In a few weeks, I have to give a 10 minute presentation on the economy, based on a paper I wrote for a Federal Reserve competition. After the 10 minute presentation, the two judges (nobody else is watching) get to pound me with questions on economics and the jobless recovery and such for 10 more minutes. I’ve never done a presentation like this before–does anyone have tips/suggestions? Thanks 
Interesting, but the most important part of the presentation is the presenter.
I know people who could make anything sound interesting.
10 mins is actually a brief amount of time, so you want an upbeat pace, where you display a genuine interest in the material. Keep some part of your body moving, like you would if you were passionate about something.
As for the answers to the questions, you’ll just have to develop and honest and thorough knowledge of the material.
“Qualifiers” are always good in your answers, so that you don’t overly commit to anything. For example, “Yes, some studies show that when the economy…”
When a counter question comes up, say something like, “But I did realize a correlation in other data that would cast doubt on some of those studies…”
I was involved recently in something similar to this for a school “We the People” competition (based on knowledge of the Constitution), although your presentation sounds much more rigorous than mine.
First, don’t fake knowledge if you know your judges are experts on the subject (as they probably will be). In my competition, not all of the judges were experts so we had a little bit of leeway.
If the time limit is strictly enforced, latch on to easy questions they ask you and don’t let go. If they ask you something you know a lot about, tell them everything you can think of (everything relevant, of course) so they’ll have less time to grill you.
Talk about things from your own experience. That’ll give you a bit more freedom.
I know it sounds cliche, but try to talk to them as you would anybody else. You don’t have to be strictly formal…I would definitely try to work in some humor to lighten yourself and the judges up. Offhand, though, I can’t really think of any good economy jokes. 
Oh, last thing - be really polite to the judges. I know it sounds obvious, but smile a lot and of course shake their hands and thank them for listening when you’re finished.
Last last thing - like Philster said, act enthusiastic about your topic, even if you aren’t necessarily particularly interested in it ( I know I wasn’t in my competition).
Good luck!
Have a look at the essay Making Good Talks into Great Ones by Doug Shaw. Although examples are taken from math talks, the tips themselves can be adapted for talks on any topic.
I should rephrase the OP; I entered the competition voluntarily, and wrote a fix page research paper, using a lot of sources, to get past the first round. The prize is a (paid!) internship at the Fed. College students would kill for that opportunity; and I’m in high school. That said, any more presentation tips are definitely welcome 
www.toastmasters.org has some good presentation tips on their site.
Presentation tips:
-
TALK SLOW
-
TALK SLOWER
-
Did I mention talking slowly?
-
Make sure your presentation flows. If you are presenting with slides, do not flip from slide to slide and back again.
-
Build your presentation to whatever conclusion you are making, making sure you substantiate each step:
Fact 1 (as shown by…)
Fact 2
Fact 3
Based on Fact 1 and Fact 2, Conclusion 1 can be drawn. When coupled with Fact 3, Conclusion 2 can easily be seen. This leads to the final Conclusion 3. Further evidence this is correct is given by Evidence 1.
-
Do not just read your slides or notes. LOOK AT YOUR AUDIENCE. Chin up, eyes forward and all that.
-
Smile.
-
Talk slowly.
Awesome! Congratulations. I actually did a presentation somewhat like this my senior year in high school, except it was on a team. We won the 7th district competition and went to the finals in DC, but didn’t make it to the last round because of some very unfortunate circumstances. ($#&@…) Our coach led several previous teams to win the national competition.
I’m sure you already know plenty about the economy, so I’m going to concentrate mostly on stylistic things, particularly ones that apply specifically to presentations to Federal Reserve types.
Your speech should be completely memorized. Have cards ONLY to remind you of numbers or the basic order of topics if you get stuck. Because your speech is about the economy, which is not the most interesting topic in the world, (admit it) and because it willl be memorized word-perfect, there will be a strong tendency to recite it in a monotone. You COULD ad-lib this stuff, but thinking about it beforehand makes things a LOT easier, trust me. Decide which words you will put emphasis on and which parts of the speech will require you to raise your voice and make those part of the memorization of the speech. Emotion is a good thing, but don’t go too far and sound perky. Perky is doom. Hand and arm gestures, smiles, things like that, should also be planned beforehand. If you’re on decent terms with your high school’s drama teacher, ask him/her to work with you.
Dress very, very, very, very well and very, very, very, very conservatively. The Fed is not really a “casual Friday” sort of place, and you want to look like a particularly well-preserved 40-year-old Fed worker rather than a high school student. I don’t know if you’re male or female, but in either case wear a dark business suit, the nicest that you own or can buy, beg, borrow, or steal. It should be black. If it can’t be black, very dark gray or very dark navy blue will be… acceptable. NO OTHER COLORS! EVER! Fed people do not wear other colors! Do not remove your sport jacket at any point. (You’ll be sweating a lot anyway.) Accessorize properly. The question of shoes, socks, belts, ties, cufflinks, watches, jewelry, or basically ANYTHING you put on your body should be considered at length. Consider getting your hair done the day before the presentation. There don’t need to be any drastic changes, but you definitely want to go with the most professional look possible. It’ll grow back. If you’re female, the skirt of your suit should NOT be ANY shorter than the tops of your kneecaps and you probably shouldn’t wear any makeup other than a bit of foundation.
Revise little points of your presentation constantly. If you’re lucky, nothing about it will need to be seriously changed between now and the day of the competition, but the more recent your information is the better you’ll look. Pick up a WSJ the morning of the presentation, and if anything pops out at you, include it.
Regarding the question-and-answer session: If you ever, EVER say “like” or “uh”, the most important thing you can do between now and then is to purge them from your speech entirely. Think of questions that they might ask you and prepare for them - write out notes on the basic points of your response AND what references you’ll make to outside sources in them. Always reference an outside source in SOME way, even if you can’t quite remember where the reference comes from. If they ask you a question you don’t know the answer to, see if you can turn it into a question you DO know the answer to - if a slight “misinterpretation” of what they say can change it from something you have no clue about into something you can say SOMETHING about, it’s a lot better than admitting defeat.
I don’t know which Federal Reserve branch you’ll be presenting to, but make plenty of references to THEIR most recent economic report if you can, or those of other Fed branches. The best possible answer you can give to any question they’ll ask you often begins with, “Well, as was stated in the (your district) (name of thing you’re referencing)…” You can and should show a bit more humanity in the Q&A than in the presentation itself, but don’t let that make you any less professional. Jokes probably are a bad idea, but smiling at your judges is a good idea. They’re going to have to work with whoever wins, so they’ll want you to be friendly as well as knowledgeable. You should seem thrilled that they’re asking you these questions.
Anyway, good luck! The Fed rules.
Someone once gave me a rule-of-thumb, that for each minute of speech you should have two visuals. For a ten minute presentation, that means about twenty overheads or slides to state or support your position. This makes for a fast paced presentation and keeps the audience focused on your information and not your shaking hands. You can even avoid using notes altogether because your visuals are your cues.
My best recommmendation would be to practice SEVERAL times in front of a critical audience. Not Mom & dad on the couch, who are already proud of you. I mean full dress rehearsal in front of knowledgable teachers. If your audience isn’t knowledgable enough on the subject to ask questions, write up questions for them, but ask them to shuffle the order of the questions around. Ask them to write down their suggestions as they’re watching. Get someone to video tape it. Then do it again. And again.
Congratulations and good luck!
StG
Interestingly, at least one of my professors recommends 1-2 minutes per slide. Also, if you have slides remember that fancy “just learned how to use PowerPoint” effects will not make up for a lack of content. Finally, if you have a slide which you use early on which you think really sums up the presentation don’t flip back and forth, make a second copy and insert it at the appropriate point.
- know your subject.
- When you think you know your subject do more research.
- use visual aids that are easy to understand. If someone has to study a graph to make sense of it then you have lost them.
- If you are using overheads then make tabs for them so you can grab each one without struggling to separate them. Practice with whatever aids you are using so there is a fluid motion to them.
I have problems speaking in public. I’m not shy but I stumble on certain words. These are words that are absolutely necessary to what I want to convey. There is no rationale to which words they are but I tend to consistently stumble on them (forget them). THESE are the words that are in my notes. I jot down the general points that I want to talk about and then include the words that I stumble on . I will even write out entire sentences with the stumble words in bold. Usually I will see these words and they will trigger what I want to talk about.
You can anticipate the questions you get and jot down your response with key words highlighted.
The judges will expect you to be nervous. You can start off with a light hearted ice breaker such as “welcome to fear of public speaking 101, My name is _________ and I will be your moderator” but NEVER denigrate your subject matter. Treat it with the same respect you want the audience to give it. Smile like you are meeting someone for the first time in a friendly atmosphere.
Preface your subject matter to put it in the proper light. The Economy can be a very dry subject if you don’t relate it to people. You can start with an observation about anything and connect it to the economy. It’s an all-encompassing subject so you have tremendous opportunity to put it in the context you want. Ex: “We get up in the morning and drink our orange juice knowing it will always be on our table but we never think of the complex number of events that make this happen”. A truck may have delivered it to the grocery store but it was a functioning Economy that moved it from seller to buyer. To understand this you only have to look at countries where orange juice is a rare commodity. The trucks exist, but the mechanism to deliver it is bogged down with economic limitations”.
I’m not sure you have to practice in front of someone but I think you need to practice with the same environment that you will be using (podiums, overheads, computers, lights etc….) If you practice in front of someone it should be for the purpose of feedback. Borrow a video recorder for personal review.
Good luck. Let us know how well you did.
I agree that you should practice, practice, practice, by yourself AND in front of a critical audience. You should have given your talk and been grilled with questions enough times so that it seems sort of normal by the time you get to the presentation itself. Dress up for the practice sessions.
A tip I got in law school: Go into the actual room where you will be giving the presentation (if this is possible and you can find out where it is ahead of time) and even practice in there before the presentation. If you can’t actually practice in there, just go in, look around, stand where you’ll be standing, etc. It makes the whole thing less intimidating (“I’ve been here before, I can do this…”) I like to use imagery – you can imagine yourself there during your presentation, giving a smooth, poised, brilliant talk and expertly responding to questions.
I would STRONGLY suggest that you write down at least 30 questions you can think of that they might ask, and write down what your answers would be, and then practice saying your answers. Ask other people to think of questions too. Many people can give a prepared presentation: I wonder if the cream will be separated from the rest of the crop through the question/answer session. Do NOT neglect this part of it – spend at least equal time on the questions preparation, unless you know something I don’t about the scoring of the sections.
In responding to questions, you should remember to be “responsive” to the questions in that your answer should bear relation to the question asked; but I second the advice to slightly “misinterpret” the question to steer it to something you know more about, if necessary.
Good luck!
That is way too many slides. Our conference guidelines is about 1 per minute - 20 for a 20 minute talk works. The last thing you want is for them to call time when you are halfway through.
No one has mentioned slide format. (What format are you using - I am assuming PowerPoint.) Use no more than 5 or six bullets per slide, and no more than 6 - 8 words per line. You don’t need sentences, since you won’t be reading your slides (or I hope not.) Use a decently large font. Use graphs if at all possible. Talking to a graph makes you sound like you know a lot more about the subject than reading bullets.
Don’t use animation unless it really adds something. While you are talking, it will seem like hours for that line to zoom into place.
For questions: take a second to think before you answer. Ask for clarification if you are unsure of the meaning of the question.
Practice, practice, practice. I never memorize a whole talk, but I do memorize important things I want to say. However, if you feel more confident memorizing, do so.
Videotape yourself to look for twitches.
Smile, be calm, and above all, speak up. Talk to the audience, not to the screen. Smile. Act as happy to be there as you are.
And don’t worry - getting this far means you’ve already won. And congratulations.
I always heard 1 slide per 30-60 seconds.
And you’ve probably seen this before, but it bears repeating:
-
Tell them what you’re going to tell them (IE spend some time on an introduction and outline of your talk) 2 slides at most
-
Tell them what you told them you’ld tell them (The body of your talk 8-15 slides).
-
Tell them what you told them (Your conclusions, re-emphasizing the main points of your talk) again 2 slides at most.
-
Acknowledgements and references (1 final slide)
And I can’t over-emphasize two additional points:
-
Don’t make busy slides. Look at them from the standpoint of a member of the audience. Can you read them from the audience? Could you easily understand the thoughts you are trying to convey if you were a member of the audience?
-
Practice, practice, practice. But don’t memorize. Just find the right flow of words that comes natural to you.