Often, nothing strikes more terror into the hearts of otherwise competent professionals as being asked to present information to an audience. The challenge of effectively presenting information is about more than just being to stand in front of a room and speak clearly. It begins like most endeavors with planning and preparation. Besides knowing the topic, good presenters know their audience so that they can anticipate not only what the audience will want to know, but also how they will want to hear it and what they might question. In this way, presenters will be able to build good presentation materials and be more confident once they are in front of the audience. Building good materials is also fraught with danger in that even good information presented in a poor format will result in losing the audience’s confidence in the presenter and missing important messaging. Presenters often forget that the most valuable part of the presentation is them, and as a result try to cram too much information into each slide, or choose distracting or ineffective ways to convey concepts. Once actually in front of the audience, speaking style becomes the key to success. We can all likely think of a presentation that was almost painful to watch as well as one that was so smooth that we wondered with admiration how someone got to be so good. This session is intended to address all of these fears, misconceptions, and bad experiences by presenting tips and tricks that with practice can help anyone become more persuasive and influential with audiences large and small.
Steve Gompertz Steve Gompertz (CQM, CBA, RAC-US, CMII) is a leader in Quality Systems management with over 25 years of experience in the life-science industry. His career includes roles in quality systems development and implementation, project management, engineering automation, configuration management, audit, and software development for companies including Pelican BioThermal, St. Jude Medical (now Abbott), Boston Scientific, Medtronic, Vital Images, and Control Data. He is now a consultant to the industry providing guidance on quality systems and regulatory compliance.
Steve holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Lehigh University, and certifications in quality management, biomedical auditing, regulatory affairs, project management, and configuration management. Steve started his professional career in software development and then moved into systems implementation project management. After joining the medical device industry, he transitioned from implementing quality- related IT solutions to managing quality organizations and processes. Steve also helped St. Cloud State University develop and is a Sr. Adjunct Instructor in M.S. in its Medical Technology Quality program. Steve can be reached at QMSPotential@aol.com.