maintain eye contact, use gestures purposefully, and adapt to audience reactions. Manage time effectively, allowing for Q&A.

Seek feedback for continuous improvement and always stay attuned to the needs and dynamics of the meeting. Engaging, clear, and well-organized presentations contribute to a successful meeting experience for both presenters and attendees.

Tips for keeping your audience engaged during a meeting presentation

Keeping your audience engaged during a meeting presentation is crucial for effective communication. Begin with a compelling introduction that captures attention and establishes relevance. Utilize visuals, such as slides, infographics, or videos, to convey information in a dynamic and accessible manner. Incorporate interactive elements like polls, questions, or discussions to involve participants actively. Maintain a conversational tone, avoiding monotonous delivery. Vary your presentation pace and employ gestures to emphasize key points.

Encourage audience participation through Q&A sessions or interactive activities. Break longer presentations into digestible segments to sustain interest. Lastly, be responsive to audience cues, adapting your approach based on their reactions. By employing these tips, you can create a more engaging and memorable meeting presentation experience for your audience.

How to structure your meeting presentation for maximum impact

Structuring your meeting presentation for maximum impact involves careful planning and a strategic approach.

Begin with a compelling introduction, clearly stating the purpose and relevance of your presentation. Develop a well-organized outline, dividing content into logical sections. Create a narrative flow that guides the audience through your key points seamlessly. Use visuals strategically to enhance understanding and retention. Incorporate interactive elements or discussions to maintain engagement. Ensure a smooth transition between sections, building anticipation for each segment. 

Conclude with a strong summary and a call to action if applicable. Practice your delivery to refine timing and clarity. A structured presentation not only facilitates comprehension but also captivates your audience, leaving a lasting impact.

Ways to effectively convey your message during a meeting presentation

Effectively conveying your message during a meeting presentation requires a thoughtful and strategic approach.

Begin by understanding your audience and tailoring your content to their needs and interests. Clearly define your key message and structure your presentation to emphasize these points. Use engaging visuals, such as slides or infographics, to support and enhance your verbal communication. Practice a confident and clear delivery, paying attention to tone and body language. Incorporate real-life examples or anecdotes to make your message relatable. Encourage audience interaction through questions or discussions, fostering a dynamic exchange. 

Be mindful of time management to avoid information overload. Lastly, seek feedback and be open to adjusting your approach based on the audience's response. By employing these strategies, you can ensure that your message is not only heard but also understood and remembered by your audience.

Utilizing graphs and charts in your meeting presentation

Incorporating graphs and charts into your meeting presentation is a powerful way to convey complex information visually, keeping your audience engaged and enhancing overall comprehension.

Utilize popular meeting presentation templates available in PowerPoint, Google Slides, or Keynote for a customizable and professional layout. Graphs and charts, when strategically placed, make your presentation visually appealing and persuasive, catering to diverse learning styles. Craft infographics that provide a snapshot of key data, making it easy for your audience to grasp important insights. This visual approach adds an element of creativity to your business presentation, making it more compelling and memorable for stakeholders, including board members, corporate teams, and department heads.

Strategies for adapting your presentation to different types of meetings

Adapting your presentation to different types of meetings involves strategic planning and customization.

Begin by selecting a suitable meeting presentation template, ensuring it aligns with the specific nature and formality of the gathering, be it a board meeting, corporate event, or departmental briefing. Tailor your content to address the unique interests and expectations of your audience, incorporating persuasive elements such as graphs and charts to engage stakeholders effectively. Adjust your tone, language, and level of detail based on the formality of the meeting and the familiarity of the audience with the topic. 

Proactively address potential questions and concerns to enhance clarity. Employing these adaptive strategies ensures that your presentation resonates with various audiences, making it a valuable tool for communication in diverse meeting settings.

How to impress your audience with a meeting presentation?

Impressing your audience with a meeting presentation involves a combination of strategic planning, engaging content, and confident delivery.

Begin by selecting an eye-catching meeting presentation template that aligns with the tone of your message. Craft a compelling introduction to capture attention, clearly stating the purpose and relevance of your presentation. Utilize visually appealing elements such as graphs and charts to convey information in a digestible format. Ensure a well-organized structure that guides the audience seamlessly through key points. Practice your delivery to enhance confidence, maintaining a conversational tone and incorporating expressive gestures. Foster audience engagement through interactive elements or discussions.

Conclude with a strong and memorable summary. By combining these elements, you can leave a lasting impression on your audience, making your meeting presentation both impactful and memorable.

Creating a visually appealing meeting presentation

Creating a visually appealing meeting presentation is essential for capturing and maintaining your audience's attention.

Begin with a visually pleasing meeting presentation template, ensuring it aligns with the theme and formality of your presentation. Use a cohesive color scheme and professional fonts to enhance readability. Incorporate high-quality images, graphics, and icons to add visual interest and support key points. Utilize spacing and layout effectively to avoid clutter and maintain a clean, organized look. Consistency in design elements throughout the presentation enhances its professional appearance. Incorporating visually engaging elements not only makes your content more accessible but also contributes to a positive and memorable audience experience.

By combining these design principles, you can create a visually appealing meeting presentation that effectively conveys your message and resonates with your audience.

Delivering a persuasive pitch during a meeting presentation

Delivering a persuasive pitch during a meeting presentation requires a strategic blend of compelling content, confident delivery, and audience engagement.

Begin by clearly defining your key message and aligning it with the needs and interests of your audience. Craft a compelling narrative that includes relevant data, anecdotes, and persuasive elements. Utilize a visually appealing meeting presentation template to enhance professionalism. Practice your delivery to ensure a confident and dynamic presentation, paying attention to tone, pace, and body language. Foster audience engagement through interactive elements, questions, or discussions. Address potential concerns proactively and provide solutions.

Conclude with a strong call to action, prompting your audience to take the desired next steps. By combining these elements, you can deliver a persuasive pitch that not only captivates your audience but also motivates them to act on your proposed ideas or recommendations.

Tips for using PowerPoint to make an impactful meeting presentation

Leveraging PowerPoint effectively can significantly enhance the impact of your meeting presentation.

Begin by selecting a visually appealing meeting presentation template that aligns with your content and audience. Maintain a clean and organized layout, avoiding clutter to enhance visual clarity. Use bullet points, graphics, and charts to convey information concisely and memorably. Employ consistent fonts and color schemes for a professional look. Utilize animations and transitions judiciously to add dynamism without distracting from your message. Practice your delivery to ensure seamless integration with your slides. Incorporate impactful visuals, such as images and infographics, to support key points.

Remember that PowerPoint is a tool to complement your presentation, not overshadow it. By following these tips, you can harness the power of PowerPoint to create an impactful meeting presentation that effectively communicates your message.

Engaging your audience during a business meeting presentation

Engaging your audience during a business meeting presentation is crucial for a successful delivery.

Begin by capturing attention with a compelling introduction, clearly outlining the purpose and relevance of your presentation. Foster interaction through strategically placed questions, discussions, or audience participation activities. Utilize a visually appealing meeting presentation template to enhance engagement and maintain a professional appearance. Incorporate relatable anecdotes or case studies to make your content more accessible.

Keep your delivery dynamic by varying your tone, pace, and gestures. Address potential concerns proactively and encourage questions throughout the presentation. Emphasize the benefits or solutions your content offers to maintain audience interest. By creating an interactive and engaging atmosphere, you can ensure that your business meeting presentation resonates with your audience and effectively conveys your message.

How to make your meeting presentation memorable and effective

To make your meeting presentation memorable and effective, focus on creating a lasting impact on your audience.

Begin with a compelling story or anecdote to captivate attention from the start. Structure your content logically, emphasizing key messages and supporting them with visuals. Use a visually appealing meeting presentation template that aligns with your brand and enhances the overall experience. Incorporate memorable quotes, relevant statistics, or relatable examples to reinforce key points. Ensure a dynamic delivery by varying your tone and pace. Encourage audience interaction through questions or discussions.

Conclude with a strong and concise summary, leaving a lasting impression. Follow up with a well-designed handout or supplementary materials for reinforcement. By combining these elements, you can make your meeting presentation both memorable and effective, ensuring that your message resonates with your audience long after the presentation concludes.

Why is it important to tailor your presentation to the specific meeting?

Tailoring your presentation to the specific meeting is essential for effective communication and audience engagement. Understanding the context, goals, and expectations of the meeting allows you to customize your content, making it more relevant and impactful. This tailored approach demonstrates a commitment to meeting participants and enhances the likelihood that your message will resonate.

By aligning your presentation with the unique needs of the audience, you create a connection that fosters interest, comprehension, and retention. It also showcases adaptability and consideration, contributing to a more positive and productive meeting experience for all involved.

Adapting your meeting presentation to the audience and purpose

Adapting your meeting presentation to the audience and purpose is pivotal for a successful communication strategy. Tailor your content to suit the knowledge level, interests, and expectations of your audience.

Consider their background, industry, and specific needs to ensure relevance. Align your language and examples with their familiarity to enhance understanding. Catering to the purpose of the meeting involves clarifying whether the goal is to inform, persuade, or collaborate, and adjusting your tone and content accordingly.

A clear understanding of your audience and purpose allows you to deliver a presentation that resonates, captivates, and effectively conveys your message, fostering engagement and achieving your desired outcomes.

Addressing the specific needs and goals of the meeting in your presentation

Addressing the specific needs and goals of the meeting in your presentation is paramount for success.

Begin by understanding the objectives and expectations of the gathering. Tailor your content to directly align with these goals, ensuring that your presentation provides valuable insights, solutions, or information. Consider the unique needs of the audience and adapt your messaging to resonate with their concerns or interests. Clearly articulate how your presentation contributes to meeting objectives, whether it's to inform, persuade, or collaborate.

By directly addressing the specific needs and goals of the meeting, your presentation becomes more focused, relevant, and impactful, leading to a more meaningful and productive engagement with your audience.

Utilizing speaker notes and cues for a tailored meeting presentation

Utilizing speaker notes and cues is an effective strategy for delivering a tailored meeting presentation. Speaker notes allow you to include additional context, key points, and reminders to ensure that your message aligns with the specific needs of the audience and the goals of the meeting. These notes provide a roadmap for your delivery, helping you maintain a focused and tailored approach. Cues can include prompts for engaging the audience, emphasizing crucial points, or adjusting your tone to suit the atmosphere.

By leveraging speaker notes and cues, you enhance your ability to customize content on the fly, respond to audience reactions, and address unexpected questions, ensuring that your meeting presentation remains adaptable, relevant, and finely tuned to the unique context of each engagement.

Key strategies for customizing your meeting presentation content

Customizing your meeting presentation content involves several key strategies to ensure relevance and engagement.

Begin by understanding your audience's background, interests, and expectations. Tailor your messaging to align with their knowledge level, using language and examples they can relate to. Incorporate relevant data and insights that directly address the specific needs and challenges of your audience. Structure your presentation to match the goals of the meeting, whether it's to inform, persuade, or collaborate. Use visual aids and graphics that resonate with the audience and enhance comprehension.

Be adaptable, and ready to adjust your content based on real-time audience reactions or questions. By employing these strategies, you can create a meeting presentation that is not only customized but also impactful, fostering meaningful connections with your audience.

Why a personalized approach enhances the impact of your meeting presentation

A personalized approach significantly enhances the impact of your meeting presentation, turning it into a memorable and engaging experience.

By customizing your content using a meeting presentation template, you ensure that your message aligns with the specific needs and preferences of your audience. Tailoring your presentation to address their concerns and interests makes it more relatable and persuasive. Utilizing customizable features, such as graphs, visuals, and infographics, adds a professional touch and keeps your audience engaged. 

A personalized presentation also demonstrates your commitment to understanding the unique challenges and goals of your stakeholders, fostering a stronger connection. This approach, coupled with pro tips for impactful delivery, transforms your meeting presentation into a powerful tool for effective communication and collaboration.

Introducing Dive: The Perfect AI Companion for 2023

Dive is your ultimate AI assistant for supercharging your meetings. Dive seamlessly integrates with popular video conferencing platforms, revolutionizing your meeting experience. 

With automated task allocation, real-time transcription , and insightful analytics, Dive ensures your meetings are efficient, engaging, and result-driven. Elevate collaboration and productivity with Dive and make every meeting count.

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The Ultimate Guide to Giving Virtual Presentations on Zoom

Part 1: an introduction to giving virtual presentations on zoom.

PART I Introduction 1 – Cool Zoom Features 2 – Virtual Presentation Do’s 3 – Virtual Presentation Don’ts PART II 4 – Presentation Purpose 5 – Structure & Flow 6 – Slide Design PART III 7 – Connect with the audience 8 – Audience Participation 9 – Sharing Content PART IV 10 – Video & Audio Recordings 11 – Post-production 12 – Your Phone as a Webcam PART V 13 – When Things Go Wrong 14 – How to Ground Yourself PART VI 15 – Advanced Techniques 16 – Zoom Webinars vs Meetings 17 – 23 Essential Settings

There are three things I hate about Zoom…

#1 the super awkward must-click-two-buttons-to-leave-the-meeting debacle.

You say goodbye, search the bottom-right corner of the screen for the red button, click the red button, continue to stare awkwardly at the corner of the screen because the call is still open and you need to click a second red button.

Never fear, this can be turned off. In General Preferences simply uncheck the “Ask me to confirm when I leave a meeting” setting and poof! One-click exits. You’re welcome.

#2 Inviting someone and never knowing what the difference is between these two options: “Copy invite link” and “Copy invitation”.

I can sense you nodding along with me.

Just remember that it’s “invite link” you want 99% of the time vs “invitation”, and you can set an option that copies the link to your clipboard as soon as you start a meeting.

#3 The dropdown to change video settings is part of the “Stop Video” button. What the actual?!

Are you trying to make me screw up my presentation?

I also love Zoom.

Why? Because it works.

A year into our forced isolation, Zoom fatigue has set in. We’re avoiding calls and talking about concepts like Zoom holidays, just to get a break.

But the answer isn’t fewer Zoom calls, it’s better Zoom calls. Almost every Zoom presentation is boring, ugly, terribly structured, poorly executed, and designed to make you fall asleep.

In this guide I’ll show you

• How to create beautiful slides that communicate with clarity and class
• Unknown and awesome features of Zoom that you can use to your advantage
• How to overcome your nerves and survive technical problems
• And how to look like a total pro every time you give a presentation—or run a meeting—on the platform we all love to hate.

Note: for the sake of brevity, unless I’m talking about Zoom-specific functionality, these tips are applicable to any platform that offers meeting and presentation software such as GotoMeeting, Google Meet, Webinar Jam etc.

There are instructional videos throughout the guide to demonstrate the best parts in more depth. You can binge watch the videos on the “Presenting on Zoom” video channel here , or read on for the word and pictures.

If you want to stand out from your peers it’s good to understand the full power of the platform and know the features most people don’t know about.

#1 Set up your own configurable ‘personal meeting room’

It can be really distracting to hear a bunch of people talking over one another when you kick off a meeting. A good solution is to use what’s called a Personal Meeting ID (PID) which gives you control of the Zoom environment right from the start.

Features of your PID include:

• Using the same invite ID and URL whenever you start a meeting, bypassing the need to repeatedly check the settings. Note: because it’s a permanent URL,you should uncheck the “Allow participants to join anytime” setting to prevent randoms dropping in unannounced.
• Placing participants into a “waiting room” which lets them in when you are ready to begin– either individually or all at once.
• Automatically recording your meetings on your computer. Having a video of your presentation is always a good idea so you can re-use your content.

#2 Press the ‘spacebar to temporarily un-mute yourself’

You can help to ensure a quality audio recording by placing everyone on mute by default. And while this feature is more appropriate for meetings vs. presentations, it’s a great thing to know about – and to tell your audience about. It’s easy to use, hold down the spacebar to un-mute yourself and let it go to turn your audio off again. It prevents people from forgetting to re-mute when they walk off to do something else forcing you to listen to their snoring dog or screaming baby.

Even if it doesn’t get used during your presentation (unless it’s a workshop you won’t want people to randomly chime in), many of your audience will thank you for learning this tip.

Note: You may need to enable it in your Zoom Preferences.

#3 Record ‘separate audio files’ for each speaker, host, or panelist in the presentation

If you have a host or a co-presenter there will be content in the session that’s not yours. Having separate audio recordings lets you use only the audio that was from your part of the presentation.

You can enable this in Preferences > Recording.

#4 Enable the ‘non-verbal feedback’ feature to allow audience interactions

Cool zoom feature #4 – enable non-verbal feedback.

To make your presentations interactive you can enable the non-verbal feedback feature. This allows participants to express reactions to your presentation.

This is not to be confused with ‘meeting reaction emojis’ which are temporary reactions that disappear after 5 seconds. To be honest, it’s hard not to be confused when there are two sets of interactions with different names.

Non-verbal feedback is for direct feedback to the speaker or host that others can agree with by clicking the same icon. The result is that the speaker can see how many people are expressing the feedback.

The options for non-verbal feedback are shown in the image below:

An example of how this would be used in a presentation is to ask the speaker to speed up or slow down. This might seem like a weird thing to be told during your talk, and if it’s just one person asking you’d most likely ignore it. But if 50 people are saying to slow down, that’s a pretty good indication that your current presentation style isn’t working for them.

It provides a pretty amazing insight – something I wish I’d had that feedback during an on-stage talk.

You can also use it to ask binary questions to the audience that they can respond yes or no to – a great way to segment the audience so you can tailor your content based on their responses.

Combine this feature with a QTINTA audience participation question for a really engaging experience. You’ll have to watch the video to know what QTINTA means.

#5 Use the Zoom ‘beauty mode’ to soften your appearance

Zoom includes a “Touch up my appearance” filter in the “Preferences > Video” settings, which gives your skin a softer appearance. There’s a slider that lets you control how much it applies the effect. It can look weird if you crank it too much, but having just a little can really help – especially if you’re looking a big bedraggled.

Settings are maintained when you quit so you can expect to look the same way every time.

#6 Use Zoom ‘video filters’ to add a cinematic high-contrast appearance

We’re all familiar with Zoom backgrounds, but a more impressive feature in my mind are the video filters. You can access them via the “Stop Video” dropdown arrow. Yes, there are some silly ones which can be funny when in a meeting, but for presenting stick to the non-silly ones. They can help improve the quality of your on-camera look. I particularly like the first option “Boost” which kicks your contrast up a notch removing any bland washed out lighting, it also removed some warmer tones which I like as it reduces the redness I often have in my skin.

You can see that it increases the contrast but also cuts down on the redness in my face.

Unlike the “Touch up my appearance” feature, your video filter settings are not maintained between sessions, which is a frustrating extra step each time if you found a setting you like.

#7 Encourage attendees to use ‘side-by-side mode’ to view you and your slides

This can be a good setting if you want to make your talk feel more personal. It shows your camera video beside your slides, and viewers can resize the videos as they see fit.

It can be a good idea to point this out as not everyone will know.

E.g. “You should be viewing this presentation in side by side mode so you see me and the slides. If you want to make the slides bigger (or smaller) you can resize them by dragging the slider between my video and the slides.”

#8 Use Zoom ‘annotations’ to mark up your slides live, or a ‘whiteboard’ for a blank canvas

A really cool feature of Zoom is Annotations. This lets you write or draw on top of the screen you are sharing. Once the feature is activated , you can access it from the menu at the top when you are sharing your screen.

This is really helpful when you have a complex slide and you want to focus people’s attention on different areas of the screen as you talk. When presenting live on a stage you can gesture towards a particular area, but it’s not as easy in a virtual presentation which is why it’s handy.

There is also a Whiteboard feature that gives you, well, a whiteboard. This could be useful if you find that you need to dig into a point you’re making in a more detailed way or discover during your talk that you need a different way to explain it.

You might want to take a quick screenshot when you’re done if you happened to get some interesting ideas marked up.

Rock open a whiteboard and sketch a diagram. Having a tablet and pen would be very helpful for this, versus trying to draw with a mouse. It might be wise to use the non-verbal feedback feature to get folks to say “Yes” to a “Let me know if you’re ready to move on” question.

Note, this is a screen sharing feature, so in order to get to the whiteboard, you need to stop sharing your screen, then share once more but choose Whiteboard as the option. Then you’ll have to stop sharing and share your slides again. Make sure you’ve practiced this if you think you’ll be using it.

#9 Use ‘closed captions’ to increase the accessibility of your virtual presentation and video recording

Zoom has transcription features that let you add closed captions to your session. You can do it manually for free, but that means someone will have to type them live, which is a pretty specific skill to have, and requires someone to do it for you.

If you have a paid Zoom account (roughly $20/month) live transcriptions are included. An alternative is to integrate with a platform like Otter.ai, to add closed captions in real time. You can also use Otter for transcribing any other audio or video files you have which makes it a much better value.

There are several reasons why closed captions are a good thing to do.

• No headphones: if an attendee doesn’t have or forgot their headphones and they’re in an environment where they can’t have the volume on, closed captions are a life saver that could be the difference between them staying or leaving.
• Accessibility: Captions allow meetings to be accessible to all. For the deaf, hard of hearing, or non-native speakers, they are an absolute necessity to understand what’s going on.
• Attention and recall: closed captioning can increase the amount of your content that an attendee comprehends and remembers. This is because they are getting it using two senses, and you have to focus more intently when you are reading.

You can check out Otter here to set up live captions.

#10 Use Zoom ‘breakout rooms’ to split workshop participants into groups

Without question, one of the most popular Zoom features is Breakout Rooms. They are exactly as they sound, allowing you to break out attendees into separate rooms. This could be for hosting a multi-track event where there is a speaker in each breakout room, or more commonly it is to allow groups to work together away from the “Main Room” and then come back in to rejoin you as the speaker.

This is a wonderful feature if you are running workshops that require groups to work through some of your worksheets or tasks for example.

There’s a good demo of how to use Zoom breakout rooms here.

#11 Use a Zoom ‘waiting room’ to hold attendees before you let them in at the same time

Nobody shows up at the same time to a presentation, and you don’t always want to start until an acceptable threshold of attendees have arrived. Particularly if the beginning of your talk is fundamental to your big idea.

The waiting room is basically a holding area where attendees are listed as they show up. They get to see a simple welcome screen (annoyingly simple really – I’d much prefer to have the options to have a fully custom slide in there), and you can admit them one by one, or all at once, when you are ready to begin.

It also allows you to block people from entering, although for the most part there’s not much reason to do this when you are presenting to a large audience. Useful if someone becomes disruptive for any reason.

Caution: it’s very easy to forget about the waiting room and have people sitting around unable to get in after you’ve started. I recommend assigning this task to your co-host.

Cool Zoom Feature to Avoid – ‘Present with your PowerPoint or Keynote slides as a virtual background’.

This is an interesting feature that’s worth discussing both for why it’s cool and why it’s uncool.

What it does

Instead of a regular screen share, it takes your slide deck and sets it as the background much like any other Zoom background. As such it places a ‘mini you’ floating on top of the slides in cutout mode which is kinda fun. Kinda.

To access the feature (beta at time of writing) click the “Advanced” tab in the “Share Screen” popup, and select “Slides as Virtual Background”.

This is what it looks like from the attendee’s perspective. And yes, you appear twice on the screen. Once on top of your slides, and again beside them. Silly.

Note: you must download a local copy of your slide deck to your computer as it doesn’t connect to cloud-based slides.

If you have audio and video in your slides, checking the “Share Sound” option at the bottom-left of the share popup should make that transmit to the audience. However, it doesn’t. In fact I couldn’t get any video or audio to play at all.

There’s also a second “Split Video from Slides” option which kinda defeats the purpose. As you can see below, you are back with your regular background in a separate window, and you are only on the screen once.

With the split setting in place, it would be a fair to wonder why you’d use this feature as it looks just the same as the regular view.

There are however, a few key differences.

The major difference is that you don’t need to have your slides in fullscreen mode on your computer. In the screenshot below you’ll see that I’m looking at a Zoom window with my slides inside it. I can now move through my slides while having other windows open such as the chat and participant windows. This is actually pretty great as the audience doesn’t see your layout, they see what they would normally see.

A nice side effect of this setting is the audience won’t see the awkward moment at the start of your talk where your whole screen is visible until you start the slides.

Looking at the main window, you can clean up the view a bit by having attendee video off by un-checking “More > Allow Participants to Start Video” in the Participants panel, and then selecting “Hide non-video participants” from the “…” menu on one of the participant video boxes.

You can take it a step further if you select “Hide self view” from the … on your video thumbnail. This will give you a view of just your slides. As much as the layout annoys me (I’d rather pop the self view out to the side with the chat), it can be important to see yourself to make sure you’re not moving out of frame – particularly if you are speaking standing up.

However, at this point in the beta it’s just not usable enough to be a serious and professional solution because of a few technical failings:

• It’s buggy like most beta features are
• It doesn’t show any animations or slide transitions
• If you are recording the screen, the merge view while fun, is a little unprofessional looking
• Audio and video didn’t work at all for me, despite there being a setting to allow slide audio to work. I think this might be because the videos didn’t play.
• When you start the share it has to process the slides before it starts which causes a delay if you aren’t expecting it.

Overall, it’s a feature with some exciting elements, although to be perfectly honest, the good aspects are nothing to do with the feature itself, but are side effects. I’d prefer to see a new feature that allows you to avoid presenting in fullscreen to allow a much greater degree of presenter screen setup.

The chapter title says it all. Do these things and your virtual presentations will be better. If you don’t, your presentation won’t be better than the last one you did, missing an important opportunity grow your skills as a virtual presenter.

Seriously. Do these things.

#1 Test your slides from the ‘attendee perspective’ using another laptop or tablet

Your slides might look amazing on your retina laptop or 5K monitor, but not all screens are alike, and your super-detailed tiny-text “revolutionary new marketing method” process diagram might look more like a dot-matrix printout to someone with a lesser screen.

Viewing your slides on a smaller or alternative screen isn’t enough. You also need to view them on Zoom on that screen, because virtual presentation software tends to change things you wouldn’t expect.

The golden rule of presentation QA is to run through every slide on the platform you’re going to be delivering on (Zoom, GotoWebinar, etc.) watching out for the things below:

• Any virtual presentation platform will add small visual artifacts to the video stream—they’re imperfect degenerative medium where some quality will be lost in transmission. As a result, your slides will never be quite as sharp as directly viewing your slides.
• If you have audio in your slides, check that the audio levels are balanced and not too loud or quiet. Remember to also test it with headphones on as that’s a common listening scenario for your audience.
• If you have video in your slides it may not come across well when presenting virtually. There’s usually some lag or choppiness that makes it skip frames. This can make the audio look out of sync.
• If you have multiple slides with audio, set them at the exact same level so people don’t get deafened. A common problem in that scenario is that the attendees will turn down their audio if you blast them, and then the next time you have audio it’s too quiet to hear properly. Your presentation software will have a setting for the audio or video volume. The best way to make sure they are the same is to move your slides to be one after the other (you can reorder them afterwards), then step through them to gauge the balance.
• If you have complex animations or transitions, they may render more slowly or less smoothly when piped through Zoom and a wifi connection. If they don’t work the way you want them to, consider simplifying them (fewer animations) or removing them altogether – replacing them with static slides. You can still use a technique like the Progressive Reveal to create a pseudo animation effect.

To prevent an audio feedback loop when testing your audio and video slides, have your partner/friend/colleague be on the viewer/attendee side in another room.

Whatever your specific case is, there’s a good chance that on the viewer’s side it’s not as perfect. So double, triple, and quadruple check.

I guess you should also single check. Why does nobody say that?

“You should single check your work to make sure it’s awesome.”

The best way to QA is to record some video of it from the viewer’s perspective. Have your QA buddy record their screen (with audio). If you don’t have anyone to help you, just set up your extra laptop (hopefully you have one somewhere) in another room and record the screen from there. If you’re using a Mac, Quicktime is an easy way to get a recording. On a PC, you can use PowerPoint to do a screen recording (more on that later), or find some free screen recording software for a test.

If you do have a helper, you can also reverse roles where they present and you observe on their machine. This will give you the truest sense of what might need to be fixed. It’ll no doubt be quite hilarious to watch, unless they turn out to be better at it than you.

#2 Remove all hashtags from your slides

My typical advice regarding hashtags is to make sure you update them to use the current event’s hashtag if you’ve used this slide deck before. If you don’t it looks awful to the audience and makes them feel like you didn’t put in the effort to make a presentation just for them.

However, the main goal of this entire guide —primarily covered in chapters 10 and 11— is to ensure you create a professional-grade recording of your virtual presentation that you can repurpose over and over for multiple virtual events.

If you leave event hashtags in your slides they will be forever embedded in your recording, rendering it useless for re-use. And trust me, once you’ve created a high-resolution awesomely edited recording of your talk, you will feel amazing about it.

It may feel counterintuitive, but you should delete all the hashtags from your slides.

If the event mentions it and asks you why or asks you to include them, just politely let them know your rationale. I’ve found that many virtual events have interactive chat in the interface they use which tends to dilute the number of people hanging out on a Twitter hashtag anyway.

#3 Have a wired Internet connection

If attendees have a poor connection they can always leave and download the video and slides later on.

But the presenter is the one person who absolutely must have a great Internet connection, and the best way to do that is to have directly wired Ethernet.

A side benefit of this is that it will help you end the endless debate over who’s connection is causing the problem. I’m sure you’ve been in a meeting where someone suggests your Internet is slow, and you say yours is fine, and they say that theirs has been working brilliantly all week.

Just say “Yeah, but I have a hardwired Ethernet connection.” End of conversation.

If you don’t have a wired connection, work on getting one set up, and in the meantime tell your eager tech wannabe roommates NOT to reset the ******* wifi while you’re presenting.

#4 Have a backup audio input device

“Is this mic on? Can you hear me at the back?”

Sometimes your mic will stop working, and it’s one of the most uncomfortable panic-ridden things that can happen to a speaker (see When Things Go Wrong ). It could be a dead battery issue, or your headphone cable could be old and the internal wiring failed.

Whatever the cause, you need to have a way to deal with the problem.

If you are using a posh external mic that stops working, ditching it for the internal microphone of your laptop will likely degrade the audio quality significantly, but it’s better than nothing.

In a later chapter I do a deep dive comparison video about microphone options for virtual presenting .

Probably the simplest backup is another set of headphones. The classic Apple headphones are only $25 now. Make sure you get the ones with the 3.5mm jack, and not the lightning cable, (especially if you’re not an Apple person) as that’s only useful for your iPhone. And if you aren’t an Apple person, there are a million other options on Amazon.

However, be warned that these headphones are rife with audio problems such as noisy cables (you’ll need to sit still which sucks), and they should only be used on Zoom. When using them with any other audio recording software they have a horrific background hiss that destroys your audio, but Zoom’s noise removal feature (on by default) actually does a fantastic job of removing it, making them a viable last minute solution. Hopefully, you’ll never need to use them.

#5 Have a slide dedicated to encouraging non-verbal feedback

The non-verbal feedback feature of Zoom is a great way to make your talk more dynamic. But you don’t want to try and explain it in the middle of your talk as it’ll break the flow and screw up the fluidity of your recording.

Instead, consider which aspects of the feature you want to use, and have a slide at the start of your presentation (slide 2 for example) that focuses on this. You can quickly walk people through how it works, and tell them how you’ll be using it throughout.

#6 Have everyone muted by default

It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. You don’t want attendees, whether it’s 5 or 500, to be chatting before or during your presentation. So this one is simple. Make sure you mute everyone. If you’re using your Personal Meeting ID you might have this already set up.

You can mute everyone in the Participants sidebar, or as a global default setting in the web portal administration settings “Settings > Schedule Meeting > Mute all participants when they join a meeting”.

#7 Wear confidence clothes

Just because you can present in your PJs it doesn’t mean you should present in your PJs. Treat it like an on-stage talk and get ready in your mojo outfit. You’ll gain confidence and look more professional.

Something I like to do when I’m on the road presenting, is lay out my clothes the night before. It helps me get in the right mindset and also saves time the next day when you might be stressing out.

#8 Close all of your other software to prevent your machine slowing down

Take a look at your computer right now and count A) how many different apps are running, and B) how many tabs you have open in your browser.

Here’s a screenshot of mine, for reference.

Tabs open in Chrome? 39. Apps open? 20

You need to be concerned about two things, the amount of memory and processing power being hogged by all the apps you have open, and the number of ways you might receive a notification during your talk.

For PCs running Windows 10, there’s a built-in function to silence notifications when presenting . But if you’re a Mac user the settings for this are horrendous (slightly better in Big Sur). Fortunately there’s a free app called Muzzle that silences all of your notifications as soon as you share your screen.

#9 Have two pre-made slides ready for Q&A at the end of your virtual presentation

It’s common for your host to ask questions that the audience has submitted in the chat window (or the Q&A window for Zoom Webinars) at the end of your session. The best way to utilize this opportunity—if you’re still in control of the screen—is to have two slides prepared.

The first slide should simply have Q&A written on it, really big.

The second slide should be a promo slide with a special offer you have.

I like to leave up the Q&A slide until the questions start, then flip it to the promo slide so it can sit there for the next 5-10 minutes. It’s a great way to have it visible for a long period of time without actually having to be salesy in your presentation.

It’s fairly common that an event organizer will ask you if you have something to promote, but if they don’t, ask them if it’s okay that you use a slide at the end like this.

#10 Build a background set to make your virtual presentations look professional

If you spend a lot of time on Zoom, instead of using a Zoom background, start thinking about how you can built a bit of a set where you do your presentations. Not only will it look more professional, but it will fill you with confidence and make you feel like you’re in presentation mode when you’re there.

I’m fortunate to have a space for my office/studio, and I’ve seen and felt the difference a well-designed environment makes when I show up to work. It took me months to get it right, so don’t think you have to suddenly have something perfect. Just chip away at it over time, turning on your webcam every day and giving a little thought as to how you can make the space more special. Small shelves with plants or books can work great, and Pinterest is definitely your friend for this type of thing.

Many folks won’t have a dedicated workspace to claim as your “stage”, but I’m pretty sure your significant other won’t complain if you make your home that little bit nicer.

Speaking of “stages”, I actually built a stage in my studio—almost burning down the house in the process —but that’s a story for another time. Like I said, it took months to get to this stage. I keep saying stage.

#11 Reboot your computer the night before your virtual presentation

Restarting your computer can help speed it up a bit, especially if you haven’t done it in ages. Any little performance advantage you can get is valuable for a live presentation. It will help clear out any processes that are stuck or hogging the CPU.

However, it’s best not to do this right before your talk, as you risk it doing some weird software updates that take hours to complete.

#12 Do a test Zoom meeting to check your camera angles and lighting

As Springsteen said in Dancing in the Dark—”I check my look in the mirror, I wanna change my clothes, my hair, my face.”—you should always check how you look on camera before the presentation starts. Adjust the angle of the camera for your most flattering look and the best view of your background, which of course is a well-decorated wall, and not a zoom background of a beach or mountaintop.

Make sure to turn on the lights you’ll be using to light your lovely face, wick away any sweat using blotting wipes, and apply some simple makeup to remove shiny reflections from your head. More details on those techniques in the lighting section .

Here’s the smart part, record your test meeting and play it back to make sure there are no weird things in the background, it’s often easier to analyze a recording as opposed to your webcam view.

#13 Double-check your audio for background noise

At the same time as your camera check, watch your test recording and listen very carefully for any noise in the background. You’ll be surprised at how oblivious you can be to background noise when you’re busy and/or nervous.

Sounds to watch out for:

• Laundry sounds: Depending on where your washer/dryer are it may not be an issue, but the low hum can travel far. Start a Zoom recording, making sure to use which ever audio (mic) input you plan on using, go turn on your washer or dryer or dishwasher, then come back and replay the recording to see if it’s discernible. Crank the volume to make sure. There is NOTHING worse than doing a badass presentation then finding out the recording is ruined by a persistent hum in the background, or the sound of someone’s hoody zip clattering round and round in the dryer.
• Tube lights: If you have any tube lights where you are recording, or even in a nearby room, turn them off. They can be soooo noisy. Then put in the effort to replace them with silent LED tube bulbs when you have time. It does require some rewiring, but it’s not that hard—I did it recently and I made sure to choose bulbs with the same colour temperature as the lights I’ll be using to light me up in the video–more on that in the A/V chapter .
• Ceiling fans: Another subtle and repetitive sound. Turn ’em off unless the resulting heat will make you sweat to the point of scaring the audience.
• Heating: Not all heating is noisy, but many houses in North America use what’s called forced air. It’s noisy. A low hum, yes, but it’s an audio killer.
• Noisy clothes: Your clothes can cause bad scratching sounds—even if you use a shotgun microphone that’s not attached to your clothes—which is an audio killer. What happens is that any loose clothing rubs against you when you gesticulate with your arms. Tighter clothes like a t-shirt are the solution to this. I go into more depth including a comparison video in What to do When Noisy Clothes Ruin Your Audio .
• Noisy shoes: if you’re wearing any kind of heels, they will cause irritating sounds if you shuffle your feet (while presenting standing up, which you should do). The simplest solution is to take them off and present in your socks (or bare feet).
• Analog watches: I’m kidding.

And make sure everyone in the house knows not to bother you while you’re presenting. If you are in a room with a door, hang a sign on it with the time of your event, and say not to disturb you until you take the sign off the door.

Guess what? Not every thing you can do as a virtual presenter is something you should be doing—I’m talking about you, speaker who likes to take a bathroom break while mic’d up, two minutes before the session starts.

Similarly, not every feature of Zoom has a positive impact on the audience or speaker experience. In this short and not-so-sweet chapter I’ll give you some tips about things to avoid so your talks go more smoothly.

#1 Don’t use a free Zoom account for your presentation

If you’re running the show yourself this is an important one. The free Zoom plan allows up to 100 attendees which is great, and more than enough for a small event, however there is also a 40-minute time limit, which would be very embarrassing if you didn’t know that and all of a sudden everyone gets kicked out of your virtual event.

#2 Try to avoid saying “Can you hear me?”

This is a classic intro statement that nervous presenters ask, but it makes you sound unprofessional. Instead, make a subtle change to how you position it, like this:

“Thanks {host name}, let’s get started, and let us know in the chat window if you have any issues hearing my audio.”

#3 Don’t use your laptop’s microphone if your webcam is sitting on an external monitor

When you do this, the laptop will be off to one side and your audio will be really quiet and sound like you’re in a different room.

#4 Don’t use stock photos in your slides

Just as you shouldn’t use a stock photo as the header background on your website, you shouldn’t use them in your presentations. To illustrate my point, it’s way too common for software companies to think it’s cool to use an overhead shot of a laptop and a coffee cup. It’s actually hilarious how prevalent it is. I recommend entering the URL of any image you’re considering using into tineye.com which will tell you how many times it’s been used.

If you absolutely have to use one, try hard to find one that’s not so widely used. Unsplash.com is a good resource for free photography that’s typically got less of a stock feel to it.

But all in all, the best way to avoid using stock photos is to develop an original content mindset (in chapter 6) .

#5 Don’t use a Zoom background. You heard me.

Zoom backgrounds can be fun in meetings, but when you’re presenting it can look unprofessional and can be really distracting. It can also make some of your head/hair disappear and speaking for myself, I need all the hair I can get.

#6 Don’t record the call without permission

This is a big no-no on certain types of call. For a presentation you can make a statement that it’s being recorded, as this is always helpful information for attendees to know (no permission needed) but if it’s a meeting with a client, customer, or coworker, you should be explicit that you are recording and why: “If it’s okay with you I’d like to record the call so I don’t miss any of the details.” This is important when you are a guest in an interview too. Asking for permission will add a level of trust and respect in the eyes of who you are asking – and in the very rare occasion that they say no, be graceful and say okay no worries. Then follow up with,”I may be taking notes throughout so bare with me if I’m scribbling”.

Also be aware, that if you  are recording the session, everyone on the other side will see a blinking “recording” signal in the top-left corner, so there’s no creeping allowed.

To recap, remember these rules when it comes to recordings:

• Meetings: Ask for permission, and don’t record if your guest is uncomfortable with it.
• Presentations: Let people know that it’s being recorded and that you will be making it available after. Ideally after some post-production enhancements in chapter 11.

#7 Don’t be the host if you might leave early

This is a nightmare as the other participants are suddenly without a meeting and they might not know why. Then they have to re-coordinate to set up a new meeting, which is always a chore and often involves Slack or text messages or even worse, emails.

Intro Introduction to Virtual Presentations on Zoom

Chapter 1 18 Cool Zoom Features You Should Know About

Chapter 2 12 Things You Should Do in Your Zoom Presentation

Chapter 3 8 Things You Shouldn’t Do in Your Zoom Presentation

Chapter 4 Defining Your Presentation’s Purpose

Chapter 5 How to Define Your Talk’s Structure, Story, & Flow

Chapter 6 41 Slide Design Tips for Virtual Presentations

Chapter 7 6 Ways to Make Eye Contact With an Invisible Audience

Chapter 8 How to do Audience Participation in a Virtual Presentation

Chapter 9 How to Share Content during a Zoom Presentation

Chapter 10 How to Create a Stunning Video and Audio Recording

Chapter 11 Using Post-Production to Add Value to Your Zoom Recording

Chapter 12 How to Use Your Phone as a Beautiful Webcam

Chapter 13 What to Do When Things go Wrong in Your Presentation

Chapter 14 How to Ground Yourself and Get Ready to Present

Chapter 15 Advanced & Creative Zoom Presentation Techniques

Chapter 16 The Difference Between Zoom Meetings and Zoom Webinars

Chapter 17 23 Zoom Settings to Enable or Disable for a Smooth Presentation

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10 Tips For Giving Effective Virtual Presentations

What to know before you go live.

September 26, 2016

Presenting online? Try these suggestions to improve your results. | Illustration by Tricia Seibold

As audiences go global and you need to reach more people through technology (including webinars, conference calls and teleconference), you must consider the challenges to connecting with a virtual audience. Here I pinpoint 10 valuable best practices to ensure you communicate successfully.

1. Be Brief

Audiences begin to lose attention after roughly 10 minutes of hearing from the same presenter. If you have more than 10 minutes of content, use interactive activities to keep your audience engaged (for example, take a poll, give quizzes, or ask audience members for their opinions via chat).

2. Be Simple

Keep slides simple — avoid too many words, graphics and animation features. Less is definitely more!

Light yourself well | Illustration by Tricia Seibold

3. Be a TV Personality

Look straight into your camera, not the screen. Wear clothing that is neutral in color (no plaids or stripes). Light yourself well and from above. Be mindful of what appears behind you in the background. Invest in a good microphone.

4. Be Standing

Even though your audience cannot see you, stand when you present. This allows you to stay focused and use good presentation delivery skills such as belly breathing, vocal variety, and pausing.

5. Be Prepared

Practice delivering your presentation with your technology in advance of your talk. Make sure all of the features of the technology work. Record your practice using the recording feature of your tool. Watch and listen to learn what works and what you can improve.

6. Be Assisted

Have someone available to deal with technical issues and to field email/text questions. Also, if you have multiple remote audience members in one location, be sure to pick one of them to be your “eyes and ears.” Ask them to queue up questions and facilitate discussion on your behalf.

7. Be Specific

Ask pointed questions to avoid too many people answering at once. For example, rather than ask, “Are there any questions?” try “Who has a question about the solution I provided?” Set a ground rule that people state their names prior to speaking.

Imagine your audience | Illustration by Tricia Seibold

8. Be Synchronized

Transitions are critical. You must connect what you just said to what is coming next when you move from point to point. Transitions between topics and slides are good opportunities to get people reengaged to your talk.

9. Be Connected

Imagine your audience even though you can’t see them. You can place pictures of audience members behind your camera so you can look at people as you present.

10. Be Early

Encourage your audience to access your call or webinar in advance of the start time so you can iron out any technical issues in advance and get them familiar with the technology.

Matt Abrahams is a Stanford GSB organizational behavior lecturer, author, and communications coach.

For media inquiries, visit the Newsroom .

Explore More

From good to great: what makes a “supercommunicator”, seen & heard: how to make your audience feel understood, sarah friar, mba ’00, on how to make strategic career risks, editor’s picks.

April 04, 2016 A Big Data Approach to Public Speaking Key takeaways from analyzing 100,000 presentations.

November 19, 2014 Matt Abrahams: The Power of the Paraphrase An expert on public speaking shows how paraphrasing can help you navigate tricky communication situations.

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How to Prepare for a Presentation, with Examples

February 15, 2021 - Dom Barnard

This guide covers everything you need to know to prepare for your presentation. including what you need to think about beforehand, during and after the presentation.

1. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse (always aloud)

Once you have your presentation worked out, you will need to practice it, but even though you might think it’s the best way to have a flawless presentation, don’t memorise what you’re going to say.

That might sound like incredibly bad advice, but here’s why:

• If you memorise your speech, you’ll get stuck in thinking you can only deliver your ideas in that way, and that stifles your creativity, and the chance for new thoughts and ways to put things that come up as you speak.

Not only that, but every  audience is different . Sometimes they laugh out loud, sometimes they sit and smile, and you never know which type of audience you’ll have until you’re live.

Practice Presentation Skills

Improve your public speaking and presentation skills by practicing them in realistic environments, with automated feedback on performance. Learn More

If you’re going off a memorised presentation, it’s much more difficult to break away from that to go with the flow on the day, and respond naturally to your audience.

• If you forget your speech in the middle of it, you will be thrown, and you’ll have more chance of complete brain freeze, which really will knock your confidence.
• Memorising your presentation gives you a false sense of security, which could leave you high and dry if something goes wrong. If you’ve only got your memorised speech, for example, what will you do if your PowerPoint freezes or your props break, and you can’t do what you were going to do?

Rehearse in front of colleagues, friends, a mirror, in virtual reality – always aloud. Make sure you spend plenty of time practising your presentation, it will make you feel much more relaxed if you know your material.

Courses where you can rehearse with interactive exercises:

• Essential Public Speaking
• How to Present over Video

Video showing how you can prepare for your presentation using virtual reality.  Learn more about virtual reality training .

2. Memorise your opening line

Do, however, memorise your opening line. If you know how you’re going to begin, you’ll get a strong start and that will build your confidence.

Many speakers and stage actors find that the minute they’ve actually delivered their first line, the nerves are gone and they’re well into their stride.

3. Practise your speech from written notes

Writing your presentation out in your own handwriting will help you clarify your ideas and may well bring you new ones.

• How to Write a Speech to Engage your Audience

4. Practise presentation flow

As well as practising for the ideas and what you want to say, practise how you want your presentation to flow. Think of it almost as a symphony, with high points, slow movements and crescendos. If it’s important, think about how you want your audience to feel, what emotions you want them to have, and when.

5. The power of silence

Don’t be afraid to pause and use the power of silence. A good pause can have a huge emotional impact. It allows people to really absorb what you are saying and react, and it’s vital to pause if you’re using humour so that the next part of your presentation doesn’t get lost underneath people’s laughter.

For more on the ‘Power of the Pause’, watch this short from video Brian Tracy:  The Power of the Pause

• 10 Effective Ways to use Pauses in your Speech

6. Have a backup

There’s nothing worse than the projector dying or finding that your laptop won’t communicate with the projector for some reason. If you know you have a backup, even if it’s only a pre-prepared flip chart, you’ll feel better, and you’ll be more confident.

7. Arrive early

Following on from that, arrive at least half an hour early so you aren’t feeling rushed, and so you have time to check your equipment and get your notes laid out ready to go. That gives you time to breathe and relax before you go on, knowing everything is as set as it can be.

8. Use physical props for a demo

Use physical props, if possible, for a demo. This can make you stand out and be more memorable among all the other speakers who only use PowerPoint, and it can add greatly to the impact of your presentation.

Video showing an example of using physical props during a live demo.

9. Structure your presentation

First, find out how much time you have to present, is it 10 minutes, 15, an hour? Prepare enough material for this time and have a couple of extra slides as backup – we tend to speak much quicker when nervous so you might find you finish your presentation too early. At some large conference events, timings may change on the day, be aware of this have a shorter version of your presentation in mind (i.e. know which slides to skip over).

• How to Structure your Presentation, with Examples
• Examples of Corporate Presentation Structures

10. Prepare for questions

Have a few backup slides for questions you think will arise from your presentation. It is sometime a tactic to explain a section briefly in your speech, so that you get a question about it afterwards. If you don’t understand the question, ask for it to be rephrased.

If there are no questions, it is not an indication how good or bad your presentation was. You many have explain your material extremely well, or simply that people are tired at the end of the day and want to go home.

• Guide for Handling Questions after a Presentation

11. Prepare for where you are presenting

If you can, go to the room you are speaking in before the actual event. It gives you an idea of furniture layout, podium height, location, room size, audience size and lighting. You can then visualise the room while practising and avoid the shock of suddenly being faced with a huge room when you expected a tiny one.

Ask the organiser if you need any particular props, for example a table to help with your live demo.

Additional planning to think about before your presentation:

1. Purpose  – what outcome are we trying to achieve? How can results be measured? What will success look like?

2. Topic  – Novelty? Complexity? Technical?

3. People  – Who should attend? What do they already know? How are they going to help?

4. Timing  – When will it happen and how long will the presentation take?

5. Location  – Where will the presentation be held? Do you have access to the correct facilities for the presentation?

6. Papers  – Who is keeping minutes? Do you need to send out an agenda before the presentation? Background information required?

7. Visual aids  – Is a  projector required ? Boards?

8. Style  – Structure or unstructured, discussion style? How assertive should you be? How should the meeting items be organised?

12. Choose the signals to give to your audience

Before the presentation, think about these 5 topics:

• Eye contact
• Facial gestures
• Body language

Decide how you will use each of these to reinforce your message. Use the table below for help.

Additional courses to help you prepare for your presentation:

• Presentation Skills Training Courses

Example from Steve Jobs

Think about these 10 techniques while you are preparing your presentation..

• Planning in Analog.  Tell a story, create stunning visuals and videos to complement video, use demonstrations and other speakers, keep the audience engaged.
• Creating a Twitter-Friendly Description  Single description sentence, condensed his message into 140 characters.
• Introduce the Enemy  Story needs villains or a problem to be solved. Jobs highlighted IBM and useless mobile phones (during iPhone release) as his villains.
• Focusing on Benefits  Keep reinforcing the benefits of your product, create top 10 lists, understand this is what customers care about.
• Sticking to Rule of Three  Classic Literary technique, things are best remembered and reinforced in threes. Read this article on  Literary Techniques  for more detail.
• Sell Dreams, Not Products  Create a vision people believe in, create a vision which will make people’s lives better
• Create Visual Slides  Use as few words as possible and use colourful graphics on the slide to highlight points.
• Make Numbers Meaningful  Compare large numbers to things people understand.
• Use Plain English  Use easy to say and easy to remember words, keep it simple.
• Large Reveals  Due to Apple secrecy, Jobs was able to deliver unexpected products to the world at his product launches.

How to Prepare for a Meeting: Step by Step (With Examples)

It’s a good idea to make sure that all bases are covered if you’re planning a meeting ahead of time, so that you know it’ll go smoothly.

But there’s plenty more to do than just getting your slides and talking points ready while you’re in preparation for the meeting.

From working out a clear structure to getting your team prepped and ready, there’s a lot to consider.

Let us walk you step-by-step through the meeting preparation process that works for us at Slido and share some of the best practices that were game-changing for us.

1. Set purpose and goals

First, define the meeting purpose, or the ‘ Why ’ behind your meeting. Why are you meeting? Is it to brainstorm? Is it to have a discussion or plan the next steps? If you set one clear objective, it’ll be much easier for you to design an agenda for your meeting.

Second, specify the main goal, or the ‘ What ’ of the meeting. What should come out of the meeting? What is the main deliverable? Set a tangible meeting outcome and stick to it. If it’s to make a decision about X, don’t leave the meeting without seeing it through.

These will be the guideposts that will help you set the right expectations and steer the meeting in the right direction.

2. Create & share an agenda

Now that you’ve set your meeting objectives and goals, it’s time to create a bulletproof agenda.

A meeting agenda is an outline of all the activities and discussion points to cover during a meeting in order to reach the meeting goal/s. In short, a structure that your meeting will follow.

While there isn’t a one-size-fits-all meeting agenda template, there are several best practices to keep in mind when designing an agenda for a) recurring and b) one-time/first-time meetings.

Recurring meetings

With meetings that you run regularly – e.g. team syncs – it is tempting to think there’s no need for an agenda. Your colleagues already know the format, so what’s there to design? Well, there are still things to consider.

The main keyword here is simplicity . A simple agenda goes a long way and will hold your meeting together like a skeleton. All you need is a list of action points to go through.

Write down the main discussion points that you want to touch on during the meeting. You can even assign owners that will drive the discussion around each point.

Here’s an example from one of our meetings:

💡 Don’t forget to share the agenda with your team members ahead of the meeting (1-3 days) via your internal comms channels, such as Slack, Webex, or Microsoft Teams.

One-time meetings/First-time meetings

With new meetings for which you don’t have an already established format, you need to go deeper. In these instances, you need to design the whole meeting agenda from scratch.

The main keyword here is alignment . Given that your team members don’t know the format, it’s crucial to:

• Communicate clearly the purpose, expectations and goals of the meeting
• Describe the structure and length
• Explain what needs to be prepared and what the responsibilities of each member are
• Crowdsource any questions or discussion points in advance of the meeting

If there are multiple speakers who will present at the meeting, align with them prior to the meeting. Set a time frame for each of the meeting sections. Be as specific as possible.

Get inspired by our first-ever ‘Cross-team alignment’ meeting, for which we set a very bold objective — to bring together 3 teams (20+ people) and get them aligned .

A lot also depends on the size of the meeting. If you’re preparing an all-company meeting, there’s a whole different strategy to employ. Read more about how to design an all-hands meeting agenda here .

3. Send out meeting invites

Send meeting invites to everyone involved in the meeting at least two weeks in advance so your colleagues have enough time to work it into their schedules.

Add all the important details in the meeting invite description. Share the meeting goals and the agenda (regardless of whether you already shared it or plan to share it later – make it available in the invite as well).

In case you’re meeting online or in a hybrid setup , also include the link to the video conference call so that nobody can miss it, and can easily access it via their calendars.

Here’s an example of a meeting invite for our summer brainstorming session:

💡 For even better invites, add links to Slido so you can start collecting people’s input , like questions or ideas before the meeting. Learn more in the next point.

4. Collect questions and ideas from your team

Gathering input from the team members before the meeting works well with some meeting formats.

Brainstorming & planning

For example, if you’re having a brainstorming session or a planning meeting, start collecting your team members’ ideas beforehand. Attach a link to Slido to the meeting agenda or to the meeting invite and ask your colleagues to type their ideas into the app.

This gives your colleagues a safe space for submitting their ideas and levels the playing field – everyone can contribute equally , even the ones who fear speaking up in the meeting. They can even do so anonymously if they wish.

Plus, it’s more efficient than brainstorming during the meeting. It allows you to review all the submissions before the meeting and then spend the meeting time discussing and prioritizing.

In preparation for our meetings at Slido we use this technique a lot:

Retrospective meetings

A team retrospective is another meeting type where you can benefit greatly from collecting insights beforehand.

Send a stop-start-continue survey for your participants to fill out in advance.

Go through people’s submissions and look for patterns, items mentioned repeatedly, or any other important feedback. This way, you can identify the most burning issues which you can then use to create an agenda, and drive discussions during the meeting.

Create your own poll or survey in Slido and hear from everyone. Sign up below and try it for yourself.

Sign up for free

All company meetings/All team meetings

Larger meetings such as all-hands, town halls, or strategic team meetings provide an opportunity to address questions or concerns that your team members might have. Give your team a chance to post their questions into Slido even before the meeting.

You can then address them during the meeting – either in a dedicated Q&A session , or address them continuously throughout.

We start collecting questions from our employees about a week before every company all-hands meeting .

This way, our executive team has time to prepare their answers and our colleagues have a chance to go through the submitted questions and upvote the ones they identify with. We also give our colleagues a chance to ask anonymously which means our leadership gets more honest questions.

You can find more tips and ideas for all-hands meetings at our all-hands hub .

Read also: How to Host More Effective Meetings by Collecting Input in Advance

5. Distribute supporting materials

If there’s material that you want your meeting participants to review before the meeting, or if there’s something that you want your team to prepare, communicate it well in advance. You may, for instance, add it as an attachment to your meeting invite or share it in your internal comms channel.

It’s good for getting everyone aligned and familiar with the forthcoming discussion.

However, it’s good practice to clarify expectations and make a clear distinction between what’s a must  and what’s nice to have . Perhaps not everyone needs to read through a 50-slides-long presentation. Sometimes, it’s enough to get a gist of what will be discussed.

6. Prepare your slides

Getting the slide deck ready is a drill you surely know very well, but here are a few tips that can make your life a little easier.

• Apply a minimalistic approach to your slides. Keep them simple – one idea/one number/one sentence per slide. People don’t want to read huge bodies of text on slides. Plus, it’s more visually appealing.
• Use the ‘Rule of three’ method – three bullet points, three columns, etc. It’s easier for people to process
• Cut the number of slides too. Spend the meeting time on a fruitful discussion rather than going through an 80-slides-long presentation.
• Use visuals like images, graphs, tables, etc. Preferable to making people read, apply the ‘show & tell’ approach – show something visual and describe what people are looking at.
• If there will be multiple presenters at your meeting, have one master deck. Share it with all the contributors before the meeting and ask them to add their slides there. It’s much smoother than switching presentation decks.
• As you prepare slides for your meeting, think of all the points of interaction with your meeting participants (see the next point). For instance, you can insert live polls directly into your slide deck with Slido for Google Slides and Slido for PowerPoint .

7. Create opportunities for interaction

When designing a meeting, create multiple ‘ interaction points ’ – the spots on the agenda where you purposefully create a space for your meeting participants to actively contribute.

This is important for creating meaningful engagement throughout your meeting. If you let your participants sit passively through the meeting, you will eventually lose their attention.

Forbes reports that the average person loses focus within 10 minutes.

If, on the other hand, you give them space to be actively involved in the meeting, you will engage them.

So, how do you create these interaction points?

Go through your meeting agenda and think about at which point it would make sense to hear from your participants.

For example, after you’ve brainstormed some ideas for projects, ask your teammates: “Which of these projects do you think we should prioritize in the next quarter?”

Turn it into an interactive poll . Add your project ideas as options in a multiple choice or a ranking poll and let your teammates vote.

It’s a way to make your meetings more democratic – you’ll give everyone a voice – and engaging – you’ll involve everyone in co-creating the meeting and influencing its outcomes.

Learn more about how to create interaction spots in your presentation here .

💡 You can add a Slido poll, quiz, or Q&A directly into your slide deck with Slido’s integration with PowerPoint and Google Slides – it will be added as a separate interactive slide. You can manage every interaction as you click through the slides.

8. Prepare the opening

How you kick off the meeting may lay the foundations for the rest of the meeting, so leave nothing to chance and make sure to prepare your opening well.

Welcome everyone; if your meeting includes remote participants, give them a special greeting to make them feel included from the start.

To loosen people up, prepare a little icebreaker, using our selection of icebreaker questions , or, if you need a quick interactive activity that will get people talking, fire up a fun poll question .

For example, check the mood in the room and ask your colleagues how they feel in a word cloud poll . You can even let them express their feelings in emojis.

Use the poll results to trigger a small chit-chat at the start – it’s good to start the meeting with a bit of socializing, and make sure to ask open-ended questions if you want to get people really talking.

Once you kick off the official part, provide a quick context for why you’re meeting up today and briefly run people through the agenda once again.

9. Set up the meeting

Lastly, make sure you have the meeting room arrangements figured out – whether you’re meeting in an actual room or in a virtual one.

Meeting room: Face-to-face meeting

• Book a meeting room and add the room number in the meeting invite or write it in your team’s internal comms channel so everyone knows where it is you’ll be meeting.
• Consider the number of participants;  make sure everyone will have a place to sit. Arrange some extra chairs just to be safe – more is better than less.
• Make sure the seating doesn’t favor anyone – everyone should feel equal and able to contribute. Ensure everyone can hear each other well. If it’s a large meeting, ensure there’s a microphone at people’s disposal.
• Arrange for refreshments; at least supply water, so people don’t need to leave the room to get a drink.

Meeting room: Hybrid meeting

• Book a room with a large screen and a tech setup that allows for a conference call with good audio and video.
• Good audio is key . Make sure that all participants – both on-site and remote – can see and hear each other well. If your online colleagues can’t hear what’s happening in the room, they’ll have trouble joining the discussion. Ensure all your meeting rooms are equipped with quality external speakers.
• Have microphones available in the meeting room to make sure everybody online can hear their on-site colleagues if they speak up. This is important especially for meetings with a larger number of participants.
• Check if people online can hear you well . Everybody has to hear everything – and feel like they’re heard.

Online room: Fully remote meeting

• Make sure everyone has easy access to the video conferencing link where the meeting will happen. Share the link in your team’s internal comms channel or in a calendar invite (see point #3).
• Send a meeting reminder via your team’s internal comms channel some 5 minutes before the meeting.
• Start the video conference a couple of minutes early , to avoid any delays. Test the audio and troubleshoot any potential tech issues.
• Ensure every participant can hear you well as people start joining the call. You can do a little ‘thumbs up’ check – just ask your participants to put their thumbs up if they hear you well.
• Encourage people to turn on their cameras so your meeting feels more personal.

Ready to kick off your meeting?

The quality of pre-meeting preparation can make or break your meeting. You can never be over-prepared. But fail to prepare at your own peril.

With the tips that we’ve shared above, you will be 9 steps closer to a stellar meeting . We wish you good luck.

And in the meantime, go ahead and try Slido for free. Start by adding one or two polls to your meeting presentation to keep your team members actively engaged . You can always add more later.

Here’s to better meetings! 🥂

Try Slido at your meeting

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What is an effective meeting?

“This meeting should have been an email.” Emblazoned on coffee mugs, endless memes, and your colleagues’ faces on their ninth video call of the day, this sentence may end up being a catchphrase of the modern era.

As the pandemic rewrote the rule book for coworking and office culture, new processes and untested systems allowed inefficiencies to creep in —inefficiencies that included meetings scheduled for the sake of unstructured discussion or even basic human interaction rather than for productivity. While interacting might be easier than ever, value-creating collaboration isn’t—and its quality seems to be deteriorating .

Effective meetings aren’t just about keeping ourselves from going around the bend. When meetings aren’t run well—or when there are too many of them— decision  making becomes slower and the quality of decisions suffers. According to one McKinsey survey , 61 percent of executives said that at least half the time they spent making decisions—much of it surely spent in meetings—was ineffective. Just 37 percent of respondents said their organizations’ decisions were both timely and high quality. And, in a different survey , 80 percent of executives were considering or already implementing changes in meeting structure and cadence in response to the evolution of how people worked during the pandemic.

What’s more, when leaders try to solve for inefficient decision making, they too often look to organizational charts and vertical-command relationships. Rarely, in McKinsey’s experience, do they see the real issue at hand: poor design and execution of collaborative interactions. In other words, you guessed it, ineffective meetings.

It doesn’t have to be this way. When meetings are run well, they not only foster better decisions but also leave attendees feeling energized and motivated to carry the momentum forward independently. For tips on how to put a stop to video call fatigue and restart your team’s productivity, read on.

Learn more about McKinsey’s People & Organizational Performance Practice .

What does time management have to do with effective meetings?

“The only thing on Earth that never lies to you is your calendar ,” says renowned business author and McKinsey alum Tom Peters. “That’s why I’m a fanatic on the topic of time management. But when you use that term, people think, ‘Here’s an adult with a brain. And he’s teaching time management. Find something more important, please.’ But something more important doesn’t exist.”

Endless, diffuse meetings, according to Peters, take up far too much of executives’ precious working time. Half of leaders’ time, he says, citing an idea from the Israeli executive Dov Frohman, should be unscheduled. What should they do with all that unstructured time? One typically cheeky suggestion from Peters is to read more.

The reality is that effective meetings and good time management exist in a virtuous circle. Good time management means you feel empowered to turn down unnecessary meetings—and better meetings mean you spend the rest of your time feeling more purposeful in carrying out your work.

How can leaders address the problem of time scarcity?

McKinsey’s experience shows that leaders may want to stop thinking about time management as primarily an individual problem and start addressing it institutionally. Increasingly, time management is an organizational issue with roots deeply embedded in corporate cultures.

Unsurprisingly, the solution seems to be balance. Executives in one McKinsey survey  who reported being satisfied with the way their time is allocated spent 34 percent of their working time interacting with external stakeholders (including boards, customers, and investors), 39 percent in internal meetings (including one-on-ones with direct reports, leadership team meetings, and other employee gatherings), and 24 percent working alone.

Here are five ways to achieve optimal balance in allocating time :

• Have a ‘time leadership’ budget—and a process for allocating it. When adding a project or initiative, companies should analyze how much leadership attention, guidance, and intervention each will need. In our experience, this is the best way to move toward the goal of treating leaders’ time as a finite resource—one that is as precious as a company’s financial capital.
• Consider time when you introduce organizational change. Understanding the time required to achieve goals is critical to the long-term success of any organizational change. The hours needed to manage, lead, or supervise an employee can leave managers with little time left over. Getting this balance right can be tough—having too few managers could lead them to feel overwhelmed, with more direct reports than they can manage. But having too many managers can cause redundancies and unnecessary complexity.
• Ensure that individuals routinely measure and manage their time. Time analysis exercises can yield surprising results—and can inspire time management that more closely aligns with organizational priorities. Including time-related metrics in performance reviews is another driver of behavioral change.
• Refine the principal calendar. Revisit all standing meetings and make an honest assessment of which ones are being held out of habit and which ones are genuinely useful.
• Provide high-quality administrative support. In a survey of executives on how they allocate their time , 85 percent of those who considered themselves effective time managers reported that they received strong support in scheduling and allocating time. Only 7 percent of ineffective time allocators said the same. In the case of one global chemical company, the administrative assistant of the CEO considers it her responsibility to ensure that the organization’s strategic objectives are reflected in the way she allocates the CEO’s time.

Learn more about McKinsey’s  People & Organizational Performance Practice .

What are three questions you should ask yourself before scheduling a meeting?

Good meetings nurture better decision making . On the flip side, inefficient meetings not only waste time but also create distraction and confusion even when people are working independently. Here are three questions you can ask when scheduling a meeting  that can help create the clarity needed for efficient decision making.

Should this even be a meeting at all? Recurring meetings are particularly susceptible to migration from the original purpose toward something more diffuse. Check in with stakeholders to ensure that the frequency is right (weekly meetings could be changed to monthly, perhaps), or think about whether decisions could be best made by an individual—with, of course, guidance from others.

Then go deeper. Examine whether your company’s culture is to encourage meetings rather than individual decision making. To remedy this, if you’re a leader, think twice before reflexively accepting any meeting invitation as it appears in your inbox. The goal should be to treat leadership capacity as a finite resource— just like your company’s financial capital .

What is this meeting for? A meeting’s title and its purpose are not the same. When the latter isn’t clear, meetings can seem frustrating at best and futile at worst. To help avoid this, companies can appoint a “chief of staff” for certain efforts or products. This person collates materials before meetings, ensures that they are distributed ahead of time, and verifies that the due diligence has been done to necessitate a meeting in the first place. This can lead to better-informed participants, which in turn can lead to more effective time spent in meetings—and, ultimately, better decisions.

What is everyone’s role? Even if a meeting has a clear purpose, it’s of little use if there is no one present deputized to make a decision . Equally, even if it’s clear who the decider is, it’s a mistake to hold a meeting when people are unsure of participants’ roles. McKinsey analysts have seen poor role clarity stymie productivity and cause frustration, especially when decisions involve complicated business activities that cut across organizational boundaries. Blurry accountability is especially costly in an era where speed and agility confer a competitive advantage .

Meeting participants can be divided into four roles:

• Decision makers should be the only participants with a vote, and the ones with the responsibility to decide as they see fit. Sometimes decision makers will need to “disagree and commit,” to use a phrase coined by Jeff Bezos in a 2017 letter to Amazon shareholders.
• Advisers give input and shape the decision. They typically have a big stake in the decision’s outcome.
• Recommenders conduct analyses, explore alternatives, illuminate pros and cons, and ultimately recommend a course of action to the advisers and decision makers. The more recommenders the better—for the process, not the decision meeting itself.
• Execution partners don’t give input in making the decision but are deeply involved in implementation. For optimal speed and clarity, execution partners should be in the room when the decision is made so that they can envision how the implementation will evolve from the decision.

OK, I’ve eliminated all unnecessary meetings and assigned specific purposes to each one. Now what?

Great work. Now you can assign each meeting to one of the following three categories , and make specific shifts to improve the outcomes.

• Decision-making meetings. This category includes routine decisions, like quarterly business reviews, as well as complex or uncertain decisions, like decisions about investments. In order to make high-quality decisions quickly, it’s critical to clarify exactly who is going to make them. Some of these meetings can be held virtually, but complex decision-making meetings are better in person. These meetings should result in a final decision (even if not everyone agrees).
• Creative solutions and coordination meetings. These include innovation sessions—for instance, in support of a new product—as well as routine working sessions, like daily check-ins. Rather than telling people what to do, leaders should work to empower employees to make their own (supported) decisions and to spend more time on high-quality coaching sessions. As with decision-making meetings, creative solutions and coordinating meetings can be virtual—but most innovation sessions should be in person. Innovation sessions should result in potential solutions and prepare for a decision meeting, whereas routine working meetings can result in next steps.
• Information-sharing meetings. Live interaction can be useful for information sharing, especially when an interpretive lens is required or if the information is sensitive. But information-sharing meetings are often regarded as having limited value. Many organizations have recently moved to drastically improve meeting efficiency. Netflix, for example, has limited the duration of meetings to a maximum of 30 minutes  and requires that meetings involving one-way information sharing be canceled in favor of other mechanisms like a memo, podcast, or vlog. Early data from Netflix shows that the company has reduced meetings by more than 65 percent and that more than 85 percent of employees favor the approach. The goal of these meetings should be to increase awareness of the new information shared in the meeting.

What are some best practices for video meetings?

Establishing best practices for meetings might seem like common sense—but they are not commonly practiced. Here are some helpful tips from Karin M. Reed , author of the 2021 book Suddenly Virtual: Making Remote Meetings Work :

• Time: The most effective meetings are short meetings. Rather than scheduling a two-hour call with ten agenda items, cut it down to a 20-minute meeting with two agenda items. There are limits to people’s endurance and attention spans in the virtual environment.
• Participants: When determining the number of attendees for decision-making meetings, the sweet spot is five to seven. More than seven attendees in any meeting can result in an unwieldy discussion.
• Appearance: Pay attention to your appearance when hosting a videoconference. It’s not a matter of vanity—it shows respect for your conversation partner and can help you get your message across. Light your face properly: facial expressions are critical to conveying a message. And anything that takes attention away from you, whether it’s a crackly audio connection or a silly picture of Uncle Rupert in the background, will distract from your message.
• Eye contact: Look at your camera lens when you’re talking, not at your screen. This goes against our natural impulses, but eye contact is critical when you’re having a conversation. And to maintain eye contact on a video call, you need to look at your camera.
• Inclusion: Leaders should engage in proactive facilitation to ensure that everyone has the chance to say their piece. Cold calling on people—gently, and with good intention—lets people know that it’s their time to speak. Even if someone doesn’t have anything to add, they will have felt included.

For more in-depth exploration of these topics, see McKinsey’s People & Organizational Performance Practice . Also check out organizational structure–related job opportunities if you’re interested in working at McKinsey.

Articles referenced:

• “ If we’re all so busy, why isn’t anything getting done? ,” January 10, 2022, Aaron De Smet , Caitlin Hewes, Mengwei Luo, J. R. Maxwell , and Patrick Simon  
• “ Author Talks: Karin M. Reed on virtual meetings ,” April 20, 2021
• “ To unlock better decision making, plan better meetings ,” November 9, 2020, Aaron De Smet  and Leigh Weiss
• “ Want a better decision? Plan a better meeting ,” McKinsey Quarterly , May 8, 2019, Aaron De Smet , Gregor Jost , and Leigh Weiss  
• “ Tom Peters on leading the 21st-century organization ,” McKinsey Quarterly , September 1, 2014, Aaron De Smet  and Suzanne Heywood
• “ Making time management the organization’s priority ,” McKinsey Quarterly , January 1, 2013, Frankki Bevins  and Aaron De Smet

Want to know more about effective meetings?

Related articles.

If we’re all so busy, why isn’t anything getting done?

To unlock better decision making, plan better meetings

Author Talks: Karin M. Reed on virtual meetings

How to Present a Meeting Agenda The Right Way [+ Free Sample Templates]

Learn how to turn around unproductive meetings successfully by incorporating meeting agendas. Streamline your meeting prep using these tips, best practices, and free sample agenda templates.

An inside look at the meeting ground rules used internally by Fellow.app, the top-rated meeting productivity software company.

After almost two years of working from home, online meetings, and new workplace dynamics, we’re pretty certain you’ve had your fair share of meetings. 9 out of 10 people daydream in the middle of meetings , but if you count as that 1 person who doesn’t, we congratulate you. But, more likely than not, much of the time you spend in meetings could be better spent elsewhere. 

This trend of unproductive meetings (which costs the US business $37 billion ) is something that we’ve all experienced, as meetings either run on for too long, stray off course, or are just completely pointless. Yet, in the midst of all of these negative statistics, there are several that show the true power of meetings. For example, the impact of a good meeting can last up to 2.5 years later .

One of the best ways to ensure that your meeting falls into this ‘good’ category is to create a detailed agenda beforehand. Although this seems incredibly simple, it’s been proven that agendas can decrease the amount of time spent in meetings by up to 80% . With clear points to hit and a path that all employees can follow along with, they help everyone get through meetings more efficiently.

In this article, we’ll be discussing the following:

What types of meetings need a meeting agenda?

Meeting agenda template tips.

• How do you present an agenda depending on the meeting type? 

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Quite simply, all of them. Meeting agendas ensure that every meeting you attend is as efficient as possible. Instead of beating around the bush, the structured format that an agenda provides will allow you to more easily navigate through the points that you have to cover.

Whether it be a daily, departmental, one-on-one, or brainstorming meeting, you should always prepare an agenda ahead of time. Agendas help people understand why they’re actually attending the meeting, making sure they don’t walk into it with a frustrated outlook or assuming it could’ve just been an email.

Additionally, if the topic requires input from others (like status updates), detailing this in an agenda ahead of time will ensure that your team members have time to prepare what they’re going to say. After doing that, there will be fewer pauses in your meetings, helping them to flow naturally through the discussion points that you’ve chosen. 

If you’re looking to have productive meetings every single time, making the most of meeting agendas is the best way to improve. Utilizing them more often will help team members feel less frustrated and have more structured discussions. 

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Before we dive into all of the different meeting agendas that you could use for various meeting types, we’ll cover some tips that you can carry forward. These are basic components and ideas that you can integrate into your meeting depending on its purpose. 

For example, a team meeting agenda with the entire team won’t have the same agenda items as a one-on-one. However, they both use simple agenda concepts, making these tips a great set of ideas to keep in mind. Typically, you want to include the following things on the agenda:

• Purpose of meeting: At the top of every single meeting agenda should be a clear statement of what you want to achieve in that meeting. Do not mince your words; keep it short and sweet. 
• Attendees: Make sure to list who is invited to the meeting near the top of the agenda. This will help put into perspective why the meeting is happening, who’s involved in a particular project, and what other people your team can contact for more information. Be sure to include who the meeting leader is.
• Main themes: Only a few words are required here. You’ll want to write down the general meeting theme (planning, HR, budget, etc.).
• Outline of points to cover: Moving down the meeting agenda, an attendee should be able to see exactly what points you’ll be discussing in the meeting. You can build these from the action items of a previous meeting if needed. This will help your team members  prepare ahead of time and get all of them on the same page with the discussion topic.
• Action items: Upon closing your meeting, you should outline the goals that the team aims to achieve. These should reflect the meeting goals and demonstrate what people have to do going forward to accomplish the goals you’ve set out.
• Bonus items: To take your meeting from good to great, include any additional documents people are going to need. Include your presentation, if you have one, and any other links, graphs, articles, or documents.

These elements are the main things that you’ll come across on a sample agenda. While some agendas don’t include all of them, the majority will contain a balance of these items. Depending on the meeting structure and the agenda items you want to cover, you can change the actual agenda you send out.

In general, we also recommend that you:

• Host your meetings online : 76% of those that began using online technology for their meetings saw an increase in productivity . If you’re not already using an online platform, you could be wasting time commuting to meetings and causing a more lengthy discussion. By using a meeting template in a tool like Fellow , you can take your meetings to the next level with AI generated meeting summaries, collaborative note-taking, and assignable action items.
• Include a post-meeting survey summary : This gives your team members the ability to provide feedback. Over time, you can use this feedback to improve performance in meetings, making your meeting process more streamlined.
• Send meeting notes to everyone: When using an online meeting application like Fellow, you’ll have the option to take meeting notes within the actual meeting, then send the document directly to everyone that attended with just the click of a button. This set of notes ensures that everyone knows what key decisions were made in the meeting. They’ll also have a location to quickly address anything that came up in the meeting.

Now that you know all about creating a meeting agenda, let’s jump into meeting agenda templates that you can follow.

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How to present an agenda for different meeting types

Moving through all the different meeting agenda templates, we’ll be demonstrating samples that you can use in your next meeting for the following:

Team meetings

One-on-ones, executive meetings, weekly meetings.

Let’s break these down further.

A team meeting agenda template can range widely, reflecting the fact that there are many different types of teams and structures out there. That being said, an effective team meeting agenda will always have:

• A main goal or purpose 
• Agenda bullet points
• Decisions that need to be made
• Next steps towards achieving goals

Here’s a sample team meeting agenda:

{{team-meeting="/blog-inserts"}}

The best way to get to know your team and to ensure they’re not overworked is through one-on-one meetings . In these meetings, you should:

• Talk about your employee’s work week
• Review their priorities
• Comment around their recent work to motivate them
• Provide feedback on their performance if needed

Here’s a sample one-on-one agenda from to use:

{{one-on-one="/blog-inserts-4"}}

Gathering the most important individuals in the company, your executive members , means that you don’t want to waste time. Whether it be the head of departments or a board meeting agenda template, make sure your team meeting is as effective as possible. Keep it short and sweet, covering the following agenda items:

• A review of the current projects in each department
• Customer or market changes
• Recent wins
• Current cross-team priorities
• Any problems that need to be overcome
• Action items for the future (suggest agenda items for personal team meetings)

Facilitating these meetings swiftly will ensure that your business isn’t wasting money on meetings that run on too long. Here’s an example executive meeting template:

{{executive-weekly-team-meeting="/blog-inserts"}}

Weekly meetings are one of the best ways to ensure that your team meets regularly. These will ensure that every team member is on the right track, and that your team members’ satisfaction remains high, with no one suffering under too much work.

A typical weekly team meeting agenda includes:

• Updates about team members’ progress
• Celebrate team wins 
• Goal review and overall progress
• Priorities and action items for the upcoming week

This is an effective agenda, filled with useful agenda topics and discussion topics. Moving through weekly team meetings will help your team stay on top of their projects at a high level.

Here’s a weekly meeting agenda that you can use:

{{weekly-meeting="/blog-inserts-7"}}

Streamline your next meeting with an agenda

Whether you like them or not, meetings play a critical role in running a business — and they aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. That being said, it's always best to prepare ahead of time to make sure everyone has a positive experience. The best way to avoid unproductive meetings is to create an effective agenda that you can send out to all your meeting participants.

From these meeting agenda templates, you’ll be able to find a structure that works for you. Having an agenda helps key decisions, conversations, and discussions that happen in your meetings become as effective as possible. 

With agendas, meeting participants will be able to enter with clear expectations, participate effectively during the meeting, and ultimately decide what needs to be done after the meeting concludes.

Don't let unproductive meetings slow you down

See the impact of fewer, shorter meetings, increased accountability, and enhanced productivity with Fellow.

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How To Craft Action-Oriented Meeting Agendas

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How to Nail Your Weekly Team Meeting [+6 Free Agenda Templates]

Understand the 6 key agenda items, plus free downloads of team meeting agenda templates for remote & in-person teams.

How To Tie Action Items From Previous Meeting Agendas Into Your Meetings

Don't let your action items burn out with your meeting. Learn how to reignite meeting action items by using these strategies consistently.

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Home Blog Presentation Ideas How to Start a Presentation: 5 Strong Opening Slides and 12 Tricks To Test

How to Start a Presentation: 5 Strong Opening Slides and 12 Tricks To Test

Knowing how to start a presentation is crucial: if you fail to capture the audience’s attention right off the bat, your entire presentation will flop. Few listeners will stick with you to the end and retain what you have told.

That is mildly unpleasant when you are doing an in-house presentation in front of your colleagues. But it can become utterly embarrassing when you present in front of larger audiences (e.g., at a conference) or worse – delivering a sales presentation to prospective customers.

Here is how most of us begin a presentation: give an awkward greeting, thank everyone for coming, clear our throats, tap the mic, and humbly start to mumble about our subject. The problem with such an opening performance? It effectively kills and buries even the best messages.

Table of Contents

• The Classic Trick: Open a Presentation with an Introduction
• Open a Presentation with a Hook
• Begin with a Captivating Visual
• Ask a “What if…” Question
• Use the Word “Imagine”
• Leverage The Curiosity Gap
• The Power of Silence
• Facts as Weapons of Communication
• Fact vs. Myths
• The Power of Music
• Physical Activity
• Acknowledging a Person

How to Start a PowerPoint Presentation The Right Way

Let’s say you have all of your presentation slides polished up (in case you don’t, check our quick & effective PowerPoint presentation design tips first). Your presentation has a clear storyline and agenda. Main ideas are broken into bite-sized statements for your slides and complemented with visuals. All you have left is to figure out how you begin presenting.

The best way is to appeal to and invoke certain emotions in your audience – curiosity, surprise, fear, or good old amusements. Also, it is recommended to present your main idea in the first 30 seconds of the presentation. And here’s how it’s done.

1. The Classic Trick: Open a Presentation with an Introduction

When you don’t feel like reinventing the wheel, use a classic trick from the book – start with a quick personal introduction. Don’t want to sound as boring as everyone else with your humble “Hi, I’m John, the head of the Customer Support Department”? Great, because we are all about promoting effective presentation techniques (hint: using a dull welcome slide isn’t one of them).

Here’s how to introduce yourself in a presentation the right way.

a. Use a link-back memory formula

To ace a presentation, you need to connect with your audience. The best way to do so is by throwing in a simple story showing who you are, where you came from, and why your words matter.

The human brain loves a good story, and we are more inclined to listen and retain the information told this way. Besides, when we can relate to the narrator (or story hero), we create an emotional bond with them, and, again – become more receptive, and less skeptical of the information that is about to be delivered.

So here are your presentation introduction lines:

My name is Joanne, and I’m the Head of Marketing at company XYZ. Five years ago I was working as a waitress, earning $10/hour and collecting rejection letters from editors. About ten letters every week landed to my mailbox. You see, I love words, but decent publisher thought mine were good enough. Except for the restaurant owner. I was very good at up-selling and recommending dishes to the customers. My boss even bumped my salary to $15/hour as a token of appreciation for my skill. And this made me realize: I should ditch creative writing and focus on copywriting instead. After loads of trial and error back in the day, I learned how to write persuasive copy. I was no longer getting rejection letters. I was receiving thousands of emails saying that someone just bought another product from our company. My sales copy pages generated over $1,500,000 in revenue over last year. And I want to teach you how to do the same”

b. Test the Stereotype Formula

This one’s simple and effective as well. Introduce yourself by sharing an obvious stereotype about your profession. This cue will help you connect with your audience better, make them chuckle a bit, and set a lighter mood for the speech to follow.

Here’s how you can frame your intro:

“My name is ___, and I am a lead software engineer at our platform [Your Job Title]. And yes, I’m that nerdy type who never liked presenting in front of large groups of people. I would rather stay in my den and write code all day long. [Stereotype]. But hey, since I have mustered enough courage…let’s talk today about the new product features my team is about to release….”

After sharing a quick, self-deprecating line, you transition back to your topic, reinforcing the audience’s attention . Both of these formulas help you set the “mood” for your further presentation, so try using them interchangeably on different occasions.

2. Open a Presentation with a Hook

Wow your audience straight off the bat by sharing something they would not expect to hear. This may be one of the popular first-time presentation tips but don’t rush to discard it.

Because here’s the thing: psychologically , we are more inclined to pay attention whenever presented with an unexpected cue. When we know what will happen next – someone flips the switch, and lights turn on – we don’t really pay much attention to that action.

But when we don’t know what to expect next – e.g., someone flips the switch and a bell starts ringing – we are likely to pay more attention to what will happen next. The same goes for words: everyone loves stories with unpredictable twists. So begin your presentation with a PowerPoint introduction slide or a line that no one expects to hear.

Here are a few hook examples you can swipe:

a. Open with a provocative statement

It creates an instant jolt and makes the audience intrigued to hear what you are about to say next – pedal back, continue with the provocation, or do something else that they will not expect.

“You will live seven and a half minutes longer than you would have otherwise, just because you watched this talk.”

That’s how Jane McGonigal opens one of her TED talks . Shocking and intriguing, right?

b. Ask a rhetorical, thought-provoking question

Seasoned presenters know that one good practice is to ask a question at the beginning of a presentation to increase audience engagement. Rhetorical questions have a great persuasive effect – instead of answering aloud, your audience will silently start musing over it during your presentation. They aroused curiosity and motivated the audience to remain attentive, as they did want to learn your answer to this question.

To reinforce your message throughout the presentation, you can further use the Rhetorical Triangle Concept – a rhetorical approach to building a persuasive argument based on Aristotle’s teachings.

c. Use a bold number, factor stat

A clean slide with some mind-boggling stat makes an undeniably strong impact. Here are a few opening statement examples you can use along with your slide:

• Shock them: “We are effectively wasting over $1.2 billion per year on producing clothes no one will ever purchase”
• Create empathy: “Are you among the 20% of people with undiagnosed ADHD?”
• Call to arms: “58% of marketing budgets are wasted due to poor landing page design. Let’s change this!”
• Spark curiosity: “Did you know that companies who invested in speech recognition have seen a 13% increase in ROI within just 3 years?”

3. Begin with a Captivating Visual

Compelling visuals are the ABC of presentation design – use them strategically to make an interesting statement at the beginning and throughout your presentation. Your first presentation slide can be text-free. Communicate your idea with a visual instead – a photo, a chart, an infographic, or another graphics asset.

Visuals are a powerful medium for communication as our brain needs just 13 milliseconds to render what our eyes see, whereas text comprehension requires more cognitive effort.

Relevant images add additional aesthetic appeal to your deck, bolster the audience’s imagination, and make your key message instantly more memorable.

Here’s an intro slide example. You want to make a strong presentation introduction to global pollution.  Use the following slide to reinforce the statement you share:

“Seven of nine snow samples taken on land in Antarctica found chemicals known as PFAs, which are used in industrial products and can harm wildlife”

Source: Reuters

4. Ask a “What if…” Question

The “what if” combo carries massive power. It gives your audience a sense of what will happen if they choose to listen to you and follow your advice.  Here are a few presentations with starting sentences + slides to illustrate this option:

Alternatively, you can work your way to this point using different questions:

• Ask the audience about their “Why.” Why are they attending this event, or why do they find this topic relevant?
• Use “How” as your question hook if you plan to introduce a potential solution to a problem.
• If your presentation has a persuasion factor associated, use “When” as a question to trigger the interest of the audience on, for example, when they are planning to take action regarding the topic being presented (if we talk about an inspirational presentation).

5. Use the Word “Imagine”

“Imagine,” “Picture This,” and “Think of” are better word choices for when you plan to begin your presentation with a quick story.

Our brain loves interacting with stories. In fact, a captivating story makes us more collaborative. Scientists have discovered that stories with tension during narrative make us:

• Pay more attention,
• Share emotions with the characters and even mimic the feelings and behaviors of those characters afterward.

That’s why good action movies often feel empowering and make us want to change the world too. By incorporating a good, persuasive story with a relatable hero, you can also create that “bond” with your audience and make them more perceptive to your pitch – donate money to support the cause; explore the solution you are offering, and so on.

6. Leverage The Curiosity Gap

The curiosity gap is another psychological trick frequently used by marketers to solicit more clicks, reads, and other interactions from the audience. In essence, it’s the trick you see behind all those clickbait, Buzzfeed-style headlines:

Not everyone is a fan of such titles. But the truth is – they do the trick and instantly capture attention. The curiosity gap sparks our desire to dig deeper into the matter. We are explicitly told that we don’t know something important, and now we crave to change that. Curiosity is an incredibly strong driving force for action – think Eve, think Pandora’s Box.

So consider incorporating these attention grabbers for your presentation speech to shock the audience. You can open with one, or strategically weave them in the middle of your presentation when you feel like your audience is getting tired and may lose their focus.

Here’s how you can use the curiosity gap during your presentation:

• Start telling a story, pause in the middle, and delay the conclusion of it.
• Withhold the key information (e.g., the best solution to the problem you have described) for a bit – but not for too long, as this can reduce the initial curiosity.
• Introduce an idea or concept and link it with an unexpected outcome or subject – this is the best opening for a presentation tip.

7. The Power of Silence

What would you do if you attended a presentation in which the speaker remains silent for 30 seconds after the presentation starts? Just the presenter, standing in front of the audience, in absolute silence.

Most likely, your mind starts racing with thoughts, expecting something of vital importance to be disclosed. The surprise factor with this effect is for us to acknowledge things we tend to take for granted.

It is a powerful resource to introduce a product or to start an inspirational presentation if followed by a fact.

8. Facts as Weapons of Communication

In some niches, using statistics as the icebreaker is the best method to retain the audience’s interest.

Say your presentation is about climate change. Why not introduce a not-so-common fact, such as the amount of wool that can be produced out of oceanic plastic waste per month? And since you have to base your introduction on facts, research manufacturers that work with Oceanic fabrics from recycled plastic bottles .

Using facts helps to build a better narrative, and also gives leverage to your presentation as you are speaking not just from emotional elements but from actually recorded data backed up by research.

9. Fact vs. Myths

Related to our previous point, we make quite an interesting speech if we contrast a fact vs. a myth in a non-conventional way: using a myth to question a well-accepted fact, then introducing a new point of view or theory, backed on sufficient research, that proves the fact wrong. This technique, when used in niches related to academia, can significantly increase the audience’s interest, and it will highlight your presentation as innovative.

Another approach is to debunk a myth using a fact. This contrast immediately piques interest because it promises to overturn commonly held beliefs, and people naturally find it compelling when their existing knowledge is put to the test. An example of this is when a nutritionist wishes to speak about how to lose weight via diet, and debunks the myth that all carbohydrates are “bad”.

10. The Power of Music

Think about a presentation that discusses the benefits of using alternative therapies to treat anxiety, reducing the need to rely on benzodiazepines. Rather than going technical and introducing facts, the presenter can play a soothing tune and invite the audience to follow an exercise that teaches how to practice breathing meditation . Perhaps, in less than 2 minutes, the presenter can accomplish the goal of exposing the advantages of this practice with a live case study fueled by the proper ambiance (due to the music played in the beginning).

11. Physical Activity

Let’s picture ourselves in an in-company presentation about workspace wellness. For this company, the sedentary lifestyle their employees engage in is a worrying factor, so they brought a personal trainer to coach the employees on a basic flexibility routine they can practice in 5 minutes after a couple of hours of desk time.

“Before we dive in, let’s all stand up for a moment.” This simple instruction breaks the ice and creates a moment of shared experience among the attendees. You could then lead them through a brief stretching routine, saying something like, “Let’s reach up high, and stretch out those muscles that get so tight sitting at our desks all day.” With this action, you’re not just talking about workplace wellness, you’re giving them a direct, personal experience of it.

This approach has several advantages. Firstly, it infuses energy into the room and increases the oxygen flow to the brain, potentially boosting the audience’s concentration and retention. Secondly, it sets a precedent that your presentation is not going to be a standard lecture, but rather an interactive experience. This can raise the level of anticipation for what’s to come, and make the presentation a topic for future conversation between coworkers.

12. Acknowledging a Person

How many times have you heard the phrase: “Before we begin, I’d like to dedicate a few words to …” . The speaker could be referring to a mentor figure, a prominent person in the local community, or a group of people who performed charity work or obtained a prize for their hard work and dedication. Whichever is the reason behind this, acknowledgment is a powerful force to use as a method of starting a presentation. It builds a connection with the audience, it speaks about your values and who you admire, and it can transmit what the conversation is going to be about based on who the acknowledged person is.

Closing Thoughts

Now you know how to start your presentation – you have the opening lines, you have the slides to use, and you can browse even more attractive PowerPoint presentation slides and templates on our website. Also, we recommend you visit our article on how to make a PowerPoint Presentation to get familiarized with the best tactics for professional presentation design and delivery, or if you need to save time preparing your presentation, we highly recommend you check our AI Presentation Maker to pair these concepts with cutting-edge slide design powered by AI.

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Presentation Agenda Slides: The Ultimate Guide to Create Spectacular Agenda Slides

Hrideep barot.

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Your audience could leave before the presentation is through if you don’t let them know what engaging and informed material is coming up next. Your agenda slides effectively inform your audience of the main takeaways they might expect from your talk.

Like a table of contents, an agenda slide lists the subjects covered during a presentation or meeting. Typically, the themes are hyperlinked to the respective parts so that viewers may easily go to the slide they desire by just clicking on the topic.

Why use agenda slides?

It is usually preferable that the crowd has a general idea of the topics you will be discussing. Agenda slides do this. It’s almost like a warm-up for the crowd. It also provides your presentation with structure. A concise agenda slide design informs the audience about the topic of your presentation and offers an outline of the items that will be discussed. Without an agenda slide, you keep your audiences in the dark.

The agenda also assists in priming the audience. It is a term commonly used in psychology to describe an enhanced sensitivity to specific stimuli due to earlier experience. When we watch a happy movie, for example, we tend to perceive the world around us from a more positive perspective and notice positive things we would not have before. For more information on the importance of agenda slides, check out this article.

If the agenda is messed up with a jumbled slide with too many divisions, you’ve already lost your audience. You may have had valuable ideas to discuss with your audience, but you drove them away with an overload of information. As a result, on your agenda slide, always include just the most crucial elements of the presentation. 

Types of Agenda Slides

Simple agenda slides.

Simple agenda slides will assist you in emphasising essential elements in your presentation as well as the main sections so that you do not overlook anything crucial. When graphics are not as vital as the material itself, these simple agenda slides might be utilised to provide the audience with a general overview of the presentation. Given here are a few types of simple agenda slides.

Horizontal Agenda Slides

These agenda templates adhere to a horizontal agenda-setting structure, allowing you to display agendas for various objectives in horizontal order.

Vertical Agenda Slides

These agenda templates adhere to a vertical agenda-setting structure, allowing you to display agendas for various objectives in vertical order.

Detailed Agenda Slides

These agenda Slides summarize the presentation’s contents and offer a quick summary of every topic discussed. The audience learns about the topics that will be explored in depth.

Creative Agenda Slides

Creative agenda slides not only convey the essential information regarding your presentation, but they also do it in a visually appealing manner that provides more information about the presentation. The user can become inventive with the concept and arrange the shapes in any manner to make more creative agenda slides.

Circular Agenda Slides

Simple designs like arcs with arrows may provide a stunning impression that is difficult to ignore. Arrange the agenda elements along the arcs with their accompanying symbols to depict the evolution of your session from beginning to conclusion in an appealing circular fashion.

Timed Agenda Slides

These templates give a foundation for using a defined timetable for the meeting or a presentation.

Priority Agenda Slides

These designs provide an agenda-setting structure that allows you to provide agendas in order of relevance. You may display the presentation’s contents in a prioritized sequence. This is so that the audience understands what is most relevant in that presentation.

Steps to Design Agenda Slides

An agenda slide is usually the initial slide that the viewer sees after the title page, thus it must be visually appealing. It is possible to accomplish this by adding a background image and utilizing icons and symbols in the subject list panel.

Choose a graphic that conveys seriousness. If you’re giving a presentation in the boardroom, the conference table might be useful. When speaking on a stage, the platform or the audience might be an excellent backdrop image. Alternatively, you may choose any business image depicting experts engaged in a discussion, a clock or a calendar indicating that time is of importance, a business desk, and so on.

Insert text boxes and use catchy titles

Instead of a regular text box, you may use the “Insert” option to insert a “SmartArt” graphic. It includes a collection of pre-formatted text boxes and graphics for displaying a group of objects’ process flow, hierarchy, and so on. For agenda slides, the “List” type is recommended. 

You can even make your own forms.

• Navigate to the Insert tab.
• Select any form in the Shapes dropdown menu.
• Construct the shape on the slide by dragging.
• Optionally, select the Rotate dropdown option in the Format tab to rotate it in whichever direction you choose.
• Duplicate the form until you obtain the required number of shapes.
• Place a circle in every box and an icon in each box.

It is advised that you use completely editable vector icons so you may modify their colour, size, and so on without affecting the icon’s quality. After that, just place text boxes within the shapes to type out your agenda items.

Consider Hyperlinks

While in presentation mode, the user may move to the correct slide by simply tapping on the topic. You insert a hyperlink by right-clicking the chosen text and selecting “Hyperlink.” A dialogue box will open, and you can then navigate to the “This Document” tab and choose the page to which you want to connect. This is especially useful for presentations that include many slides and is shared with the audience. For conferences or speeches, this is rarely used. 

Outline for making agenda slides in PowerPoint

Step 1 : In the “Click to add title” box, put “Agenda” or your desired agenda slide title, such as “Today’s Topic.” then pull it to the slide’s top.

Step 2 : In the subtitle text box, write the first topic of the agenda, such as “Introductions.” Hit the “Enter” key to create a line of spacing between lines. Fill in the blanks on your slide with all of the items.

Step 3 : Highlight all of the text. Click the “Home” tab and the “Numbering” button in the ribbon’s paragraph area to add numbering to the agenda items. You may also use the drop-down arrow on the “Numbering” button to add A, B, C, or another formatting to the agenda topics instead of numbers. You don’t have to use numbers; you may alternatively use arrows or nothing.

Steps 2 and 3 can be substituted with the SmartArt Graphic described above. The graphic will automatically fill in the blanks for you to construct a list, provide a numbering, and give you space to enter your text.

Step 4 : Select the “Design” tab and move your mouse over the elements in the Themes column. There are several themes available with various backgrounds, text colours and sizes, and design components. If desired, select one to apply to the slide. You may also adjust specific text looks such as font type, size, colour and positioning using the Home tab’s Font section of the ribbon.

Step 5 : Select “Picture” under the “Insert” option. Double-click the corporate logo by navigating to it, dragging it into the slide’s vacant space, ideally to the left or right of the title.

How to Present Agenda Slides

The agenda requires hooks in order to keep the audience’s attention during the presentation. A hook persuades the audience to pay attention. It clearly explains why the information is valuable. The subjects that will be discussed in the presentation are simply listed on the agenda. The audience may or may not take the agenda’s worth into account.

The standard agenda slide has the drawback of being tedious and lengthy for the presenter to go through, and also gives the audience the option of choosing not to listen at specific times, if at all. As a result, the agenda presentation must be interesting.

To understand how to use hooks, you can refer to this article or even this video linked below

Additionally, it is advised not to start your speech with an agenda. Start off with something more engaging. For ideas, see this article . Deliver your agenda after you’ve concluded your opening.

Websites that provide templates for agenda slides

Powerpoint creation might take a lot of time. Therefore, to save you both time and effort, here are some websites that provide free PowerPoint templates.

You can see in their downloadable PowerPoint templates that Behance has some of the top designs on the globe. You can give a terrific presentation with excellent visuals by using templates like this agenda presentation template .

SlideModel offers the audience fully customizable PowerPoint, Google Slides, and Keynote templates and slides objects. Even for sophisticated editing objects, both in colour and size (points and curves). You can use their templates like this creative agenda slide in any presentation.

This startup, made by the Freepik Company, offers users totally customisable PPT and Google Slide templates that are used by organisations like Amazon, NASA, and Spotify. They furthermore offer infographics to assist in delivering the user-specific material. The graphic prowess of this website is demonstrated by the slides from templates like this medical agenda template .

An inventive selection of unrestricted PowerPoint templates is provided by SlideGeeks. You will need to sign up with an account and share the hyperlink in order to download these templates, but there are so many templates available, including this one , that it is well worth it.

A presentation’s table of contents, or agenda slide, lists the subjects that will be covered throughout the presentation. It typically includes the headings for each portion and subsection, as well as, on occasion, the start and finish timings and the speaker for each one. It outlines the presentation’s format and serves as a primer for the presentation or meeting.

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• Meeting agenda examples: How to plan, w ...

Meeting agenda examples: How to plan, write, and implement

Your agenda tells your team what to expect during a meeting and how they can prepare for it. Ideally, you’ll use your agenda to connect your team with the meeting’s purpose, assign tasks or items to team members, and designate a realistic amount of time to each agenda item. A great meeting agenda maximizes the meeting’s effectiveness and keeps your team on track.

An effective agenda communicates the purpose of your meeting, gives your team the chance to prepare their agenda items, and keeps everyone on track.

Whether you’re preparing for your next board meeting, staff meeting, or business meeting, we’ll help you write an agenda that will maximize your meeting’s potential.

What is a meeting agenda?

A meeting agenda serves as a structured roadmap for your meeting, detailing the topics and activities planned. Its primary role is to provide meeting participants with a clear framework, outlining the sequence of events, the leader for each agenda item, and the time allocated for each task. By having this agenda as a guide both before and throughout the meeting, it helps to facilitate an efficient and productive flow of discussion.

How to write a meeting agenda

Crafting a meeting agenda is a key step in ensuring a focused and productive meeting. Here's how to do it effectively.

1. Clarify meeting objectives

The first step in writing a meeting agenda is to clearly define any goals. In clarifying the goal, be as specific as possible. This specificity helps guide the discussion and ensure that the meeting remains focused. It also helps stakeholders prepare for the meeting.

For example, if the goal is to finalize the budget for the next quarter or discuss new business, participants would come prepared with relevant data and insights.

A well-defined goal also helps set the meeting's tone and align everyone's expectations. This clarity leads to a more structured discussion and a more productive meeting overall.

2. Invite participant input

Inviting input from participants before finalizing the agenda is a critical step in creating a comprehensive and inclusive meeting plan. This involves reaching out to potential attendees and asking if there's anything specific they would like to discuss or add to the meeting agenda.

For example, if you're planning a meeting for a project team, you could send an email asking each member to suggest topics they feel are important to address. This could reveal issues or ideas you hadn't considered, ensuring a more well-rounded agenda.

Incorporating participant input not only makes the agenda more comprehensive but also increases engagement. When team members see their suggestions included, they feel valued and are more likely to participate actively in the meeting. It also ensures that the meeting addresses the concerns of all attendees.

Gathering input can be done through various channels, like email, shared docs, or team collaboration tools. The key is to make it easy for meeting participants to contribute and to ensure their suggestions are considered and, where appropriate, included in the final agenda.

3. Outline key questions for discussion

Making a list of important things to talk about is important for keeping the meeting on track and focused. Start by identifying the main meeting topics that need to be addressed and framing them as questions.

For instance, if the meeting is to discuss the progress of an ongoing project, key questions might include:

What are the current roadblocks in the project?

How are we tracking against the project timeline

What resources are needed to maintain the pace of work?

These questions serve as talking points and a guide for the discussion, ensuring that all relevant topics are covered. They also help in structuring the conversation, making it easier for participants to prepare and engage effectively.

4. Define each task’s purpose

Each task or topic on the agenda should have a clearly defined purpose. This transparency helps participants understand the importance of each discussion point and how it relates to the overall goal of the meeting.

For example, if one of the agenda items is to review recent client feedback and performance metrics, the purpose might be to identify areas for improvement in customer service. By stating this purpose, participants can focus their thoughts on this specific objective, leading to a more targeted and fruitful discussion.

Defining the purpose of each task also helps prevent the meeting from going off track. When participants understand why a topic is being discussed, they are less likely to veer off-topic, making the meeting more efficient.

5. Allocate time for agenda items

Effective meeting management requires allotting time for each item on the agenda. This includes determining the amount of time needed for each meeting topic or task and scheduling the meeting appropriately.

For instance, if you have five items on your agenda, you might allocate 10 minutes for a brief update, 20 minutes for brainstorming, and 15 minutes for discussing action items. This time allocation should be based on the complexity and importance of each topic.

Effective time management requires being realistic with your time estimates and factoring in extra time for unforeseen conversations or inquiries. This approach helps in keeping the meeting within the scheduled time frame, respecting everyone's time, and maintaining focus.

6. Assign topic facilitators

Assigning facilitators for each topic on the agenda can greatly enhance the effectiveness of the meeting. A facilitator’s role is to guide the discussion, make certain that the conversation stays on track, and that all voices are heard.

For example, if one of the agenda items is to discuss sales strategies, you might assign this topic to a senior salesperson. Their expertise and familiarity with the subject can help steer the conversation productively.

Facilitators should be chosen based on their knowledge of the topic and their ability to manage group discussions. They should also be briefed on their role and the expectations for the discussion.

7. Write the meeting agenda

Finally, compile all the elements into a structured and comprehensive agenda. The agenda should include the meeting’s goal, a list of topics to be discussed with their purposes, time allocations, and assigned facilitators. This structure provides a clear roadmap for the meeting, ensuring that all important points are covered.

Share the agenda with all participants well in advance of the meeting. This allows them to prepare and ensures that everyone is on the same page. A well-written agenda is a key tool in running an effective and productive meeting.

Tips to create an effective meeting agenda

Let’s start with some of our favorite tips on creating great meeting agendas so you can make the most of yours:

Create and share your meeting agenda as early as possible. At the very latest, you should share your meeting agenda an hour before the meeting time. This allows everyone to prepare for what’s going to happen. Your team can also relay questions or additional agenda items to you for a potential adjustment before the meeting. Besides, when your team members have a chance to properly prepare themselves, they’ll have a much easier time focusing during the meeting.

Link to any relevant pre-reading materials in advance. This can be the presentation deck, additional context, or a previous decision. Everyone arriving at the meeting will be on the same page and ready to move the discussion forward rather than asking a ton of questions that take up relevant time.

Assign facilitators for each agenda item. Remember that feeling of being called on in school when you didn’t know the answer? It’s a pretty terrible feeling that we’re sure you don’t want to evoke in your teammates. By assigning a facilitator for each agenda item before the meeting, you allow them to prepare for a quick rundown of the topic, questions, and feedback.

Define and prioritize your agenda items. Differentiate between the three categories of agenda items: informational, discussion topics, and action items. Clarifying the purpose of each agenda item helps your team member understand what’s most important and what to focus on. You’ll also want to prioritize which items are most important and absolutely have to be discussed during the meeting and which ones can be addressed asynchronously, should the clock run out.

Use your meeting agenda during the meeting to track notes and action items. That way, all of the meeting information is in one place. If anyone has questions about decisions or action items from the meeting, they have an easy place to find it. Bonus: Do this in Asana so you can assign out action items and next steps to ensure nothing falls through the cracks. Asana also integrates with Zoom and pulls in your Zoom recording or meeting transcript directly into the meeting agenda task.

Create flow by categorizing your agenda items. To maximize productivity, you’ll want to create a meeting agenda that flows well. Batch similar items together and ensure they can build off of one another. For example, list any informational items before the discussion items so your team has all of the information going into the discussion.

Allocate enough time for each item on your agenda. Nobody will complain about a meeting that runs short—keeping everyone longer than anticipated isn’t as much fun. Plan sufficient time for each agenda item by calculating an estimated time and adding a couple of minutes as a buffer. This will help with keeping your team on track and moving on from a topic when the time runs out.

By sticking to these best practices, you can ensure that your meeting agenda is a reliable tool and does the job—before, during, and after your meeting.

Why are meeting agendas important?

Whether you work from home and take virtual calls or sit in the office and meet in person, meetings can be incredibly draining. Beginning with some small talk may be nice to get to know each other better or catch up on what everyone did this past weekend but it certainly isn’t goal-oriented or productive. A meeting agenda can help your team maximize the potential of each meeting you hold.

Our research shows that unnecessary meetings accounted for 157 hours of “work” in 2020, compared to 103 in 2019. Considering a 40-hour work week, that’s almost four weeks of wasted time. This is where your meeting agenda comes in. If you’re doing it right, writing your meeting agenda is the first and best indicator of whether or not your meeting is actually necessary. If you find that everything on your meeting agenda can be discussed asynchronously , you can cancel the meeting and share your message in a time-saving email.

That isn’t to say all meetings should be replaced by emails. If you’re sure that the meeting is justified and necessary in order to drive your team’s progress, have that meeting. However, always make sure that you create an agenda before getting together so your team members know what you’ll be discussing and why the meeting matters.

Here are a few more great reasons to have meeting agendas:

Your agenda allows everyone to prepare for the meeting. Ideally, every item on your agenda will have a dedicated topic facilitator. When everyone going into the meeting knows what their responsibilities are in advance, they have time to prepare and will be more efficient during the meeting.

It shows you’re considerate of your team’s time. When your team receives a well-thought-out meeting agenda, they’ll immediately see that the meeting is actually necessary. Besides, it’s also a roadmap that will keep you on track during the meeting and ensure no time is wasted.

An agenda sets clear expectations of what will and won’t be discussed. Think of a meeting agenda as a way of setting boundaries and ensuring that only topics on the agenda will be talked about. If anything comes up during the meeting that needs to be discussed, write it down in your minutes and return to it later. Either at the end of your meeting—if you got through it faster than expected—asynchronously, or in the next meeting.

It keeps your team on track. Your meeting agenda will prevent your team from drifting off—whether that’s discussing non-agenda topics (like the barbecue at Kat’s place last night) or taking too much time for an item that had specific time allocated.

Your agenda will provide purpose, structure, and opportunities to collaborate. With a clear plan for everyone to follow, your team will go into the meeting knowing the purpose and goal of the meeting. Your meeting agenda also allows your team to direct their attention toward opportunities to collaborate, whether that’s during a brainstorming session , a town hall, or your daily standup.

Track next steps and action items so nothing falls through the cracks. Keep your agenda open during the meeting to capture any next steps or action items . By adding them directly into the agenda, these items won’t be forgotten when the meeting ends.

Meetings are great opportunities for your team to bond but the time spent on small talk can be worked into the first few minutes of the agenda rather than surfacing every now and then during the meeting, disrupting the flow and productivity or your team’s discussion.

Meeting agenda examples

We’ve discussed what makes a good meeting agenda and what you should avoid doing but, as always, it’s easiest to learn from a real life example. Let’s take a look at a project kickoff meeting agenda created in Asana:

As you can see, each item has a timebox and a teammate assigned to ensure everyone knows when it’s their turn and how long they have to lead their discussion or give their presentation. The agenda also has relevant files attached and is shared with all team members for visibility and better collaboration.

Meetings are a staple in the professional world, each with its own unique focus and dynamics. Understanding how to tailor your meeting agenda to the type of meeting you're conducting is key to ensuring effective communication and teamwork. Here are some common types of meetings and examples of how to structure their agendas.

Team meeting agenda

Team meetings serve as a platform for team building, decision making, and brainstorming. They can vary in frequency and duration but are essential for ensuring alignment and forward momentum. Effective team meeting agendas should include recurring items for regular meetings and space for new, ad-hoc topics. It’s also vital to track next steps and responsibilities assigned during the meeting. An example of a 45-minute team meeting agenda might cover metrics, a round-table plan, identification of blockers, and recognition of team members' contributions​​.

Daily Scrum meeting agenda

Daily scrum meetings, or stand-ups , are brief, focused gatherings aimed at keeping the team aligned during a sprint. These meetings typically cover blockers, a recap of the previous day’s work, goals for the current day, and progress towards sprint goals. The agility of these meetings helps in maintaining momentum and addressing issues promptly.

Project kickoff meeting agenda

Project kickoff meetings bring together cross-functional teams to start a new project. These meetings set the tone for the project and align everyone on objectives and expectations. The agenda should cover the project brief, roles and responsibilities, meeting cadence, actionable next steps, and a Q&A session to clarify doubts and ensure everyone is on the same page​​.

Retrospective meeting agenda

A retrospective meeting is a type of recurring meeting focused on reflecting on a past period of work, usually at the end of a project cycle or sprint. Its main purpose is to share information among team members about what worked well and what didn't. During the meeting, the entire team discusses various meeting topics, including successes, challenges, and blockers that impacted their work. This process helps in identifying areas for improvement and developing strategies to address any issues. Retrospective meetings are vital for continuous team development and ensuring better outcomes in future work cycles.

One-on-one meeting agenda

One-on-one meetings , whether they are between a manager and a direct report, peer-to-peer, or skip-level, are crucial for discussing work projects, roadblocks, and career development. They are foundational for building trust.

A good agenda for these meetings should balance topics like motivation, communication, growth, and work-related discussions. Avoid status updates; those are better suited for stand-up meetings. Sample questions for a weekly one-on-one might include assessing highlights and lowlights of the week, discussing any blockers, and inquiring about work-life balance​​.

Remote one-on-one meeting agenda

Remote one-on-one meetings require a slightly different approach, with a focus on rapport-building and clear communication. Since physical presence is lacking, these meetings benefit from a shared online agenda accessible to all participants. Key points could include checking in on general well-being, discussing current work assignments, and addressing any immediate concerns or assistance needed​​.

Skip-level meeting agenda

Skip-level meetings, involving senior managers and employees not in their direct report chain, offer a chance to connect across organizational levels. These meetings are ideal for discussing broader career development and providing feedback to senior leadership. Agenda items might cover clarity on company strategies and goals, personal professional objectives, and suggestions for organizational improvements​​.

Leadership team meeting agenda

Leadership team meetings are vital for strategic decision-making and issue resolution at the highest levels of an organization. An effective agenda for such meetings might include personal updates, reviewing key metrics, sharing wins and insights, discussing important messages, addressing pressing issues, and allocating time for an open discussion or "hot seat" session where specific topics are addressed in-depth​​.

Each type of meeting, be it an all-hands gathering, one-on-one discussion, performance review, or team brainstorming session, requires a thoughtfully crafted agenda to avoid unproductive meetings and keep discussions on track.

By using these meeting agenda examples, you can ensure that each meeting, regardless of its format, contributes meaningfully to the organization's goals and enhances teamwork and collaboration.

Running an effective meeting

It’s one thing to have an amazingly organized and detailed agenda that your team can reference before the meeting—using it as a tool during the meeting is a whole other ballpark. These tips will help you make your meeting agenda as useful during the meeting as it is as a preparation tool

Stick to your agenda. The best agenda becomes useless if you don’t stick to it during the meeting. Try not to bounce back and forth between agenda items but rather stick to the priorities you established earlier.

Stick to your timeboxes. It absolutely helps release some tension and lighten the mood if you have a bit of small talk or a quick check-in at the beginning of your meeting. That’s why you should allocate three to five minutes to this—and stick to the timeframe. Pictures of Kabir’s son’s adorable Halloween costume can be shared elsewhere so you have enough time to reach your meeting’s goals now.

Designate a note taker. At the beginning of the meeting, designate a note taker who will write down any questions, feedback, tasks, and ideas that come up during the meeting. You can rotate this position so everyone on your team gets to contribute at some point. Ideally, these notes are taken in the same place as the meeting agenda—this will make it a lot easier for team members to follow the notes and link them to agenda items. Notes can also be directly entered into Asana for real-time updating and tracking

Follow up after the meeting. Typically, the note taker will be responsible for following up with the meeting notes afterward. The notes should include any decisions that were made during the meeting, tasks that need to be completed, and questions that remained unanswered. If possible, assign teammates and add due dates to action items to keep accountability high. To ensure that these action items are tracked and completed, they should be promptly added to our Asana project management tool.

Make the most out of every meeting

With Asana, you can keep your meeting agenda, meeting minutes, and meeting action items in one place. Effortlessly share the agenda with your team and assign agenda items in real time so nothing falls through the cracks.

Streamlining your meetings with one central tool will reduce the amount of work about work your team faces, connect everyone to the purpose of the meeting, and allow for productive meetings everyone enjoys.

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Updated on: March 29, 2024 / 6:54 AM EDT / CBS News

President Biden participated in a star-studded fundraiser with former Democratic Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton on Thursday in New York City in an event expected to raise more than $25 million for the president's re-election campaign.

Thursday's New York City fundraiser at Radio City Music Hall was hosted by actress Mindy Kaling and featured performances by several musical guests and artists, including Queen Latifah, Lizzo, Ben Platt, Cynthia Erivo and Lea Michele. The event was capped off with a nearly hourlong discussion between Mr. Biden, Obama and Clinton moderated by "The Late Show" host Stephen Colbert. 

Obama accompanied Mr. Biden on the Air Force One flight from Washington, D.C., to New York earlier in the day.  

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and first lady Jill Biden also delivered remarks during the event. 

Schumer touted several of Mr. Biden's accomplishments and spoke of the potential for not just the president's re-election, but for Democrats to control all three branches of government with key wins in the 2024 election.

"Re-elect Joe Biden as president, put Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker, keep me as Majority Leader, and the next four years will be better than this. You ain't seen nothing yet," the Senate majority leader said.

The first lady, joined by several other members of the Biden family, recalled that after she agreed to marry Mr. Biden, "He said, 'Jill, I promise you, your life will never change.' Well that, of course, turned out to be wildly untrue."

She also spoke of the large sum raised for her husband's campaign.

"This is the biggest fundraiser the DNC has ever held – the fundraiser to end all fundraisers – and we've raised a record amount," Jill Biden said.

Mr. Biden, Obama and Clinton discussed a wide variety of topics, from the economy to the border to the Jan. 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol, which Mr. Biden bluntly referred to as an insurrection. 

"I was supposed to make a speech on the economy, and I decided I couldn't remain silent," Mr. Biden said. "So what I did was I made a speech about January the sixth, what was happening. And I said it was an insurrection underway, and it must be dealt with and I plead with the president to stop and do his job, call these people off. He sat there in the dining room off the Oval Office for several hours and watched, didn't do a damn thing. That's why I felt obliged even though I wasn't sworn in yet. I was president-elect."

The fundraiser was interrupted by demonstrators protesting against the war in Gaza multiple times, and one who appeared to be yelling something about nuclear with Russia, throughout the night. One interruption came while Obama was discussing Gaza, to which he replied "You can't just talk and not listen," leading the audience to give him a standing ovation.

"It is also possible for us to have our hearts broken watching innocent people being killed and try to manage through that in a way that ultimately leads to both people being able to live in peace side by side," Obama said. "That is not an easy thing."

"It is important for us to understand that it is possible to have moral clarity and have deeply held beliefs, but still recognize that the world is complicated and it is hard to solve these problems," the former president added.

There were also Pro-Palestinian protests outside the music hall, CBS News New York reported . The New York Police Department told CBS News one person was detained. There was no word on why.

The demonstrators were chanting and screaming their messages, directing their anger toward Mr. Biden and, at times, at police officers.

Mr. Biden reiterated his support for Israel and its right to self defense, but said there were "too many innocent victims" and that more aid needs to get into Gaza. Mr. Biden also expressed support for a two-state solution.

"It's understandable there's such a profound anger, and Hamas is still there, but we must in fact, stop the effort resulting in significant deaths of innocent civilians, particularly children," Mr. Biden said.

The campaign has billed the event as the "most successful political fundraiser in American history." 

During a swing through Texas earlier this month, the Biden campaign raised a combined $7 million from three separate fundraisers. A fundraiser for Mr. Biden in Raleigh, North Carolina, on Tuesday raised $2.3 million. 

Mr. Biden's largest single-day haul prior to Thursday came in the 24 hours after his  State of the Union address earlier in March, when he raised $10 million, according to his campaign.

But Thursday's staggering sum is a new record for the campaign, and it further illustrates the growing cash gap between Mr. Biden and his presumptive general election opponent, former President Donald Trump. 

Trump raised $20 million in the whole month of February and $8.8 million in January. He's also been dogged by legal bills and payments , with his campaign and the political action committees supporting him spending over $10 million in legal fees this year.

Mr. Biden's campaign committees have more than double the cash on hand of Trump's equivalent groups, $155 million for Mr. Biden and $74 million for Trump as of late March.

"Unlike our opponent, every dollar we're raising is going to reach the voters who will decide this election — communicating the President's historic record, his vision for the future and laying plain the stakes of this election," said Biden-Harris campaign co-chair and Hollywood mogul Jeffrey Katzenberg. 

Trump's campaign sent out two fundraising emails Wednesday mentioning Mr. Biden's Thursday fundraiser, with one calling on "one million Trump supporters to donate to beat the "Obama-Clinton cartel" and the other reading, "We can't lose to Obama!"

• Democratic Party

Aaron Navarro is a CBS News digital reporter covering Florida Governor Ron DeSantis' presidential campaign and the 2024 election. He was previously an associate producer for the CBS News political unit in the 2021 and 2022 election cycles.

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