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5 Virtual Presentation Challenges and How to Overcome Them

Virtual events and webinars have exploded in popularity. It makes sense that these kinds of get-togethers have obvious advantages. For example, virtual events allow presenters to reach hundreds, if not thousands, of people around the world at the same time. They’re also much more affordable to produce.

In this article, we’ll outline a few of these challenges and give you proven ways to eliminate them. By the end, you’ll have the tools you need to host highly effective virtual events .

Table of Contents

Common Virtual Presentation Challenges

Webinar marketing can take your business to new heights. But you have to overcome the five virtual presentation challenges listed below before you can experience the benefits.

1. Technical Difficulties

The first virtual presentation challenge we’ll tackle today is technical difficulties .

What if your computer crashes? Or your external microphone won’t pick up the audio? Or your internet connection drops out at random intervals and your video feed is grainy? These issues can completely derail an otherwise successful live virtual event.

Even worse, they can make you and/or your company look unprofessional in the eyes of your audience. So, you must do what you can to minimize technical difficulties. Here’s how:

Test, Test, Test!

Take time before your virtual event starts to test your equipment. You may be able to catch potential issues this way and remedy them before you go live. At the very least, you’ll have confidence knowing you did everything you could to prevent technical difficulties.

Better Equipment

If you have faulty equipment, replace it immediately—especially if you plan to host virtual presentations regularly. Now, you don’t need to drop thousands of dollars on the latest gadgets. But you should be using reliable gear to help avoid malfunctions.

More Experience

Sometimes technical difficulties are caused by a lack of experience. Overcome this challenge by regularly hosting webinars . That way, you can get comfortable with both your software and hardware and learn how to quickly fix issues when they come up.

2. Distracted Attendees

One of the biggest virtual presentation challenges you’ll have to overcome during your webinar is distracted attendees. It can be difficult to keep your audience’s attention when Google, Instagram, and their email inboxes are just a click away.

Another common distraction is multitasking. Many attendees believe they can get work done—respond to an email, research a report, etc.—while they view a presentation. Unfortunately, this just leads to a misunderstanding of the information shared.

We’ll be honest, there aren’t a ton of things you can do to eliminate distractions. Your attendees are responsible for themselves. But here are a few tips that might help:

Ask for Attention

There’s nothing wrong with asking your audience to give you their undivided attention for the duration of your webinar. Let them know that you have valuable information to share and you want everyone who attends to get the most out of your presentation .

Shorten Your Webinar

Most people’s attention spans are short. If you drone on for two hours, your audience will get bored and seek a distraction. Or they’ll just leave your event altogether. Combat this by crafting to-the-point content that’s easy to understand and remember.

Give Key Takeaways

One of the ways to make sure your content is easy to understand is to share key takeaways throughout your presentation . What do you want your audience to know? Deliver this information to them in the form of periodic bullet points.

3. Impersonal Experience

Webinars are amazing tools because they allow you to interact with attendees in a face-to-face manner. But let’s be honest, it’s still not the same as having an in-person conversation. Because of this, virtual presentations can feel less personal.

If you’re not able to connect with your audience on a real, human level, you’ll experience visual presentation challenges like distracted attendees (mentioned above) and a lack of attendee engagement (mentioned below.) Neither is ideal.

Make your events feel more personal by:

Presenting with Passion

A little passion goes a long way. If you’re excited about the material you’re sharing, your attendees will naturally feel closer to you. Your exuberance will rub off on them. Passion can help with audience engagement too which we’ll talk more about below.

Limit Attendance

It’s easy to feel like just another face in the crowd when you attend a virtual event with 1,000 other people. Try hosting smaller gatherings to make your presentations seem more personal. If this isn’t feasible for you, take advantage of your webinar software’s breakout rooms feature.

4. Lack of Engagement

A lack of audience engagement is one of the toughest virtual presentation challenges to overcome. Why? Because all of the other challenges we’ve already talked about affect it.

A rush of technical difficulties will leave attendees feeling disengaged. Constant distractions lead to poor engagement as well. And impersonal experiences? You guessed it: a major breeding ground for disengaged audiences who couldn’t care less about your content.

Fortunately, we have a few proven tips to help:

Involve Your Audience

The best presenters don’t speak at their audience, they speak to them. It’s a dialogue . Sure, the presenter does most of the talking but they’re constantly checking in with their attendees to make sure they’re understanding and enjoying the content.

You can do this too by choosing a webinar software that includes polls, surveys, and chat features . That way, you can get real-time feedback from your audience.

Use Visual Elements

You know what’s not engaging? Your face on your attendees’ screens. It doesn’t matter how good-looking you are or how interesting your topic is, if you are all your audience sees for an hour straight, they won’t be able to engage. That’s why you need to use visual elements.

By visual elements, we mean slideshows, screen shares , videos, graphs, charts, etc. Include these in your presentation and you’ll connect with attendees on a deeper level.

5. Flying Blind

If you sell 100 tickets to an in-person presentation, you can be confident that roughly 100 people will show up on the day of the event. This isn’t always true in the virtual world.

Many people register for webinars but don’t take the time to watch them.

Your self-esteem might plummet if you expect to host a webinar for 50 people and only 15 attend—especially if you have marketed your event as a large gathering. Low self-esteem often leads to passionless, forgettable, and subpar presentations.

“Flying blind” isn’t fun but there are things you can do to minimize these feelings:

Cancel Recordings

Webinar recordings will allow you to connect with people who can’t attend your live event. They can also be edited and turned into additional pieces of content.

But if your audience knows they can access your content at any time, they’ll be less inclined to view it live. Tell your webinar registrants that you will NOT be recording your next webinar and see if attendance improves.

Offer Incentives

If you hate the idea of canceling recordings (we don’t blame you!) try offering incentives to people who attend your virtual presentation live instead.

Your incentive can be anything that will interest your audience. A few ideas include gated pieces of content, bonus material that won’t be included in the webinar recording , and even one-time discounts on your products and services.

Better Presentations

If your webinars are really good , people will rearrange their schedules to attend them live.

Make sure you speak on topics that excite your target audience, present with passion, work to engage your attendees with polls, surveys, and more, and use visual elements during your virtual presentation. These things will help draw a crowd to your online events.

Professional Presentations with ClickMeeting

ClickMeeting is an easy-to-use webinar platform that packs a serious punch. With our platform, you’ll be able to overcome each of the virtual presentation challenges outlined above. You’ll also benefit from a few industry-leading features like:

Custom Branding. Make sure your event looks like YOU . ClickMeeting allows users to add logos, images, and custom color schemes to their event rooms.

Engagement Tools. Audience engagement will make or break your event. Captivate attendees with virtual whiteboards , screen sharing , and polls and surveys .

Social Streaming. When you host an online event, you want to connect with as many people as you can. Steam your webinars on Facebook or YouTube to reach them.

Webinar Recording. ClickMeeting webinars are easily recorded and distributed. More than that, recorded events can be turned into automated webinars that run on autopilot.

Analytics Dashboard. Want to know who attended your virtual event, where they attended from, and which device they used to watch? ClickMeeting will tell you .

Does ClickMeeting sound like a tool you’d like to use? Give it a try for free for 30 days and get access to all of our platform’s features—no strings attached!

Wrapping Up

There you have it, the five most common virtual presentation challenges and how to overcome them. If you host virtual events, implement the tips above.

When you do, you’ll experience fewer technical difficulties, eliminate distractions, and be able to engage your audience in a much more authentic way.

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How to Give a Virtual Presentation: Tips, Challenges, and More

For many, virtual presentations are an acquired taste. But, with remote teams becoming increasingly popular—especially now due to the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic—virtual presentations are not only to be expected, but they are also rapidly becoming the norm in our day-to-day professional lives. In addition to helping colleagues stay aligned on major projects, virtual presentations are a useful sales tool that helps you improve your profit margins and are also a staple of customer or client engagements, whether in the form of quarterly business reviews, new feature introductions or providing regular reporting.

How Do Virtual Presentations Differ From Regular Presentations?

It’s tempting to think that the same rules that apply to in-person presentations would apply to virtual presentations as well. In reality, however, the two require different approaches to keep viewers engaged in the presentation. Here are two major differences between virtual and regular presentations:

Virtual presentations are competing with more distractions

Participants viewing a virtual presentation are far more easily distracted than a typical meeting participant would be when viewing the content in the same room as the presenter. With in-office presentations, participants are typically in the conference room, which is a controlled environment with fewer distractions  competing for attention, making it easier to tune into body language and what the speaker is saying. With virtual presentations, the context is very different.

Often, viewers are on mute (video or audio), making it much more difficult for presenters to understand who is engaging with the content. At any moment attendees may be answering a phone call, checking email, browsing social media or simply multitasking due to lack of interest, to all of which the presenter would be none the wiser.

Virtual presentations offer greater scalability

Virtual presentations allow you to present to more people at the same time, aided by group video conferencing services such as Lifesize, which allow for hundreds of participants per meeting . To participate, all that meeting attendees need is a device with an internet connection, greatly simplifying logistics when compared to a traditional in-office presentation, which often requires making travel plans, blocking a few days to travel and booking a conference room. Even then, you can’t be sure that everyone will show up on the agreed date and time until the meeting begins.

While virtual presentations are convenient, that doesn’t necessarily make them easier for you or your audience members. We’ve all experienced the pains of failed virtual presentations plagued by poor audio or video quality or presenters who don’t feel fully comfortable navigating controls to share content. Additionally, when you’re not physically presenting to an audience face to face, you have to work that much harder to establish a connection and sustain their attention. Here’s how to do it.

4 Virtual Presentation Tips for Your Next Meeting

Great content, preparation and practice speaking in public are key factors for every presentation, but if you can’t keep your audience engaged by getting rid of all distractions, your presentation is likely to flop. Here are four presentation tips that will help you minimize distractions next time you’re in the meeting spotlight.

1. Keep it short

When presenting virtually, your audience has a near-infinite supply of distractions at their fingertips, from email to instant messaging to social media feeds. So if you’re doing a virtual presentation, keep it concise and straightforward. Even if you’re committed to a longer presentation like a webinar , staying focused and not meandering is critical.

The average attention span when listening to a presenter is between 5 and 10 minutes. Even elite, experienced speakers struggle to hold an audience’s attention for longer than 20 minutes. In order to avoid listener fatigue and hold the attention of the (virtual) room, you want to pack a punch in your presentation, condensing content to no more than five key points along with a succinct summary of the action you want the audience to take after the presentation.

One way to do this is by starting with the end in mind. For example, if you’re giving a presentation on how to be productive working from home , your goal may be to have the audience put the advice into practice and provide feedback on their experience. Having identified this, you will know the amount of information you need to provide that will lead them to take that specific action you want them to take.

2. Close out windows you don’t need

Before you share your screen, make sure you have the content you want to present already prepared. The first few moments of your presentation are critical to establishing a connection with the audience, and no one enjoys watching a speaker scramble nervously to find their presentation on a cluttered desktop or, worse, inadvertently sharing sensitive or personal information that may be displayed from another application.

Additionally, if you’re using the same presentation for different audiences, make sure you evaluate every slide to ensure it’s relevant and tailored to the room. Distracting your viewer by having to go through a bunch of generic slides that haven’t been tailored to their organization, job function or priorities makes you seem unprepared, giving the audience the perfect excuse to tune out what you have to say. Whenever you do this, you break the flow of your presentation and their willingness to stick around till you’re done.

3. Ask the audience to commit to a distraction-free meeting

Many remote companies have an unspoken rule: mute your mic if you’re not presenting. It’s easy for an ambulance passing by to throw a presentation off track, so before you start, ask participants to mute their mics until you’re ready for Q&A. Luckily, many video conferencing platforms allow meeting hosts to mute participants’ mics to better control the meeting experience. As an additional benefit, muting helps presenters hold the attention of meeting participants by establishing when it will be their turn to speak.

For fully remote and distributed teams, it’s also common to ask meeting participants to avoid multitasking and mute phones for the duration of the meeting. This creates a meeting environment that more closely resembles an in-office meeting with minimal distractions competing with the speaker for attention.

4. Test your equipment beforehand

If you’re reading this, you’ve likely participated in an online meeting where someone presented for several minutes without knowing that their microphone was muted or that their content wasn’t showing on the screen. It’s an uncomfortable experience for both the presenter and the audience and, luckily, very easy to avoid.

Before your next virtual presentation, make sure to test your mic, screen sharing and camera 5-10 minutes before you go live. This helps you identify what’s working and what isn’t and rectify it. This is also a great opportunity to check your lighting to ensure your video feed is clear and ready for prime time.

Besides, knowing that your tools are in good condition boosts your confidence because you’re sure they won’t interrupt your presentation.

How to Virtually Present on Lifesize

Lifesize is a high-definition, secure video conferencing solution for online meetings that helps you hold uninterrupted presentations and deliver an exceptional experience for meeting participants across different devices. Here are a few steps to help you use Lifesize for your next virtual presentation:

1. Have your presentation ready

Compelling visuals and copy make any presentation better. Don’t worry if your design chops are lacking; use content from your company’s website, blog or social media feeds.

Great copy helps back up your slides and persuades your audience to take action. You want to talk about the benefits of taking action, overcome objections and provide irresistible calls to action to make it easy for your audience to get involved.

For your most critical presentations, consider hiring a copywriting service to help you create compelling slides that leave a lasting impression in the minds of your audience so that when you ask them to take action, they’ll be ready to do so. Interactive presentation development tools like Visme also simplify the process of building unique, immersive content that will show great during meetings. The company also regularly publishes presentation best practices  to help users avoid overly cluttered or text-heavy layouts.

2. Click “Present”

Once you’re ready with your presentation, join your Lifesize meeting from the desktop/web app, confirm that your attendees are present, then click on the “Share your screen” icon to start your presentation. You’ll then be prompted to select which display or application you want to share.

3. Share your slides or the entire screen

Once you’ve made your selection, click on the “Share” button to show your slides. Remember, you can’t share slides at the same time as another presenter, so make sure any other speakers have ended their presentation before you try to share your slides.

What to Do After the Presentation

Great news — you crushed the presentation. Now what do you do? The best presenters don’t stop once the meeting ends. After every presentation, take a few minutes to evaluate yourself, or ask colleagues for feedback, to see how well you did and whether you achieved your objective. In addition, here are a few ways to ensure the presentation translates to business impact.

1. Send out your recorded meeting link

Depending on the material, your audience might need to rewatch the meeting to help them get hold of crucial details in your presentation. Lifesize allows you to record and share your presentations so that once you’re done, all you need to do is share a link of the recording with your attendees for later reference. You can also use a video editor to stitch different videos together to use for added material in any future webinars, meetings or presentations.

2. Schedule a follow-up meeting if necessary

When is the appropriate time to reconvene and discuss progress? In a week? Two weeks? All great virtual meetings result in some type of action, so don’t wait to schedule and send a meeting invite for your next Lifesize call. Follow up meetings are great way to stay top of mind with customers, move projects forward or course correct if there is any misalignment concerning next steps.

Your next presentation won’t suck because of one thing: keeping your audience engaged. You’ve got excellent presentation skills and great content, but distractions are your biggest enemy.

By implementing the ideas we’ve discussed above, it’s possible to get rid of these distractions to help you focus on getting the most out of your presentations.

Virtual Presentation FAQ’s

How do you create a virtual presentation.

You’ll need some sort of visual medium to create a virtual presentation (such as PowerPoint) and a teleconferencing solution like Lifesize that allows you to share screens. With the visuals in place, you just have to come up with a speech or speaking plan to accompany your presentation.

How do you engage the audience in a virtual presentation?

To create an engaging virtual presentation, make sure that the presentation flows smoothly with no awkward pauses, and that you have a number of things to say for each slide or visual reference. From there, you have to speak in a lively and engaging manner, and ask the audience questions if possible to keep them engaged.

What are some of the challenges you need to consider when presenting in an online environment?

The wild card is technical difficulties: lag time, poor video/audio quality, or connectivity issues can ruin a presentation. If you have an integrated video conferencing solution in place, then the main challenge is keeping the audience’s attention (which can easily be lost).

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Improving the Video Conferencing Experience in the Era of Remote Work

In case you’ve been living under a rock for the past six months, it’s clear that remote work and distributed teams are here to stay, even after the pandemic recedes. While some workers will gradually find their way back to in-person (office or otherwise) workplace settings, this is just the on-ramp to the highway of working from anywhere for many others.

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Crush Your Next Virtual Presentation

A little prep can go a long way.

While virtual communication platforms help keep remote teams connected, they’re not always the ideal venue for delivering engaging presentations. It’s difficult (or impossible) to read your audience’s nonverbal cues over video and audio — if you’ve lost them, you might not even realize it. You’re also up against the many distractions inherent to working from home. Delivering effective presentations over video requires a little extra preparation. Ask a few people you trust to help you out before and after the meeting by being ready to participate when called on and by giving you actionable feedback afterward. Learn about your audience in advance and build in a short, relevant personal story that will make them feel included. Above all, be concise and clear.

My coaching client, an engineer named Carlos, is a magnificent in-person storyteller. He talks with his hands and tells lengthy, animated stories replete with humorous metaphors and plot twists. His wit and warmth used to be received positively.

• GS Gia Storms is a leadership coach and member of The Boda Group. She facilitates team and executive coaching from Los Angeles.

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Best practices for virtual presentations: 15 expert tips that work for everyone.

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In today’s COVID-19 world, virtual meetings and presentations have become the norm. While many presentation skills and best practices apply to both in-person and virtual presentations, expert virtual presenters understand the importance of adjusting their approach to match the medium. With in-person presentations, you more or less have a captive audience — you still need be engaging, but your audience is kind of stuck with you for the duration. But with virtual presentations, your audience has a greater opportunity to stray. You now have to compete for their eyes, ears, hearts, and minds against diminished attention spans, increased home and work life distractions, and conflicting priorities. 

Here are 15 expert tips to set you up for success in your next virtual presentation:

1.     Get the Lighting Right:  As a presenter, it is essential that people can see you well. Make sure you have good front light—meaning the light shines brightly on your face. If your back is to a window, close the shades. While natural light is often the best choice, if your home office doesn’t have natural light and you do a lot of virtual presentations, consider purchasing supplemental lighting to enhance your image.

2.     Choose the Right Background:  Try to use a background that enhances your professional image and is aligned with your message. Avoid a cluttered background or anything that can be distracting. Learn whether your presentation platform enables you to use virtual backgrounds (like Zoom) or whether you can blur your background (like Microsoft Teams). Your background can either add to your professional presence or detract from it.

3.     Know the Technology:  Nothing kills a presentation faster than a presenter who fumbles with the technology. This is a performance, so make sure you know how to make it work. A dry run is essential so that you’re comfortable with the platform features. It’s best to have a co-host (or producer or moderator) assist you with the technology so that you can focus on your presentation. Make sure you practice with the same technical set up (computer and internet connection) that you will use when you deliver the presentation.

4.     Play to the Camera:  When you are the one speaking, look directly into your computer’s camera , not on the screen or at the other participants. This takes some practice, but it makes the viewer feel as if you are looking right at them. Some presenters turn off their self-view so that they aren’t distracted by their own image. Put the camera at eye level . Try not to have your camera too far above or below you. If it’s too low, then you run the risk of creating a double chin. A camera too high makes it difficult to maintain eye contact, as you may find your gaze dropping as you speak. If you are part of a panel or a team of presenters, make sure you are aware of when your camera is on. If you are not speaking but your camera is on, make sure you look like you are paying attention! Powerful presenters understand the importance of making eye contact with their audience, so this means you have to simulate the same effect virtually.

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5.     Get Close (But Not Too Close).  You want the camera to frame your face, neck, and shoulders. People are drawn to faces, so you don’t want to lose that connection by being too far away, but you also don’t want your face to take over the whole screen like a dismembered head because, well, that looks weird. Practice your positioning and distance.

6.     Stand Up:  If possible, use a standing desk or position your laptop so you can stand at eye level with your computer. Standing up provides a higher energy level and forces us to put our body in a more presentation-like mode. If you have to sit, lean forward as you would if you were presenting at a real meeting or as if you were a TV news anchor. Avoid slouching away from the camera, as that sends a signal that you are disconnected from the audience.

7.     Be Animated:  Just like in a live presentation, you want to present with a little energy and animation. Too slow or too monotone in your voice makes it easy for folks to disengage and tune out. Keeping people engaged virtually requires you to actually be engaging.

8.     Pace Yourself:  Without real-time visual audience feedback cues, getting the pacing right can be difficult. Even though you want to infuse some animation and energy into your presentation don’t pump up the speed too much. If you tend to be a fast talker in real life, practice slowing down just a bit. If you’re a slow talker, you may want to speed up just a bit.

9.     Do A Sound Check:  If your sound is garbled, people will tune out. While people may forgive less than perfect video, if they can’t clearly hear you, they will leave. Practice with someone on the other end of the presentation platform. Make sure your sound emits clearly. Sometimes headphones or external microphones work better than the computer audio, sometimes not. Every platform is different, so make sure your sound quality is excellent every time. And again, you should practice with the same technical configurations and location that you will use for your presentation.

10.  Plug into Your Modem:  If possible, plug your computer directly into your modem using an Ethernet cable. This will give you the strongest signal and most stable internet connection. The last thing you want to happen during your presentation is to have a weak or unstable internet signal.

11.  Incorporate Redundant Systems.  If using slides, make sure someone else (another webinar co-host or producer) also has a copy of the slides just in case your internet goes wonky and you have to present by calling in. If you are using slides, make them visually appealing. Use high-quality graphics and limit the amount of text on each slide. It’s your job as presenter to deliver the content. The slides are meant to enhance your spoken words, not replace them.

12.  Engage Your Participants. Just as if you were doing an in-person presentation, craft your presentation to engage the audience. Incorporate chats, polls, raised hand features, etc. Try not to speak for more than ten minutes without some sort of audience engagement. Use the participant list to interact with your participants by name. Have people chat or raise a hand if they want to speak. Keep track of the order of people and then call on them to invite them to turn on their mics or cameras. 

13.  Let Someone Else Check the Chats.  Don’t get sidetracked by the chats during your presentation. You’ll be shocked at how distracting it is to your train of thought if you attempt to read the chats while speaking. Instead, have your co-host or producer monitor the chats. If you ask people to chat you answers or comments to a question you’ve posed, then pause your talking and engage directly with the chats by acknowledging them, reading them out loud, and commenting on them. 

14.  Evaluate and Enhance:  If possible, record the session and take the time to play back and look for areas that worked well and areas that you might want to improve upon. Great presenters, whether virtual or in person, understand the value of continually honing their craft. Be sure to acknowledge your strengths as well as your areas of improvement.

15.  Be Yourself and Have Fun:  Again, just like in face-to-face presentations, audiences connect to authenticity, so be yourself! Let your personality show through. Have fun. If you look like you’re enjoying the presentation so will others. Research shows that happy people retain information better than bored or disinterested people, so model the energy that you want to create. The audience takes its cue from you.

Remember, whether you are presenting in-person or virtually, all presentations are performances. And all performances are in service to your audience. Their time is valuable, so honor that time by delivering the best presentation you can. No matter what kind of presentation you are giving, you must find ways to create authentic audience connection, engagement, and value.

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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 .

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The Top 10 Challenges of Virtual Presentations

George Torok April 7, 2021 Communication skills , Insights , Online coaching , Online training , Virtual presentation , Zoom Meetings Leave a Comment

Have you noticed that it’s more challenging to deliver a virtual presentation than a real world (in-the-same-room} presentation?

It’s not your imagination. Delivering a virtual presentation is much more challenging for several reasons. Let’s review the missing pieces, then see what we can do about it.

Have you noticed these challenges with virtual presentations?

The Feel of the Empty Room

When you are in the same room with people, you feel the shared experience. Contrast that with a virtual presentation where each person tends to feel isolated and lonely because they are in separate rooms.

Fix: Engage with the audience on a more personal and relevant level.

Energy Vampire

When in the same room, the audience feels your energy and returns it to you.

Not only is the energy not exchanged in a virtual setting – the camera filters out what little energy was transmitted but not received. And speaking to the camera drains energy from the presenter. No wonder people feel lethargic.

Fix: Keep it short and make it more engaging.

Flexible as a Brick

The live presentation offers more flexibility. The speaker can adapt the delivery based on immediate feedback from the audience. The speaker can bounce back from simple mistakes or a weak moment. When you are in the same room, The audience is more forgiving of errors and flawed delivery.

The virtual setting is rigid. It’s difficult to adapt quickly.

Fix: Check in with your audience more frequently and be prepared to adapt. Have options ready.

Interaction Barricade

When you are together in the room there’s opportunity for spontaneity and interaction among the audience and between audience and speaker. In Zoom you have Chat. It’s a useful tool but not the same.

Fix: Learn how to maximize all the tools of your platform. That might include Chat, Polling, Rooms, White Board…

Feedback Hunger

In the real setting, the speaker receives immediate feedback from the audience. That might be laughter, smiles, nodding heads, writing notes, hands raised to asked questions and applause.

Fix: Be clear on your purpose and message. Know your audience well. Invite feedback throughout the presentation.

No Satisfaction

I wonder if the Rolling Stones were ahead of their time with the song – I can’t get no satisfaction? Because that’s exactly the feeling you have during and after a virtual presentation.

Fix: Get over it. Enjoy the moment and rest after.

Body Language Missing

When in the same room, the audience reads the clues and emphasis from your body language. You can read their body language to evaluate their level of interest and connection.

Fix: Make the most of your face, hands and voice.

Crossed-Eye Contact

How does the audience know when you are talking to them? When they see your eyes looking directly at them. That conveys the feeling, “The speaker was talking to me.”

While you’re looking at them you can receive their support and interest from the returning eye contact. Add a smile or nod and you’re connected.

When speaking online, you must stare at the camera to convey the feel of eye contact for your audience. While you’re doing that, you can’t look at them on the screen because they won’t perceive you as looking at them. If that sounds weird, it is. Feel free to read that again.

Fix: Get used to speaking to that glass eye of the camera as if you were on TV.

Technology Glitches

The more your presentation relies on technology, the greater the risk of technological glitches. Remember Murphy’s Law? In a real presentation, microphones, computers and projectors might fail,

In virtual the environment, add poor camera and microphone, band width, WIFI, barking dogs, nosey and noisy family members…

Fix: Upgrade your equipment. Check everything and have a plan B and maybe a Plan C.

The Multiplier Effect

Each of these challenges is difficult by itself. Imagine the angst when you are faced with a few or more combined during your presentation.

Perhaps you were a decent presenter during live presentations. The virtual environment works against you because it magnifies your flaws and weakness.

That might mean that you need to revisit the fundamentals of effective presentations. Then you need to wrestle with the challenges of delivering a virtual presentation.

Fix: Prepare, rehearse and know the environment.  Stay calm when things go wrong.

Delivering a virtual presentation is much more challenging than a live presentation. It also offers you the opportunity to distinguish yourself by outshining the competition.

Challenges of Virtual presentations

©George Torok is The Speech Coach for Executives and president of Superior Presentations. He helps presenters deliver the intended message for greater success.

If you want help to transform the quality and success of your presentations, arrange for private coaching with george., if it’s time for your team to take their presentations to a higher level, arrange a training program., live or virtual – george torok can help you boost your presentation to a higher level., the 10 challenges of virtual presentations.

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Death by powerpoint: the pain, the monsters and the horror, my journey to become a confident communicator and powerful presenter.

Virtual meeting challenges and how to overcome them

Reading time: about 8 min

• Teamwork and collaboration

Although virtual meetings do have a lot to offer hybrid and remote teams, great virtual meetings don’t happen by accident. Virtual meetings come with challenges that are often preventable with some advance preparation. 

To make your virtual meetings more intentional from the start, consider implementing meeting best practices that can improve participation and engagement. 

Technical challenges and solutions  

Although technology has a lot to offer, technical issues are almost a given with virtual meetings. These issues can show up for both facilitators and participants—potentially impacting your success in collaborating with your team. Challenges may run the gamut from internet issues to software bugs. Common technical problems with virtual meetings include: 

• Bad connection
• Feedback or echo
• Poor sound quality
• Video slows or stops
• Dropped meeting or call 
• Software updates
• System incompatibility 
• Wrong settings or permissions 

Regardless of the cause, you may experience technical challenges from time to time, and without having a plan for how to manage those technical issues, the productivity of your virtual meetings may suffer. 

Prevention and planning are your best tools for managing technical challenges. Not all of your participants may have the same level of comfort with technology and resolving their own technical issues, so you as a facilitator may be put in the position of troubleshooting technology. If necessary, ask everyone to install the meeting software beforehand and check their microphones, sound, and connectivity in advance of the meeting. 

• Microphone not working: If your microphone isn’t working properly, it’s possible that the wrong microphone is selected in your settings or that your permissions aren’t granting your meeting software access to your microphone. Your computer/device may have more than one microphone, so be sure to check that you’re using the correct one. If one microphone isn’t working properly, you can switch to a different microphone or purchase a plug-and-play microphone for your device. Test your microphone using a free online testing tool or built-in testing via your meeting software platform. 
• Feedback or an echo: Speaker noise could be caused by problems with a participant’s microphone and speaker setup, so if you have a large number of participants attending the meeting, be sure to ask them all to mute their microphones when they’re not speaking. You can look for the source of the echo by testing each microphone one at a time, if needed. 
• Speaker not working: Speaker issues are often a software problem, meaning you may need to check software settings or permissions. As with microphones, speakers can be tested online or within your meeting software. Aging speakers sometimes develop sound problems, too, so you may want to consider purchasing a high-quality speaker or headset you can plug into your device. 
• Background noise : During the call, ask everyone to mute their microphones while they aren’t speaking. Facilitators and participants should find somewhere quiet to join the meeting and silence background noise, if possible. If that doesn’t eliminate the background noise, you may be experiencing a software issue. If all else fails, sometimes ending the meeting and starting over can help. 
• Weak connection: Ultimately, even the best internet connection has limitations, but a weak connection can make it impossible to facilitate or participate in a virtual meeting. Sharing a connection with high-bandwidth activities such as video streaming, information processing or uploading can make it more difficult to successfully run a virtual meeting. Try to save high-bandwidth activity for when you aren’t in a meeting. Before the meeting begins, check your connection.
• No internet: When your internet connection fails, your meeting software will usually drop your call unexpectedly, and you won’t be able to reconnect. Having a secondary connection available if your internet connection is unreliable can help. Sometimes a smartphone hotspot will suffice in a pinch. If your connection drops suddenly, try reconnecting. 

Participation challenges and solutions

Like technical challenges, participation issues can disrupt virtual meetings or reduce their likelihood of success. Quality participation means everyone is getting value from the meeting and contributing value also. 

What you do to encourage participation as a facilitator can have a direct impact on your results. Do what you can to help your participants get the most out of the virtual meeting. 

Participation issues can range from the impact of time zone differences to how easy it is to interrupt other meeting attendees. Other common challenges include: 

• Multitasking during the call 
• Distractions outside of the meeting 
• Boredom or a lack of engagement with the topic 
• Focus on other projects or on personal issues 
• Participants feel uncomfortable or unacknowledged 
• Participants don’t know each other well
• Meeting is scheduled at an inconvenient time for a particular time zone 
• Forgetting which time zone the meeting is in 

One or more of these challenges could interfere with a participant’s ability to attend the meeting and participate successfully. For this reason, it’s important to work with your participants so that everyone has what they need. 

To improve participation quality, it is important to keep your meetings well-organized and prepared. Here are a few tips: 

• Find the best time: Split the difference between time zones to build engagement and boost attendance. If possible, avoid scheduling meetings that are late in the night or early in the morning for your attendees. You could also pre-record a presentation and schedule a short follow-up meeting for questions. 
• Build rapport: Whenever possible, create an environment in your virtual meeting room where attendees feel comfortable asking questions or making comments. You could ask someone ahead of time to ask you a question or two during the meeting to help other attendees feel comfortable. 
• Make it visual: Having visuals to look at provides more reinforcement for the topics discussed during your meeting, helps visual learners to participate, and helps to alleviate boredom. 
• Break up long presentations: If you’re presenting difficult or lengthy information to a group, consider breaking up the presentation into smaller pieces with different activities or topics in between. For instance, after a 10-minute overview of a new topic, you could open up discussion around a short case study or example before moving on. Remember that long meetings are unlikely to succeed—many people begin to lose focus when meetings are longer than an hour. You could schedule breaks or plan a long meeting in sessions over a few days. 
• Ask questions: Engage participants during a long presentation by asking your audience a question or two for discussion. 

Improving meeting engagement and facilitation 

Often, how facilitators run their virtual meetings has a direct impact on the quality and value attendees receive. Facilitating better meetings has a lot to do with making meetings more meaningful and helpful rather than just mandatory online gatherings. 

Ineffective facilitation can cause many meeting challenges, such as: 

• Meeting moves too fast or too slow 
• Only some attendees sharing ideas while others aren’t heard 
• Uncertain goals 
• Incomplete guest list or too many attendees

To facilitate a better meeting for your attendees, consider: 

• Involving the meeting sponsor: Ask whomever gains the most from your meeting’s outcome to share their own expectations and objectives with you. Find out what outcome your meeting needs to meet in order for it to be considered productive. You can use this information to guide your planning, invitations, and scheduling. 

• Setting expectations upfront: At the beginning of the meeting, let everyone know how long you expect the meeting to last. Share your meeting agenda and let everyone know when you’ll be opening the meeting to questions and discussion. 
• Asking everyone to turn on their cameras: Having your cameras on improves connection. Whenever possible, specify in the meeting invite that your meeting will have cameras on, so your attendees know what to expect. When the call starts, ask everyone to turn on their camera where possible. If this isn’t practical for the entire call, then you may want to have a quick introduction at the beginning of the call before switching to a screen share. 

Empower your team to solve complex problems with clear and creative solutions. Sign up for our Creative Facilitation course today.  

Run effective virtual meetings 

By speaking to the meeting sponsor, creating a plan for your meeting, mitigating technical issues, encouraging participation, and having clear expectations that you share with attendees, you can create better meetings and help your team communicate more effectively. Over time, you can build your own internal best practices around meetings and use those guidelines to strengthen your team’s culture. 

Keep learning about how to improve virtual meetings with a free ebook.   

About Lucidspark

Lucidspark, a cloud-based virtual whiteboard, is a core component of Lucid Software's Visual Collaboration Suite. This cutting-edge digital canvas brings teams together to brainstorm, collaborate, and consolidate collective thinking into actionable next steps—all in real time. Lucid is proud to serve top businesses around the world, including customers such as Google, GE, and NBC Universal, and 99% of the Fortune 500. Lucid partners with industry leaders, including Google, Atlassian, and Microsoft. Since its founding, Lucid has received numerous awards for its products, business, and workplace culture. For more information, visit lucidspark.com.

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The 8 Killer Mistakes to Avoid when Presenting Online

So, you have to prepare a presentation today? Well you’re not alone! According to estimates, 36 million presentations are given daily all around the world. Yes, you read that right! Incredibly, that’s about the equivalent of the population of Canada! And yet how many of these presentations actually achieve their purpose? And in online presentations, how many people are actually still listening by the end slide? Now we’re probably talking more like the population of Liechtenstein! Because while it is easy to lose your audience face-to-face, this danger is even greater than ever as people follow online from the comfort and distractions of their own home office.

Let’s face it – you can’t please all the people all the time, but you can improve your chances by avoiding the following 8 common, yet lethal pitfalls.

The 8 Killer Mistakes of Online Presenting

1. not getting to the point quickly.

These days, time is short and attention is shorter—we’re not here to hear the Iliad, so keep any background information brief and avoid detours. Are you selling us an idea? Explaining a roll-out plan? Asking us to make a decision? Think like Twitter, get to your main idea within the first two minutes and tell us directly and clearly how it will make our lives better or easier. Structure your content clearly and use facts and examples to make your arguments more interesting and persuasive.

2. So many words…

In a face-to face setting, your body language and overall presence can partly compensate for dense, confusing or unattractive slides. But when online, the audience’s attention is channeled almost exclusively towards the slides right in front of them. It’s like sitting in a nice restaurant and only looking at your plate! Take care with fonts and sizes, colours and spelling errors. Spare your audience the ordeal of a “Docupoint” and its big blocks of text and endless bullet points— use key words and memorable short phrases instead. Remember, when it comes to communication, “Less is More”!

3. Not enough slides

Yes, you read right! Business presentations are often complex, but excess data whether text, numbers or graphs all on one slide, will cloud, not clarify your idea. Good news! Slides are free! Rather than cramming so much into one slide so that it looks like the London Tube Map circa 2050, you’d do much better to spread your content over several good clear slides. This way you will get your message across more effectively AND keep the audience engaged as they have more of a sense of progression, spending less time on each slide. Think Less Across More. Include section-dividers to guide your audience through your story and avoid them getting lost.

4. Not enough images

Images are without doubt the single most powerful way to give your presentation more impact and boost your chances of engaging the audience. What’s more, images are essential not just to make your message more attractive, but also to help others understand it more easily— 65% of people learn visually . Look for good quality eye-catching, interesting photos to capture or underline your message; try Shutterstock for symbolic or conceptual images or Unsplash for more real and (free) images. Remember, be brave and go full screen—don’t scatter small photos around your slides. Your images should be the main dish, not the garnish!

5. Not flexing your voice

First and foremost, never use the PowerPoint as a teleprompter! Remember your audience can read much faster than you can read aloud  – 60% faster to be precise! The average (educated) adult reading speed is 280 words per minute compared to the rate of 173 spoken words per minute used by TED speakers. This is a difference that can seem excruciatingly slooooowwww in an online setting. Don’t read your content—instead summarize and talk about your message , enrich it with facts and examples. Your voice is absolutely vital to bring your message to life and engage the audience. Sit straight or stand to release your diaphragm and use intonation, pauses and vary your tempo to project energy and enthusiasm. Without body language, your voice is the star of the show, so bring out your inner DJ!

6. It’s a one-man or woman show

Conversely, one of the biggest mistakes you can make online is to talk continually at the audience instead of with them. While people are sitting in a meeting room social pressure will prevent them from much more than sneaking a furtive glance at their mobile. At home, however, there is no one to stop the siren call of the laptop and its treasure trove of mails, social media and breaking news. Stop the rush for the virtual door by building in interaction every 5 or 6 minutes to interact with the audience with questions, polling or asking for comments via webcam or chat. OK, we know, at the beginning it can feel like you’re talking to the Big Black Hole, but if you give it a little time then people will respond, we promise! Try Mentimeter , Kahoot and Quizziz to engage big audiences with games and polling. Get help managing the chat function as it can easily get out of control  and divide your audience’s attention. For longer presentations, think about taking speaking turns with a colleague so that the audience hears different voices. As always, variety is the spice of life!

7. You don’t have a Plan B

Let’s face it, Murphy’s Law is absolute since presenting on-line became the norm. Over the past 6 months giving courses and attending webinars, whether at Harvard, Stanford or even MIT, our team has witnessed cameras and microphones fail, problems sharing screen or sound, Microsoft Teams crashing, and spontaneous computer re-starts. And let’s not even start with the traffic noise, cats meowing and children screaming! So, what can we do?!” Always rehearse, arm yourself with patience and have a Plan B—send your PPT to a colleague beforehand just in case, have a PDF of your talk and have some questions ready to fill time while you or your IT hero fix it. If the worst does happen, keep calm and don’t worry! We’re all in this together and the audience has seen it all before! As one speaker at MIT said, “This is what life’s like now”.

8. You have had no training

Sorry, not sorry to plug our expertise here! So many people muddle through presenting the best they can, yet a little training can have a huge impact. By learning insider tips, practising new techniques and receiving expert feedback, you can really boost your presence, influence others more effectively and make the experience more enjoyable for all. After all, there is a world of difference between having basic cooking skills and being a Master Chef!

So next time you get ready to give a presentation online, remember our tips and keep your audience watching right till the credits roll! For more information on Presenting with Impact in English or Spanish, check out our RM Skills Academy offering or get in touch to learn more about in-company options.

Engaging Your Audience Online: 15 Strategies for Virtual Presentations

How do you captivate a virtual audience and keep them engaged throughout your online presentation? One effective way is to incorporate interactive elements into your presentation. By adding interactivity, you can make your presentation more engaging and dynamic. As a keynote speaker, it is crucial to utilize these interactive elements to connect with your audience and create an immersive experience . In today’s digital age, where face-to-face interactions are limited, mastering the art of public speaking in virtual presentations is crucial for effective communication. Adding interactivity and interactive elements through social media can greatly enhance engagement and make your presentations more impactful. With the shift to online platforms, there are both challenges and opportunities for interactivity and competition. The inclusion of interactive elements in virtual events can enhance engagement and make the experience more dynamic.

Virtual presentations require a different approach compared to in-person presentations. Adding interactive elements can engage speakers and event attendees, making the experience more dynamic for people. The absence of physical presence in a virtual event platform makes it challenging to gauge audience reactions and maintain their attention. However, with the right speaker and a fun movement, these challenges can be overcome. However, by leveraging a virtual event platform and incorporating interactive tools, dynamic content, and great speakers, you can create a fun and immersive experience that keeps attendees hooked from start to finish.

We will also discuss strategies to overcome the unique challenges faced when engaging online audiences on our virtual event platform. Our speaker will provide great insights and tips for making the experience fun and engaging. So, if you’re ready to take your online presentations to the next level at a virtual event with a great speaker, read on!

Strategies for Creating Engaging Virtual Presentations

Understanding the needs and preferences of your online audience.

To create great virtual presentations, it is crucial for the speaker to understand the needs and preferences of their online audience at the event. Unlike in-person presentations, virtual presentations require a different approach to capture and maintain the attention of viewers. The speaker at a virtual event must employ great techniques to engage the audience. One way to gather insights into what your audience expects from a virtual event is by conducting research or surveys . This will help you understand the expectations of your audience for a great online presentation.

Once you have a better understanding of your audience’s needs and preferences, you can tailor your content accordingly for a great virtual event. Additionally, consider how the speaker can address these needs and preferences. For example, if your virtual event audience prefers concise and visually appealing slides , focus on creating impactful visuals with minimal text. On the other hand, if they prefer more detailed information about the virtual event, provide supplementary resources such as handouts or links to additional materials.

Incorporating Storytelling Techniques to Captivate Viewers

Storytelling is a powerful tool that can captivate viewers during virtual presentations, whether it’s a business event, conference, or online gathering. By incorporating storytelling techniques into your virtual event presentation, you can make it more relatable and memorable for your audience. Start by identifying key points or messages that you want to convey during your virtual event and find creative ways to present them through stories or anecdotes.

Consider using personal experiences or case studies that resonate with your audience’s interests or challenges during a virtual event. This helps establish an emotional connection with viewers during a virtual event and keeps them engaged throughout the presentation. Using storytelling techniques at an event allows you to break down complex concepts into simpler terms, making it easier for event attendees to understand and retain information.

Utilizing Multimedia Elements to Enhance Engagement

Incorporating multimedia elements is another effective strategy for enhancing engagement in virtual presentations during an event.

Utilizing Humor and Visual Reinforcement

In order to create engaging virtual presentations for an event, it’s essential to utilize humor and visual reinforcement. These elements can help to capture the attention of your audience at an event, make the presentation more enjoyable during the event, and reinforce key points effectively at the event.

Adding humor to create a relaxed and enjoyable atmosphere

One way to engage your audience during a virtual event is by adding humor. Injecting some lightheartedness into your event content can create a relaxed atmosphere and make the event experience more enjoyable for everyone involved. Incorporating jokes, funny anecdotes, or humorous stories related to your event topic can instantly grab the attention of your event audience and keep them engaged throughout the event.

However, when planning an event, it’s important to strike a balance between being humorous and maintaining professionalism. While humor can be an effective engagement tool, it should never overshadow the main message or distract from the purpose of your presentation. Ensure that any jokes or humorous elements you include are relevant to the topic at hand and align with the overall tone of your presentation.

Using visuals such as images, charts, and videos to reinforce key points

Visual aids play a crucial role in virtual presentations as they provide additional context for your audience. Incorporating images, charts, graphs, infographics, or videos can help reinforce key points and make complex information easier to understand. Visuals have a powerful impact on our brains as they enhance comprehension and retention of information.

For instance, if you’re presenting data or statistics, using charts or graphs can visually represent the information in a clear and concise manner.

The Power of Strategic Pauses

Employing strategic pauses for emphasis and reflection during presentations.

Engaging your audience online can be a challenge. However, one powerful technique that can captivate your audience and keep them actively involved is the use of strategic pauses . These deliberate breaks in your speech not only allow time for ass imilation and comprehension but also create anticipation and enhance the overall impact of your message.

Strategic pauses serve as natural resting points in your presentation, giving both you and your audience a moment to breathe. By strategically inserting these pauses at key moments, you can effectively emphasize important points and allow them to sink in. This helps prevent information overload and gives your audience time to process what they have just heard.

Allowing time for audience assimilation and comprehension

In the fast-paced world of virtual presentations, it’s easy for information to become overwhelming. By incorporating strategic pauses into your delivery, you give your audience the opportunity to absorb and understand what you’ve just presented. These brief moments of silence allow listeners to reflect on the information before moving on to the next point.

Think of strategic pauses as mini-breaks that provide mental space for your audience. Just like taking a breath between sentences or paragraphs when reading aloud, pausing during a presentation allows individuals to catch up mentally, ensuring they are following along with you.

Enhancing anticipation by strategically pausing before revealing important information

One effective way to engage your audience during virtual presentations is by building anticipation through well-timed pauses. Before unveiling crucial details or sharing significant insights, pause briefly beforehand.

Mastering Vocal Techniques for Engagement

Varying pitch, tone, and volume to maintain audience interest.

One of the key aspects of engaging your audience during virtual presentations is mastering vocal techniques . By varying your pitch, tone, and volume throughout your presentation, you can effectively capture and maintain the interest of your audience.

Think of it as the musicality of your voice. Just like a song with a monotonous melody can become dull, speaking in a monotone voice can quickly bore your listeners. Instead, aim to vary the pitch by emphasizing certain words or phrases with higher or lower tones. This creates a dynamic flow in your speech that keeps the audience engaged.

Similarly, adjusting the tone of your voice can have a significant impact on how your message is received. A warm and friendly tone can help create a connection with your audience and make them feel more comfortable. On the other hand, using a serious or authoritative tone can convey confidence and credibility. By consciously choosing different tones based on the content you’re delivering, you can add depth and richness to your presentation.

In addition to pitch and tone, controlling the volume of your voice is crucial for maintaining engagement during virtual presentations. Speaking too softly may cause participants to strain their ears to hear you clearly, leading to disengagement or frustration. On the other hand, speaking too loudly might come across as aggressive or overpowering.

To strike the right balance, consider adjusting your volume based on specific parts of your presentation. For example, when sharing an exciting anecdote or highlighting important information, increase your volume slightly to grab attention.

Interactive Presentation Ideas for Online Audiences

In today’s digital landscape, virtual presentations have become the norm. Engaging your audience online can be a challenge, but with the right interactive elements and presentation ideas, you can create an immersive experience that captivates your virtual audience. Let’s explore some effective strategies to make your online presentations more interactive and engaging.

Implementing live polls or surveys to encourage active participation.

One way to boost engagement during virtual presentations is by incorporating live polls or surveys . These interactive features allow you to gather real-time feedback from your audience and encourage active participation . By posing questions related to your presentation topic, you can gauge the opinions and thoughts of your attendees instantly. This not only keeps them engaged but also provides valuable insights that can enhance the overall experience.

• Encourages active participation
• Provides instant feedback
• Allows customization based on presentation topic
• Requires a reliable virtual event platform with polling capabilities
• May require additional time for preparation and analysis of poll results

Incorporating Q&A sessions or chat features for real-time interaction.

Another effective way to engage your online audience is by including dedicated Q&A sessions or chat features. These enable real-time interaction between the presenter and attendees, fostering a sense of connection and dialogue. Participants can ask questions, seek clarification, share their thoughts, or engage in discussions related to the presentation content. This interactivity not only enhances engagement but also creates a collaborative learning environment.

Enhancing Communication Beyond Verbal Language

Significance of non-verbal cues in virtual presentations.

In virtual presentations, effective communication goes beyond just verbal language. Non-verbal cues , such as body language , play a crucial role in engaging your audience and conveying your message effectively . While physical presence may be limited in an online setting, there are still ways to incorporate these non-verbal cues to enhance communication.

Body language is a powerful tool for expressing emotions, emphasizing key points, and establishing rapport with your audience. It helps create a connection and captivate the attention of your listeners. Even though you may not be physically present with them, your gestures and expressions can still leave an impact through video conferencing tools.

Incorporating Gestures, Facial Expressions, and Eye Contact

When delivering a virtual presentation, it’s important to make intentional use of gestures and facial expressions to convey meaning and engage your audience. Just like in face-to-face interactions, hand gestures can help emphasize certain points or add emphasis to your speech.

Facial expressions also play a significant role in conveying emotions and maintaining engagement. A smile can instantly make you appear more approachable and friendly. Similarly, raising an eyebrow or nodding can indicate agreement or understanding.

Maintaining eye contact is another crucial aspect of effective communication during virtual presentations. By looking directly into the camera lens instead of at yourself on the screen, you create the illusion of making eye contact with your audience. This helps establish a sense of connection and attentiveness.

Wrapping Up the Importance of Engaging Virtual Presentations

Reiterating the benefits of engaging virtual presentations.

Now that we’ve explored the ins and outs of engaging virtual presentations, let’s recap why they are so crucial for capturing and retaining your audience’s attention. By incorporating interactive elements, you can create an immersive experience that keeps participants actively involved throughout the event. This level of engagement leads to improved retention and understanding of the key points you want to convey.

Engaging virtual presentations offer several advantages over traditional in-person events. First and foremost, they provide a convenient way for attendees to join from anywhere in the world without the need for travel or accommodation expenses. This accessibility greatly expands your potential audience and allows you to reach individuals who may not have been able to attend otherwise.

Interactive features such as polls, quizzes, and Q&A sessions foster active participation from attendees. These elements encourage them to think critically about the content being presented and provide opportunities for immediate feedback. By involving your audience in this way, you create a sense of connection and collaboration that enhances their overall experience.

Another benefit of engaging virtual presentations is their ability to cater to different learning styles. People have diverse preferencesWhile others prefer auditory or kinesthetic methods. Through multimedia integration, including videos, images, and slideshows, you can accommodate various learning styles simultaneously. This multi-sensory approach helps ensure that your message resonates with a wider range of participants.

The Power of Humor and Visual Reinforcement in Virtual Presentations

In the world of virtual presentations, engaging your audience online can be a challenge. However, there are two powerful tools that can help you create a memorable and enjoyable experience for your online audience: humor and visual reinforcement. Let’s explore how these elements can make a significant impact on the effectiveness of your virtual presentations.

Humor: Creating a Fun and Light Experience

Injecting humor into your content is like adding a pinch of salt to enhance the flavor. It helps to keep your audience engaged, entertained, and connected with your message. A well-placed joke or witty remark can instantly break the ice and create a relaxed atmosphere.

• Using humorous anecdotes or personal stories related to your topic can captivate your audience’s attention.
• Incorporating funny visuals or memes that align with your presentation’s theme adds an element of surprise and amusement.
• Interactive activities such as quizzes or polls with humorous options can make the session more dynamic and enjoyable.

By infusing humor into your virtual presentation, you not only entertain your audience but also establish a rapport that makes them more receptive to the information you’re sharing.

Visual Reinforcement: Showing rather than Telling

In virtual presentations, where participants are often multitasking or easily distracted by their surroundings, visual aids play a crucial role in reinforcing key messages. By using compelling visuals strategically throughout your presentation, you can enhance understanding, retention, and engagement.

• Utilize eye-catching slides with minimal text that highlight key points or data.

Embracing the Pause: Enhancing Engagement through Strategic Pauses

In virtual presentations, maintaining audience engagement can be a challenge. However, one effective technique that can greatly enhance audience attention and comprehension is the strategic use of pauses . By incorporating well-timed pauses into your virtual presentations, you can create anticipation, emphasize important points, and keep your audience fully engaged throughout.

Elaborating on the effectiveness of strategic pauses in maintaining audience attention.

Strategic pauses serve as powerful tools to maintain audience attention during virtual presentations. When used effectively, they allow for moments of reflection and processing of information. These brief breaks in speech or action give the audience time to absorb what has been said and prepare for what is to come next.

By strategically pausing at key points in your presentation, you create a sense of suspense and curiosity among your listeners. This pause allows them to anticipate what will happen next, keeping them actively engaged in the content. It also helps to break up the monotony of continuous talking or presenting, providing a natural rhythm to your delivery.

Discussing how well-timed pauses can create anticipation and emphasize important points.

Well-timed pauses have the power to create anticipation among your audience. Just like a suspenseful moment in a movie or a punchline in a joke, these intentional breaks build tension and intrigue. By pausing before revealing crucial information or making an impactful statement, you heighten the impact of that moment.

Pauses also serve as signposts for important points within your presentation. They draw attention to key concepts or ideas by giving listeners time to absorb and process them fully.

Mastering Your Voice: Leveraging Vocal Techniques for Audience Engagement

In virtual presentations, capturing and retaining audience interest is crucial. While visual aids and content are important, the role of vocal techniques should not be underestimated. Your voice has the power to engage, captivate, and connect with your audience on a deeper level. By leveraging specific vocal techniques such as modulation , pacing , and emphasis, you can enhance your virtual presentations and leave a lasting impact.

Explaining the Role of Vocal Techniques in Capturing and Retaining Audience Interest

Your voice is a powerful tool that can convey emotions, emphasize key points, and create a sense of connection with your audience. When delivering virtual presentations, it’s essential to understand how vocal techniques play a vital role in capturing and retaining audience interest.

Modulation refers to varying the pitch, tone, and volume of your voice throughout your presentation. By using different levels of modulation strategically, you can add depth and expressiveness to your delivery. This helps to keep your audience engaged by creating a dynamic listening experience.

Pacing involves controlling the speed at which you speak during your presentation. Adjusting your pace can help maintain interest by adding rhythm and preventing monotony. It allows you to emphasize important points or slow down for clarity when discussing complex ideas.

Emphasis is another crucial aspect of vocal technique that helps highlight key information or ideas. By placing emphasis on certain words or phrases through changes in volume or tone, you draw attention to critical elements in your presentation. This ensures that important concepts are not overlooked by your audience.

Boosting Audience Engagement: Best Practices for Captivating Online Audiences

In today’s digital age, virtual presentations have become the norm for engaging with audiences . However, capturing and maintaining the attention of online participants can be quite challenging. To ensure that your virtual presentations are effective and impactful, it is crucial to employ best practices that enhance audience engagement.

Using Relatable Examples

One of the most effective ways to engage an online audience is by using relatable examples . People connect more easily with content when they can see how it applies to their own lives or experiences. By incorporating relevant anecdotes or case studies into your presentation, you can make your message more relatable and resonate with your audience on a personal level .

For instance, if you are delivering a sales pitch for a new product, sharing success stories from satisfied customers can help potential buyers envision themselves benefiting from the product’s features. These relatable examples create a sense of trust and credibility while also sparking interest among your online audience.

The Power of Storytelling

Storytelling has been an age-old method of captivating listeners, and it holds true even in virtual presentations. Sharing compelling stories can evoke emotions and make your content memorable. When crafting your presentation, consider incorporating narratives that illustrate key points or convey important messages.

By weaving storytelling into your virtual presentation, you can transform dry information into a captivating experience for your audience.

Ten Interactive Presentation Ideas to Keep Your Audience Engaged

In today’s digital landscape, virtual presentations have become the norm for connecting with audiences. However, keeping your audience engaged in an online setting can be quite challenging. To overcome this hurdle, here are ten creative ideas to make your virtual presentations more interactive and captivating.

Quizzes: Test Their Knowledge

One effective way to engage your audience is by incorporating quizzes into your presentation. Create interactive quizzes related to your topic and ask participants to answer questions throughout the session. This not only encourages active participation but also helps you gauge their understanding of the subject matter .

Polls: Gather Opinions

Another engaging technique is using polls to gather opinions from your audience. Pose thought-provoking questions and allow participants to vote on their preferred answers. This not only provides valuable insights but also creates a sense of involvement among attendees.

Brainstorming Sessions: Encourage Collaboration

To foster collaboration and generate innovative ideas, include brainstorming sessions in your virtual presentation. Divide participants into breakout rooms or use collaborative tools that allow them to contribute their thoughts and suggestions in real-time.

Virtual Whiteboarding: Visualize Ideas

Visualizing ideas can significantly enhance engagement during virtual presentations. Utilize virtual whiteboarding tools that enable participants to sketch diagrams, mind maps, or flowcharts related to the topic at hand. This interactive approach stimulates creativity and facilitates better understanding.

Gamification: Make Learning Fun

Integrating elements of gamification into your presentation can transform it into an enjoyable learning experience.

Creating Word Pictures: Enhancing Communication Beyond Verbal Language

In virtual presentations, the power of visual communication goes beyond just images and videos. It extends to the use of descriptive language that paints vivid word pictures in the minds of your audience. By incorporating techniques such as metaphors , analogies , and vivid imagery, you can engage online audiences effectively and make your message more memorable.

Importance of Visual Communication through Descriptive Language

When delivering a virtual presentation, relying solely on verbal language may not be enough to captivate your audience. People have different learning styles, and some individuals are more visually oriented than others. By using descriptive language that appeals to their senses, you can create a richer experience for your viewers.

Crafting effective word pictures allows you to tap into the power of storytelling. Instead of simply relaying information, you can paint a mental image that resonates with your audience on a deeper level. This helps them connect emotionally with your message and enhances their overall engagement.

Techniques for Engaging Online Audiences

To engage online audiences effectively, it’s essential to incorporate techniques that go beyond plain speech. Here are some strategies for creating impactful word pictures in virtual presentations:

• Metaphors: Utilize metaphors by comparing two unrelated concepts to create a powerful visual representation. For example, if you’re discussing teamwork, you could say “Teamwork is like a well-oiled machine where every person plays a vital role.”
• Analogies: Draw parallels between different scenarios or situations to help your audience understand complex ideas better.

Planning Virtual Activities: Strategies for Interactive and Engaging Presentations

In today’s digital age, virtual presentations have become the norm. However, engaging your audience online can be quite challenging. To make your virtual presentations more interactive and captivating, it is crucial to plan ahead and incorporate effective strategies. This section will outline some key planning strategies for incorporating interactive activities into your virtual presentations.

Outlining Effective Planning Strategies

There are a few important considerations to keep in mind.

• Time Management : Begin by allocating specific time slots for interactive activities throughout your presentation. By carefully managing the timing of these activities, you can maintain a steady flow and prevent any lulls in engagement.
• Technology Requirements : Consider the technological tools and platforms that will be required for each activity. Ensure that participants have access to the necessary resources and provide clear instructions on how to use them effectively.
• Participant Engagement : Keep in mind the level of engagement you want to achieve with each activity. Consider whether participants will need to actively participate or simply observe. Design activities that encourage active involvement, such as polls, quizzes, or breakout room discussions.

Discussing Considerations

To ensure a successful virtual presentation with interactive activities, it is essential to discuss certain considerations beforehand.

• Presentation Topic : Tailor your choice of interactive activities based on the topic of your presentation. For instance, if you are discussing a complex project management concept, consider incorporating a collaborative whiteboard session where participants can brainstorm ideas together.
• Audience Analysis

User-Selected Presentation Paths: Engaging Strategies for Virtual Presentations

In the world of virtual presentations, engagement is key. With participants spread across different locations and distractions just a click away, it can be challenging to keep them focused and involved. That’s where user-selected presentation paths come into play. By exploring this concept, we can discover strategies that will help us create more engaging virtual presentations.

Exploring Hyperlinked Content

One option for implementing user-selected presentation paths is through hyperlinked content. This allows participants to navigate through the presentation at their own pace, clicking on links that interest them the most. By providing hyperlinks within your slides or presentation materials, you give participants the freedom to choose which topics they want to explore further.

• Tailored experience: Participants can delve deeper into areas that interest them the most.
• Increased involvement: By giving participants control over their learning journey, they become active participants rather than passive listeners.
• Potential distraction: While hyperlinked content offers flexibility, there is a risk that participants may get sidetracked by unrelated information.
• Time management: Depending on how many links are provided, participants might spend too much time exploring one topic and not have enough time for other important content.

Interactive Menus for Navigation

Another strategy to enhance engagement in virtual presentations is by incorporating interactive menus. These menus act as a roadmap for participants, allowing them to choose which sections or topics they want to focus on during the presentation. By presenting an overview of the content and providing clickable options, you empower participants to take charge of their learning experience.

Keeping an Online Audience Engaged: Preparing and Previewing Materials

To ensure a successful virtual presentation, thorough preparation and previewing of materials are crucial. By organizing content effectively, using clear headings, and providing visual cues, you can keep your online audience engaged throughout the presentation.

Importance of Thorough Preparation

Preparation is key. Taking the time to thoroughly prepare your materials allows you to deliver a polished and professional presentation that captures your audience’s attention. It also helps you feel more confident and prepared, reducing any potential stress or anxiety.

Preparing for a virtual presentation involves several steps. First, gather all the necessary media and content you plan to use during the presentation. This includes slideshows, videos, images, or any other visual aids that will enhance your message. Ensure that these materials are easily accessible and organized in a way that makes them easy to navigate during the presentation.

Organizing Content Effectively

One of the challenges of virtual presentations is keeping your audience engaged when they cannot physically be in the same room as you. To overcome this challenge, it’s essential to organize your content effectively.

Start by using clear headings for each section of your presentation. This helps guide your audience through the material and allows them to quickly understand what each section will cover. Consider using bullet points or numbered lists within each section to break up information into digestible chunks.

Another effective way to organize content is by providing visual cues throughout your presentation. Use relevant images or icons to highlight key points or emphasize important information on slides.

Eye Contact and Camera Placement: Establishing Connection in Virtual Presentations

Maintaining eye contact is crucial for engaging your audience during virtual presentations. Despite the physical distance, there are techniques you can employ to create a sense of connection with your online viewers. Optimizing camera angles and positioning can significantly enhance the impact of your presentation.

Significance of Maintaining Eye Contact

Eye contact plays a vital role in communication, both in-person and online. It helps establish trust, convey sincerity, and foster engagement. In virtual presentations, maintaining eye contact through camera placement is essential for creating a personal connection with your audience.

When you maintain eye contact during a virtual presentation, it shows that you are focused on your viewers and value their presence. It helps build rapport and keeps them actively engaged throughout the session. By looking directly into the camera lens, you give the impression that you are speaking directly to each individual viewer.

Techniques for Creating Connection Online

Creating a sense of connection with an online audience requires conscious effort. Here are some practical techniques to help you establish that connection:

• Look directly into the camera: When presenting virtually, make sure to look directly into the camera rather than at your own image on the screen. This gives the illusion of making direct eye contact with your audience.
• Position yourself at eye level: Adjust your camera setup so that it aligns with your eye level or slightly above it. This ensures that you appear more approachable and engaged with your viewers.
• Minimize distractions:

Engaging with Polling and Gamification: Interactive Techniques for Audience Involvement

In virtual presentations, it’s crucial to find ways to keep your audience engaged and involved. One effective method is through the use of polling and gamification techniques. By incorporating these interactive elements, you can create a more dynamic and participatory experience for your participants.

Exploring increased interactivity with polling

One way to enhance audience participation is by utilizing polls during your virtual presentation. Polling allows you to gather real-time feedback from your audience, making them an active part of the discussion. It not only encourages engagement but also provides valuable insights into the thoughts and opinions of your participants.

Benefits of polling:

• Increased interactivity : Polls allow participants to actively participate in the presentation by expressing their opinions or preferences.
• Data collection: The data collected from polls can provide valuable insights that can be used for future presentations or decision-making processes.
• Instant feedback : Real-time polling gives presenters immediate feedback on how well their message is being received, allowing them to adjust their approach if needed.
• Fostering healthy competition: Incorporating competitive elements in polls, such as leaderboard rankings, can encourage friendly competition among participants.

Discussing gamification for audience involvement

Gamification involves incorporating game-like elements into non-game contexts to increase engagement and motivation. By introducing gamified features in virtual presentations, you can make the experience more enjoyable and interactive for your audience.

Benefits of gamification:

• Enhanced engagement: Gamified elements such as quizzes, challenges, or rewards motivate participants to actively engage with the content.

Creating a Distraction-Free Background: Optimizing Visual Focus in Online Presentations

Creating engaging virtual presentations is crucial for capturing the attention and interest of your online audience. By implementing strategies such as optimizing visual focus , utilizing humor and visual reinforcement, mastering vocal techniques, and incorporating interactive presentation ideas, you can enhance audience engagement and make your virtual presentations more impactful. Enhancing communication beyond verbal language and embracing strategic pauses can further captivate your audience’s attention. Remember to plan virtual activities, establish eye contact through camera placement, and engage with polling and gamification to keep your online audience involved. With these techniques in mind, you’ll be well-equipped to deliver compelling virtual presentations that leave a lasting impression.

Call-to-action: Start applying these strategies in your next virtual presentation to create an engaging experience for your audience. Experiment with different techniques, embrace creativity, and continuously seek feedback to improve the impact of your online presentations.

Can I use humor in my virtual presentations?

Absolutely! Humor is a powerful tool for engaging an online audience. Incorporating light-hearted jokes or funny anecdotes can help create a relaxed atmosphere and make your presentation more enjoyable. Just ensure that the humor is appropriate for your specific audience.

How can I optimize visual focus in my virtual presentations?

To optimize visual focus in virtual presentations, it’s important to create a distraction-free background. Choose a clean and clutter-free environment with minimal distractions behind you. Consider using a neutral-colored backdrop or even a virtual background feature if available.

What are some interactive presentation ideas for online audiences?

There are numerous interactive presentation ideas you can explore for online audiences. Some examples include conducting live polls or surveys during the presentation, incorporating breakout rooms for group discussions or activities, utilizing interactive slides with clickable elements or quizzes, and encouraging real-time chat participation.

How do strategic pauses enhance engagement in virtual presentations?

Strategic pauses provide moments of reflection for the audience while allowing them to process information effectively. They also build anticipation and create a sense of suspense, keeping the audience engaged and eager to hear what comes next. Incorporating pauses at key moments in your presentation can significantly enhance audience engagement.

How can I enhance communication beyond verbal language in virtual presentations?

To enhance communication beyond verbal language in virtual presentations, consider using visual aids such as slides, infographics, or videos to convey information. Utilize gestures and facial expressions to add emphasis and emotion to your delivery. Make use of props or demonstrations whenever applicable to reinforce your message visually

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Presenting Virtually: 5 Best Practices for Online Presentations

Sep 28, 2022

By Fire Spark

In a post-COVID world, presenting virtually has become the norm for millions. However, the experience is nothing like the in-person presentations you’ve been practicing for years. 

But what is it about giving online presentations that feels so unnerving? Well, the reality is that virtual presentations bring on a whole new set of challenges. While presenting online, the pressure of the audience tuning out and losing interest is multiplied. 

Plus, the technical difficulties that come along just add to your anxiety. You're relying on your internet connection to make or break your business. And even worse, presenters lose audience visibility while presenting materials and sharing their screen, which makes it difficult to gauge feedback. 

In this article, we’ll explore 5 best practices for online presentations – to elicit greater connection, win over your audience, and get your message across. Get ready to ace your next online presentation! 

5 Best Practices for Virtual Presentations

Get your technology ready ahead of time.

As a presenter, your technology failing you right before your presentation would be the biggest nightmare. So, make sure to test your system’s camera and microphone beforehand. Nothing kills a presentation more than audio and video distortion.

Consider getting a webcam that surpasses the audio and video quality of your original system. Upgrade your system for better quality and reliability – this AI Smart Camera offers 1080p video quality with responsive features.

Above all, ensure that your laptop/PC is up to date on software leading up to your presentation. 

Prepare for the worst when it comes to your Wi-Fi connection

One of the best practices for virtual presentations that people often overlook is presenting with stable internet. You need to minimize any possible hurdles, so present in a location where the signals are strong. You can also get an ethernet connection for greater reliability. 

Whether online or offline, the best presenters are those who prepare for the worst. Keep a backup plan in case your Wi-Fi fails you. If your internet connection fails, be prepared to dial in to your meeting or use a cellular hotspot to connect.

Dry run your presentation

Practice your presentation before you speak by doing it on your own, with a colleague, a peer, or family member. By doing so, you ease your own tension, learn to better time your presentation, and make the delivery flow much more smoothly.  

Gather your assets and materials

Adding visuals is yet another excellent approach to help demonstrate more abstract concepts in your presentation. It's possibly the best way to interest the audience (and get them to interact with you). 

For this, collect all of your visuals and other resources beforehand, and make sure to practice referencing them. Make sure you send backups of your materials to a trusted colleague in case you’re unable to access them during your presentation.

Be sure to engage your audience 

Virtual presentations mean that you’re competing for your audience’s hearts, minds, and attention. While it’s relatively harder to captivate your audience through a screen, your presentation's success frequently depends on their acceptance.

Not sure about how to engage the audience during virtual presentations? Let’s dive deeper into some techniques that encourage interaction.

How to Engage the Audience During Virtual Presentations

Make your visuals useful and eye-catching.

The audience is better able to comprehend and remember the information that is presented visually. Ideally, if you’re using a pitch deck, each slide should only contain one or two main points and some eye-catching visuals for the main concepts. 

Even if you don’t have a slideshow for your presentation, other visual materials can still be useful to your audience. Consider showing images, videos, infographics, or other visual assets that support your points.

Keep your energy up

Within a virtual medium, your audience is more likely to zone out – especially if their cameras are turned off. 

So, tailor your presentation to your audience, and keep your energy up while you present. If you look bored, your audience is more likely to pay no attention and, eventually lose interest. Speak passionately about your topics, and the audience is more likely to match your energy.

Look at the camera and address the audience often.

When considering how to make a virtual presentation interactive, looking at the camera is a critical factor. The most effective way to engage your audience is by making "eye contact" (as much as you can through a screen) and using engagement techniques like polls, interactive exercises, and more.

While presenting, you have to switch tabs frequently. Attaching a second screen, like the TRIO Monitors , can help you multitask, viewing your presentation screen and your audience’s video stream simultaneously. This is a great way to stay connected with your audience while remaining in control of your presentation materials and reference notes. 

Got a virtual presentation that you want to ace? Learn more about conferencing tools and how Mobile Pixels can help you present more effectively in digital settings.

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Presentation Training Institute

A division of bold new directions training, common problems that most people have when presenting.

Presenting is a skill that requires a great deal of preparation and practice. It is also something that does not come naturally to most people. In fact, many people are terrified at the thought of public speaking, yet a successful presentation is dependent on the speaker appearing calm, confident, and in control. Even with extensive preparation, unforeseen challenges can arise, quickly derailing a presentation and throwing the speaker off their game. How, then, can one navigate these challenges and avoid getting flustered in front of their audience? Let’s take a look at some of the most common problems that presenters face and how to overcome them in order to deliver a successful presentation. 

Problem 1: You suffer from pre-presentation anxiety 

This is perhaps the most common problem faced by any presenter. The thought of speaking in public can be extremely scary for many people. They may be fine for the weeks leading up to the presentation but then panic in the moments before their talk begins. The key to managing nerves and anxiousness is to be well prepared and to find ways to calm yourself down. The more a speaker practices and rehearses their presentation, the more confident they will be in their delivery. In addition to preparation, presenters should also practice deep breathing exercises to calm their nerves and get oxygen flowing throughout the body. 

Problem 2: You don’t know which content to put on your slides

Many presenters know their content quite well, but they have a hard time narrowing it down to create their slides. It is important for presenters not to overwhelm their audience with too much content while also sticking to their time allotment. Transforming thoughts into engaging slides can be a challenge, but condensing your thoughts into key points is essential. 

Problem 3: Failure to engage the audience

Many presenters rehearse their content over and over and know exactly what to say, but they forget all about engaging the audience. Although they have their material down, they fail to build a rapport and connect with the audience. Unfortunately, this lack of engagement can be the demise of any presentation. To fix this problem, presenters need to spend time meeting and greeting audience members beforehand. They also need to smile, make eye contact, and nod to audience members throughout the presentation to engage them in the conversation. 

Problem 4: Poor body language

Audiences will quickly get bored by a speaker who simply stands behind a podium throughout the presentation. Similarly, they will easily be distracted by a speaker who fidgets nervously with their hands or makes awkward gestures. Stiff body language can detract from the speaker’s message. Thus, it is important for speakers to move around the space to create energy and keep the audience interested. They should also avoid putting hands in pockets, playing with a marker or notes, using unnecessary filler words (ah’s, uhm’s, ok’s), speaking monotone, or standing still the entire time. 

Problem 5: Lack of energy or enthusiasm

A great speaker is able to convince their audience by their energy and enthusiasm. All too often, however, this component is missing from the presentation. How can you get your audience excited about your presentation if you aren’t even excited about it? Speakers can increase enthusiasm by moving around the stage, interacting with the audience, and using voice inflection to highlight key points. 

Problem 6: Losing their place or forgetting what to say next

When speakers are nervous, it’s easy to lose their train of thought during the presentation. Things like a technical difficulty, a challenging question, or a yawning audience member can easily distract the speaker causing them to get lost and forget what they were saying. If this happens, it’s important not to get flustered but to simply take a deep breath and regain composure. It can also be helpful to use notes or reference your slides in order to get back on track. 

Problem 7: Not interacting with the audience

Audience members do not want to be spoken “at†but rather spoken “with.†It can be difficult to keep the audience’s attention but one of the best ways to do so is by making them part of the presentation. Find creative ways to interact with the audience through polls, Q&A, games, stories, or other visuals. Not only will this make the presentation more memorable, but it will keep the audience attentive and interested.

Giving Effective Virtual Presentations – 7 Rules to Follow

Giving effective virtual presentations is a skill. And, as with any skill, you can master it with the right tools and practice. Be mindful that what makes a great presentation at in-person events may not necessarily translate to an engaging virtual presentation.

The ABCs of Giving Effective Virtual Presentations

Rule 1: use slides strategically for an engaging virtual presentation.

At offline events, the participants still see you when you have your PowerPoint projected on the screen. Online presentations, on the other hand, either replace the video of you with that of your slides or display a video of you in a small format in the corner of the screen. It makes it more difficult to be present and actively engage your audience. Try to keep the number of slides to a minimum. Use them to show the most important information or help your audience visualize what you are saying at that moment.

Rule 2: Know your virtual presentation platform

No matter how brilliant a speaker you are, it can all go to waste if you do not know how to properly use the online platform that’s hosting the event. A glitch, a delay, an interruption – so many things can happen to disrupt the flow of your presentation. Talk to the event organizer in advance and learn as much as you can about the online presentation platform.

Rule 3: Check your background and AV quality

Your background should not be distracting. Plain clean walls, neatly organized bookshelves, and office spaces are some of the most common backdrops that work well for virtual presentations. You can also use a virtual background . Just make sure you select one in advance.

Rule 4: Eliminate noise and other distractions

Make sure you are alone in the room during your presentation. You don’t want a colleague or a family member captured on-screen as you are talking about the latest findings of your research. It takes the attention of your audience away from what you are saying.

Rule 5: Address your audience and try to engage it

Just like with offline presentations, encourage your audience to submit questions via the live chat function and address their points. Interact with your audience as much as you can during the online presentation. Make the information you present relevant to their needs and field of study and facilitate discussions.

Rule 6: Be on time

Delays in the schedule are frustrating for attendees at in-person events. They are just as frustrating with online events. Plus, in this case, they can simply walk away from their laptop and either return later or sign off completely. Do not risk losing your audience over a delay. Join the event at least 15 minutes before your presentation.

Rule 7: Work with your event organizer

Your conference organizer is a treasure trove of information on giving effective and engaging virtual presentations. They know the audience you will be presenting to inside and out. They are regularly in touch with your audience and understand what type of topics and style of delivery gets them interested. Use this to your advantage.

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Virtual Facilitation: 10 Top Challenges & What to Do About Them

Posted in Blog , Create , Facilitation , Lead , Virtual Facilitation by Jo North

How’s your virtual facilitation going right now?

How are all your Zoom , Microsoft Teams , Adobe Connect (insert your online meeting tool of choice!) sessions going?

I’ve been facilitating online as well as in person for quite a few years, but since the Covid-19 lockdown periods, I’ve really ramped up the number and intensity of the virtual sessions that I’m facilitating.

I’ve also been on the receiving end of other people’s virtual facilitation as a delegate. My experiences have ranged from the pretty good to the dire! Anyone who’s hosting an online meeting that’s more than a quick, practical update can do SO MUCH BETTER than just having conversations with people on screen.

Why I wrote this guide to virtual facilitation

It’s wonderful that we can connect through a variety of brilliant, intuitive and affordable online meeting tools, especially during times such as these. These tools, such as Zoom, Teams and others, make it so easy that I’ve witnessed a lack in creativity and engagement in some online sessions I’ve attended as a delegate.

To get the best results and deliver a great experience for our delegates, as facilitators we need to innovate how we design and manage our online workshops. That means all the way through, not just going for a quirky icebreaker before settling back into the ordinariness of a boring and uninspiring core.

How this virtual facilitation guide will help

I think you will find this virtual facilitation guide really helpful if:

• You already facilitate online meetings, manage a remote or socially distanced team, and want your online work to be more creative, collaborative and effective • You want to make your online training and development sessions more engaging and inclusive • You want to lead online meetings that are just as, if not even more engaging and effective  than in-person sessions

I’ve written this guide with the aim of helping you, as a virtual facilitator, to:

• Overcome any perceived challenges of virtual facilitation; and
• Suggest some ways in which you can be more creative and add more value in your sessions.

I’d also love to hear from you on any other challenges or tips that you have, so please do leave me some comments below.

Benefits of Online Meetings

Before we dive into the perceived challenges of virtual facilitation, let’s pause for a moment and reflect on the substantial benefits that online meetings offer.

• They are easy to access, set up and are inclusive, as long as people have a decent internet service.
• Their accessibility means that there are more opportunities for people from diverse locations to join.
• They’re super cost-effective and don’t need all the logistics, catering and venue work that goes into an in-person event.
• They can be recorded easily and for free, meaning that people can watch them back, or catch up with what happened afterwards if they couldn’t be present themselves.

Now, let’s crack on with practical tips and advice for dealing with the 10 most common challenges of online meetings that facilitators ask me about.

#1 Tech Challenges

Some people are genuinely concerned about either using the tech or about the tech going wrong.

You can do a lot about the first concern by making sure that you get plenty of practise. Rehearse what you’re doing in as near-live an environment as you can and do it over and over to get really familiar with the tools. As I’ve said, the tools are designed to be super-easy and intuitive, and practice really does lead to great performance.

There will be times when the tech does go wrong because of factors beyond your control.

Expect the tech to be unpredictable sometimes, and don’t panic if it does fail. Have some low-tech contingencies ready in case it does, and make sure that you have everyone’s contact details in case links or connections go down so that you can arrange how you are going to regroup.

I am a big fan of live video expert, Ian Anderson Gray . You can find a whole range of tips, videos, podcasts and free downloadable checklists to help build your confidence both with going live on camera and what do if the tech fails on Ian’s website here.

Get delegates using the tech early and talk them through and demo the features you want them to use with easy questions that everyone can answer and things everyone can do.

Use great equipment too – a good quality mic is essential and will really help if you’re sound recording. There are some great recommendations for sound here .

#2 Keeping the session on track

Some people say that they find it more challenging to keep things on track when they are facilitating online sessions, but the same principles apply as when you’re facilitating in-person events. You can find some more tips and techniques from me on this in my article Creative Facilitation – an Introduction .

Use and share an agenda in advance, flag when one part of the agenda is complete and another is about to start to delegates as you go.

Create a ‘car park’ or ‘parking lot’ perhaps using on screen sticky notes for issues that come up that aren’t directly on topic.

#3 Lack of visual feedback

It can be more challenging to spot visual cues and read non-verbal signals online, for sure. Always make sure that delegates have the video on, and that they know that this will be the case in advance of the session to avoid any issues.

Scan facial expressions and body language on gallery view from time to time to see how everyone is doing.

Because you are the facilitator, it’s important that you make sure that people can see you easily and pick you out from the gallery. A tip is to wear a bright, block colour that pops on screen and doesn’t blend in with your background. Use your hands, speak with some movement and be visual in how you engage and speak to camera.

#4 Lack of engagement

Don’t become background noise or entertainment, something people are half-listening to as they’re waiting for the next Tesco home delivery slot to become available.

Over-reliance on presentations will get your delegates tuning out. Aim for MVP – which in this case means “Minimum Viable Powerpoint”! Mix facts with stories. Share key statistics, fascinating insights and anecdotes. Go for lightning talks , expert interviews and creative information sharing instead of lengthy slide decks.

Get people engaged, on camera, doing / commenting / pressing things every 5 minutes or so.

Set tasks. Use breakout rooms to get participants working together in smaller groups where there is more accountability, interest and individuals can contribute more easily.

The Ringelmann Effect , similar to the concepts of Social Loafing or the Bystander Effect , shows us that participants are more likely to invest less effort when working collectively as part of a group, compared with performing a task alone. It’s even more evident in tasks where the contribution of each group member is combined into a group outcome, making it difficult to identify the contribution of a single person.

Breakout rooms make it easier for everyone to contribute their ideas to discussions, and you can ask each group to feedback their collective thoughts in plenary once the breakout discussions have happened, avoiding blank faces or awkward silences when you ask the full group a question!

My colleague, Paul Slater of The Change Shed , also offers these words of advice. Paul recommends regular check-ins for better engagement, along with even more q&a. Verbalise more often what you are doing, because of the lack of /difficulty with less body language, especially with larger groups and therefore smaller video tiles. The earlier you engage your audience, the more likely they are to stay engaged.

Download my free toolkit here, Appreciative Inquiry for Facilitators.

#5 Building connection between delegates

People think it might be harder to build a sense or team or community in online sessions – but that’s not necessarily true. Make sure that your sessions include activities that are fun, social and human as well as your task and work-focused ones.

Interrupting, or politely getting a word in during discussions can be more difficult, for sure – different internet speeds, speed of tools and so on mean that people can bump into each other from time to time. Accept that it’s inevitable, let people know that will happen from the outset and encourage people to use the chat, raise hand functions or give visible signs that they’d like to come in and speak.

What is fantastic is that some teams that I work with, as much as I love them, like to speak over each other and have a few conversations running at once. Online tools prevent this from being possible, woohoo!

Additional tips for building a sense of team are:

• Agree clear, shared objectives that are meaningful for everyone.
• Make your openings sociable and human-focused.
• Leave the audio and video up during breaks (and don’t forget to tell people!). This leads to informal conversations that can help people to connect with each other beyond the core session.

Hale and Grenny in their 2020 Harvard Business Review article found that in a study of 200 people, 86% of people showed even higher engagement in virtual meetings than face-to-face ones when the meeting is structured and facilitated in the right way.

“The key is to sustain a continual expectation of meaningful involvement so participants don’t retreat into an observer role. When that happens, you’ll have to work hard to bring them back.” Hale & Grenny, HBR 2020

Psychological Safety in Your Online Meetings

Psychological safety was originally defined as:

“a shared belief held by members of a team that the team is safe for interpersonal risk taking.” Amy Edmondson, Harvard Business School

Your participants need to have a feeling of psychological safety in order to challenge, share ideas, have fun and participate to the best of their ability. in your virtual meeting.

You can foster a sense of psychological safety through your virtual facilitation by:

• Focusing on learning and growth, rather than on “correct” or “right” answers
• Showing that you’re open to learning, too
• Model curiosity and ask lots of questions
• Recognise and value the contribution that everyone in the group makes, and ensure everyone has space to speak

You can find out more about psychological safety and leading remote collaboration in my video below.

#6 Connecting as the facilitator

To connect with your delegates in your virtual facilitation role, use and vary your voice, look directly into the camera when you speak and move closer and away from the camera at different points.

Your way through to your delegates is via your webcam and your mic – get reasonable quality ones, you don’t need to spend a fortune, but the ones on your laptop or desktop are likely to cut it. I recommend a blue yeti mic and logitech C920 webcam , you can get both together for around $200. To dampen echoes and make the sound better I also use a Marantz sound shield , but I’ve got a really successful colleague who does just as well with an old duvet draped out of shot behind the mic. You can see my set-up in the photo here, complete with my mandatory mug of green tea and a pink owl box!

#7 Being creative and interactive

Use the screen share, chat roll and breakout room functions in your main meeting tool combined with other tools such as Mentimeter, Google docs & slides , Mural, Stormz, Miro, Sessionlab and Stormboard to massively expand the creativity and interaction in your virtual facilitation design and delivery.

We’ll have a look at these now. Each of them has a free trial option, so you can play around and test them out to see what you think.

Great virtual facilitation tools

Mural  enables innovative teams to think and collaborate visually to solve important problems. Once people have had some practice, it’s quick and easy to use it for creating diagrams, which are popular in design thinking and agile methodologies, as well as tools to facilitate more impactful meetings and workshops.

This tool is quite intuitive to use, but definitely does take practice – for delegates as well as facilitators. If you’re going to be meeting with the same people regularly it’s worth looking at because the delegate’s investment in learning the ropes will pay off more and the co-creation process will speed up over time.

I like the shared canvas approach in Mural , and the extensive template library available.

Stormz  has Workshop, Quiz and Socializer elements, and is an online collaboration tool with features that enable you to facilitate conversations, run quizzes and hold collaborative sessions such as brainstorming, design thinking, retrospectives or strategic planning workshops.

Stormz say that their tool is “Aimed at demanding facilitators that love to fine tune their sessions, the application gives unparalleled flexibility. The participants can test their knowledge, share their perspectives, co-create solutions and make collective decisions directly from their laptop, tablet or mobile phone.”

Mentimeter  allows you to create questions (such as multiple-choice questions) in their web application and participants can answer them from their mobile devices. This tool is one of my favourites because it’s so easy and effective.

The brilliant thing about Mentimeter is that you can instantly visualise everyone’s feedback and inputs and display the results live to the group. It helps your participants to feel engaged and connected, and interested in how their response compares and contrasts to what others are saying.

It works really well on mobile devices with a streamlined user experience and is much more budget-friendly than some of the other tools here.

Miro  is an online whiteboard tool designed for remote teams. It provides an entire toolkit for user story or customer journey maps, wireframing, roadmap or sprint planning, retros, and more.

Miro is designed to: “Better engage distributed and remote teams in brainstorming, processes, workshops and decision making with digital workspaces that enable asynchronous and synchronous collaboration — just as easily as if everyone were in the same room.” It certainly achieves this objective and is a great virtual facilitation tool.

SessionLab  is not a virtual facilitation delivery tool, but can help you to design your events. SessionLab’s session planner can help you plan and design more effective meetings and save time. You can reuse content   from meetings and access their library of techniques.

Stormboard provides shared online workspace for delegates to use to generate ideas, and then prioritise, organise, and refine those ideas. There are also some great tools and integrations available to make sure actions are followed up and done after the session.

Milanote is an absolutely awesome tool for virtual facilitation. Alongside Mentimeter it is hands-down my favourite. It’s intuitive, has a great free option and delegates find it super-easy to use. They can collaborate in real-time from their different remote meeting locations to create mood and vision boards, strategy and innovation whiteboards, storyboards, mind maps and much, more more. Please do check this one out as it’s such a good one!

#8 Making it smooth and seamless

Create a smooth, seamless experience without being clunky with the tech by making sure that you don’t over complicate things and bounce between too many tools, apps and platforms. Stick to your core hosting tool (such as Zoom, Teams) and introduce one or maybe two others maximum.

Delegates also need to go through a learning curve when they use any new tools, and before you know it, if you’re not careful, a big chunk of your meeting time can be taken up with people trying to figure out how to use the tech. So be clear, be creative, AND be simple, streamlined and avoid using tech for tech’s sake. That’s just gimicky and will frustrate the heck out of your delegates.

#9 Perceptions of time & concentration span

We need to be health and concentration span aware when we’re designing virtual facilitation sessions. From a sitting and screen-time perspective, an hour is ok. If you go beyond that please do build in adequate breaks. I suggest that 2-2.5 hours is a maximum duration for any single online session – and please give a short break during this after around 90 minutes.

Frequent questions, interaction and incorporating some physical movement from time-to-time increase blood flow to the decision-making area of the brain, so build these in to keep your participants engaged and focused.

#10 Making progress beyond the meeting

Making progress once the workshop is over can be a challenge at the best of times, whether the session is in person or virtual. But holding your meeting online also creates a great opportunity for you to take the next steps and work beyond the virtual session using asynchronous apps such as Trello , Basecamp , Asana , Slack , Monday , Teams and so on.

These are fantastic, and help with the communication and social continuity aspects too, as well as project progression. My favourite is definitely Trello!

If you’re interested in facilitation and developing your professional practice as a facilitator, I’d love you to come and join me in my free, private Facebook Group, Idea Time for Workshop Facilitators .

As well as a fantastic community of likeminded people, you will get access to free facilitation trainings, tools, techniques and time savers.

If you’d like to book us to deliver some professional virtual facilitation for you and your team, or would like a one-to-one virtual facilitation training and coaching session, you can find out more about what we do here , or contact me direct using the form below and I’ll get straight back to you.

Hope to hear from you in so that we can chat about all things virtual facilitation! x

5 thoughts on “ Virtual Facilitation: 10 Top Challenges & What to Do About Them ”

Always beautiful to learn from you. Hope you also had a chance to read my ebook “Mastering Facilitation; 7 Principles & 1 Law” and please share your comments. Thank you Jo

Thanks so much for the lovely mention, Jo. This is a fab article – with so many ideas and ways forward. We really need all of this right now! Thanks for all you do. Ian

Thank you very much Ian for your feedback and also for your help. I’m learning so much from your lives, YouTube and resources, practical and invaluable tips on live video and being in front of the camera. Jo

Great blog. I like the idea of post it’s on hand to catch anything off topic. Then confirming when you have completed one topic and will be starting the next.

Simple – yet impactful

Thank you so much Georgia – really appreciate the feedback and pleased there are some quick wins in there for you.

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Table of Contents

10 Advantages and Disadvantages of Virtual Meetings

Virtual meetings

Virtual meetings are a real-time and fast-growing method used in every industry to conduct business meetings, seminars, and interact with colleagues about projects, through the Internet.

Virtual meetings are as crucial as physical meetings. They are the only way to connect with your colleagues and clients when you cannot do a face-to-face meeting. 

With the rise in remote jobs and work from home culture, we increasingly turn to virtual meetings to conduct our work and deal with clients globally.

With the availability of multiple video conferences and communication tools, we can attain virtual meetings from any part of the world.

The technology has improved internet connections so that the users on the web can stay connected with all the clients across the globe.

It is useful to host a virtual meeting when you cannot meet your clients personally, as it allows you to discuss the project online and complete it within a specific timeframe. Entering your username and password is all it takes to join the virtual meeting.

Types Of Virtual Meetings For Office

• Teleconference (only audio)

Teleconferencing or conference calls are a type of virtual meeting where multiple participants connect to a common conference call bridge using a specified password to join the call. 

The teleconference is an audio-only meeting between geographically distant individuals. 

• Video conference (audio and video)

Video conferences are a type of online conferencing that allows participants to see, discuss, and exchange ideas as a group. 

• Web conference (audio, video, and content-sharing)

A web conference is an online service with which one participant can host a meeting presentation through the web.  

Users can host web conferences via desktop computers, smartphones, or tablets. It allows individuals to collaborate online and share documents or screens.

Learn more:-   Top Free Presentation Software

Advantages Of Virtual Meetings

• Saves Time and Cost

Online meetings require less cost and time compared to physical sessions. Virtual/online discussion needs a computer or smart device with a stable internet connection.

Conducting a physical meeting requires hotel accommodation costs, arrangements of facilities, travel expenses, etc., 

The attendees need to come from different locations, due to which there may be a delay in gathering all participants.  As such, a physical meeting might become more extended than a virtual meeting, as you need to wait until all the participants are fully present. 

Setting a virtual meeting saves plenty of time. By avoiding business trips and working from a specific location, you can maximise your productivity. 

Similarly, it saves time because a virtual meeting can be completed in a few hours, whereas managing actual meetings takes more time.

Therefore, an online meeting is more cost-effective and saves time than a physical meeting.  

Learn More:- How To Save Time In Daily Life⏰ ⏰  

• Easy Accessibility

The use of virtual meetings enables increased participation among a wider audience as almost anyone can easily access the meetings with an electronic device and a stable internet connection. 

A company with a large number of employees or clients can set up a virtual meet that can be easily accessed saving the need for resources like a fixed location or expenses. 

• Ease Of Sharing Information With Team Members

Discussion and sharing information about the project with clients is necessary to achieve the organisational goal. Especially when you and your client are in different parts of the world, the entire project will be at risk if the provider doesn’t handle the communication correctly.

It is necessary to create numerous copies of documents when attending physical meetings. While the use of virtual conferencing tools like Zoom, Skype, Meet, etc., makes it easier for sharing documents and information in a virtual meeting. 

This ease of sharing information allows the meeting participants to raise any issues in real-time and make changes to the documents whenever necessary. This increases the collaboration of all the team members making the meeting more fruitful. 

Learn more:-   Importance Of Team Collaboration In Workplace

• Easier to Leave 

Sometimes you might not stay full time in the meeting due to a non-relevant topic to your project. We have also experienced the frustration of sitting in a forum that is not relevant to our project. 

No matter how annoying the meeting is, you cannot stand up and quit the physical meeting in front of your colleagues. It is also challenging to make an excuse to leave the session. 

If the meeting is not relevant to your project, it is easier to go when you are in an online discussion. There is less chance of being awkward to excuse and leave the meeting.

• Increased Attendance  

The participants do not need to travel to attend the online meeting. They can attain a discussion on their own time and from anywhere. 

Whether you are sick, are in a remote location, or are caught up in urgent work, you can join a virtual meeting from anywhere. This increases audience participation as even the busiest individuals or sick employees can attend a virtual meet at least for a short period. 

Increased meeting participation means increased idea exchanges, increased collaboration, and fruitful results. 

Learn more:-   Best Attendance Management Software

• Maintain Physical Safety Of Participants 

A virtual meeting ensures the physical safety of its participants. As all participants can access the meet from a convenient location, and there are no face-to-face interactions, things like the spread of germs, traffic accidents due to running late for meetings, etc., do not happen. 

Furthermore, if a meeting goes wrong, the participants cannot engage in a fistfight in a virtual meeting. All in all, virtual meetings reduce the risk of physical injuries or diseases between participants, unlike physical meetings. 

• Set a Clear Goal 

Every individual has their own goal and specific planning when making an organisational decision. Your goal might be different from your team members. 

While discussing, you can share your idea with team members and listen to all the members’ plans to set a final goal.

Proper virtual communication lets you share your ideas and thoughts regarding any project with your supervisors and seniors.

Even while working from home or in different locations, the team members can collaborate on their entire goal through virtual communication and finally set a clear plan by considering every individual’s idea.

Learn more:- Best Software For Employee Engagement👨‍💼👨‍💼

• Motivate Team Members

It is essential to motivate your team members to boost productivity. You can provide vital guidelines to your team members through virtual meetings and encourage them to work. 

Unless the employees are motivated, they cannot properly focus on work. As a result, leaders may provide regular feedback to employees to help them improve their performance, regardless of where they work.

You can use various tools and valuable guidelines to motivate them. The team leader can have a virtual meeting individually with employees and provide the necessary feedback that can be negative or positive. 

You can be polite with employees while giving negative comments or feedback. If you are not polite, they might get panicked and cannot focus on work.  

Learn more:- How to Motivate Your Employees For Better Results💪💪

• Recording the Meeting

In the physical meeting, you need to capture everything in your mind that you listen to the presenters in real-time. You may also miss important information when not present at the meeting. 

In a virtual meeting, you have the option of recording the meeting. If you have multiple things to do while attending an appointment and cannot focus on the discussion, you can record the session and save it to see when you are done with work.

You can keep the recording safely as a file and view it whenever you want to collect any information from that discussion.

Learn more:-   9 Best Screen Recording Software To Record Your Virtual Meetings

• Involvement of the Whole Team 

The meeting can be effective only when the entire team members have involved. Most of the time, some employees remain absent in a meeting room due to sickness or other work. 

The attendees might not be able to present in time, which will also be a waste.

In a virtual meeting, there is a chance of involving every team member at the appropriate time. With advanced video conferencing tools, every employee can join discussions from any location.

It is not difficult to attend the meeting even when you are sick until there is no emergency. Thus, the virtual meeting becomes more effective with the involvement of the whole staff.

Disadvantages of Virtual Meetings

• Less face-to-face contact with clients and colleagues

Face-to-face communication is one of the most powerful tools available to humans. It promotes a healthy engagement while also building a trustworthy work environment among participants.

However, we only have virtual communication with our clients and coworkers during virtual meetings. A virtual environment, although great for time-saving, simply cannot make team members understand each other more and build more trust. 

Learn more:-   Best Ways To Build Trust With Employees🧑‍💼

• Interactions Between Participants Are Difficult

It is more difficult for all participants to take an active role when a virtual meeting, especially if the group is large. 

In private gatherings, you can talk to each other to some extent and create a reciprocal conversation.

When numerous people speak in a virtual meeting, it’s difficult to understand what they’re saying. It can make the interaction feel unnatural.

Learn More:- Tips for Establishing Effective Communication in Remote Team🤝🏿🤝🏿  

• Difficulty In Understanding Emotions

We, humans, need face-to-face contact to communicate. We use emotions, tone of voice, gestures, and facial expressions as part of our communication. 

 A virtual meeting may not give you a chance to fully express yourself and your emotions. It can also limit the level of understanding you want to get from other participants as you cannot understand their emotions and passion.

• Internet Connections Can Fail  

While working remotely, you might have a poor internet connection at your location. The internet connection may get lost while attending a meeting, and you may not get a chance to attain a complete discussion. Participants might miss a vital part of the session due to poor connection.

Moreover, individuals may also occasionally take advantage of this situation. The participants can use the excuse of an internet connection failure to excuse themselves from meetings.  

Learn More:-  How to Monitor your Employees’ Internet Usage🌐🌐

• Members of the team could be in different time zones.

It is not required for all of our company’s employees to live in the same city. If your company’s employees are dispersed across the globe, each with their time zone, you’re in for a major headache. 

You can arrange the meeting for the morning, but some participants may have to attend at midnight due to time zone differences. Attending meetings simultaneously every day can be irritating for those team members.

To address this issue, consider changing the time of the meeting every time so that everyone is treated equally.

• Difficulty In Sample Presentations

A virtual meeting only ensures audio and video. This may be ok in normal discussions. But for presentations of samples of products to the participants, it becomes inconvenient. 

The individuals in the meeting cannot give out any specific response without physically touching some samples as only video and images are not enough. Some samples need to be carefully analysed before making any decisions. 

This is one of the major drawbacks of a virtual meeting.  

• Pay for Software

To conduct virtual meetings, we need various software such as Zoom Microsoft Teams, Skype, GoToWebinar, etc. These tools come in both free and paid versions. If you want a better meeting atmosphere and more features, you need a paid version of the virtual meeting software. 

Paying for the software requires money. And if you want more features, you need to pay more. With monthly or yearly subscription renewals and other packages, paying for a good virtual meer software costs a lot. 

This leads to sometimes virtual meetings being more expensive than physical meetings.   Learn More:- How To Save More Time and Money Working Remotely💻📱🧑🏠  

• Privacy And Security Issues

The breach of privacy and security is one of the major concerns of virtual meetings. 

As the meeting participants often use their personal devices while attending virtual meetings from their homes or remote locations, any security compromise can result in a loss of sensitive private data. 

The security of meeting clients is another issue. With the use of many software for virtual meets, any security vulnerabilities or hacking of software gravely compromises the participant’s data. 

Moreover, it may become difficult to exchange confidential information in a virtual meeting as the communication channel may not be secure. Organisations need to constantly remain up-to-date on meeting security for a safe and secure virtual meeting environment.

Learn More:-  Best Data Security Practices for Remote Workers🔒🔒

• Difficult To Organise In Case Of Poor Technological Infrastructure

Facilitators may find virtual meetings difficult to organise because not everyone has technology or physical resources. You can find it difficult to go to a meeting when you are hiking in remote mountains or in a warzone where the internet has been cut off. 

• Problems Due To Lack of Technological Understanding

Many people in today’s society still don’t understand how remote connectivity, particularly virtual technology, works. Because people do not understand how to use the technology, this limits a larger acceptance of virtual meetings.

It could be a big negative for organisations or uneducated individuals by introducing new software and technology for productive virtual meetings.

Best and Easiest Online Virtual Meetings Platforms

• Calendly – Meeting Scheduling Calendly is a calendar app that allows you to schedule appointments , meetings, and events. Calendly is probably the most user-friendly scheduling tool available. Calendly encrypts everything it sends and receives, both in transit and rest.
• Zoom – Video Calling Zoom is a well-known video conferencing platform that is well-known for its user-friendliness. The free version of Zoom’s software allows registered users to host meetings with up to 100 attendees. Meeting recordings are available in the Zoom Cloud, including unlimited storage in the Enterprise package.
• Slack – Communication and File Sharing Slack is a business messaging platform that links individuals to the information they require. Slack changes the way businesses interact by bringing individuals together to work as one united team.

We can conclude that virtual meetings have both benefits and drawbacks. The question is whether the benefits of the virtual meeting offset the drawbacks it may have for your organisation. The answer may be different for each organisation. 

In short, like any other technology, a virtual meeting can make our meeting interactions efficient and fruitful, but can also inconvenience us due to scheduling, or risk our private data. In the end, however, whether or not to employ virtual meetings depends on the circumstance of an organisation.

People Also Ask (FAQ)

What is the safest online meeting platform.

Zoom is the most secure online conferencing platform that offers users a safe and secure environment. Zoom contains a host control feature and several security measures like meeting encryptions, suspension and expulsion of participants.

What is the difference between a virtual meeting and a face-to-face meeting?

A face-to-face meeting is one in which all participants are physically present at the same location. Meanwhile, a virtual meeting takes place online using video conferencing applications like Zoom, Skype, Meet, etc.

 Why are virtual meetings better than face-to-face meetings?

You can participate in virtual meetings from wherever, including your home. It saves both time and money if you participate virtually through the Internet.

Samir Luintel

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4 key distinctions between in-person and virtual presenting

Organisations and leaders are coming to realise that there are considerable upsides to virtual presenting:.

• saves time and money
• wider reach
• more participants available
• audience typically more relaxed
• easy and straightforward to record and share presentations
• reduces the increasing amount of carbon in the environment.

It is of course quite possible to be even duller when presenting online. You, like us, may well have yawned your way through dozens of virtual presentations in the last 2 months. Many worked well though.

What is the difference that makes the difference?  

Here are the 4 key distinctions in virtual presenting and we concentrate on practical solutions so you can be more agile in the way you deliver.

1.  There is less focus on performance

Even amongst very senior people we find that a key coaching issue with old world presenting is lack of confidence or imposter syndrome (thinking you are not good enough and do not deserve to be in an exalted position of authority).

Online, this confidence issue appears to be reduced. Presenters are in the comfort of their homes, and this seems to relax them. The presenter is often only available as a small window in the top right-hand corner, so a lot of people like the fact that the focus is less on them and more on the technology and the message.

There is certainly less emphasis on the performance element. Even though the audience may be large (and of course you can present to many hundreds online) they are also probably more laid back and relaxed and there is greater intimacy and less of a sense that you have to be a bigger version of yourself when presenting. There is a greater chance in fact that presenters can be more authentic in the relative informality of an online presentation.

2.  There are way more potential distractions virtually

Have you focused 100% on every presentation you have attended online? I suspect not.

There are just more potential distractions compared to sitting in an audience and listening to a presentation back in the old world. A survey from Intercall, the largest international conference call company, finds that when we occasionally zone out on conference calls and presentations, we appear to be participating in a national pastime. Here is what we are doing when we are not fully focused:

We know that multi-tasking audiences’ attention span is short. When British bank Lloyds set out to study what causes careless (and costly) household accidents, the researchers made an interesting discovery; the average adult attention span has plummeted from 12 minutes a decade ago to just 5 minutes in 2020.

So, what happens if you are planning a presentation which could have a big impact on your career, hitting a target, getting a key message across to worried and anxious employees and it is 20 minutes long? With an attention span of 5 minutes, the average audience is going to tune out 75% of the time.

The first thing you can do is reduce your content, Less is more. Remember the Power of 3 – your audience will retain three key points rather than many. We are surrounded by 3’s in branding, messaging and it is embedded deep in our culture.

Quick examples:

• Nike: ‘Just do it’
• McDonalds: ‘I’m loving it’
• L’Oréal: ‘You’re worth it’
• Three blind mice
• The Holy Trinity
• Location location location
• ‘See it, Say it, sorted’
• ‘Stay home, Protect the NHS, Save lives’.

3.  Body language has less impact so focus on your voice

Voice is more important than body language in virtual presenting.

Unless you’re standing up – a good thing sometimes – the audience only sees the top half of you. Come on, which of us has not jumped on a remote meeting half naked?

Focus on developing variety in your voice and choosing the right words that will help you achieve your outcome to persuade, motivate, or win business.

Presenting online is a bit like the difference between performing in a theatre and acting in a film or television. When you are presenting face to face the audience is seeing all of you – your body language, your gestures, your voice, and the words you choose to use to communicate your message. You can judge the ‘energy’ in the room – virtually impossible when remote.

The audience sees a smaller version of you online. Most presentations are delivered sitting down, the shot is usually of your top half and the focus is mainly on the face and your eyes and the audience may not even pick up on gestures. And of course, you do not have the eye contact, and therefore it is much tougher to pick up on visual clues from the audience.

The key to vocal impact is variety.

What do we want to project? Do we want to connect with the audience or is it important to be credible? Or both? You can adapt your voice to fit your desired outcome during any presentation.

If you want to be a credible (the experienced, knowledgeable expert) then speak like this:

• With pauses
• Quite monotone
• And go down at the end of the phrase.

If you want to connect on a human level, then speak like this:

• Lots of musicality
• Up at the end of the phrase.

4.  You have to engage more

If you don’t sustain continued meaningful involvement, your audience will retreat into that alluring observer role, or you will just lose them permanently.

So, if you want to fail here is what you do:

• Broadcast rather than interact
• Use hundreds of bulleted slides
• Speak for longer than required
• Make it all about you and your expertise

Want to succeed?

There are 3 major things you have reasonable control over if you want to keep your internal and external audience engaged throughout.

Your 3 control areas are You, The Technology and Your audience activities.

You the presenter

You need to be present when you present. You cannot just hide behind the technology.

Here are 6 controllables:

• Pre-Suasion  is what savvy communicators do before delivering a message in order to get it accepted. It was coined by Dr. Robert Cialdini and published as a book in 2016. You may remember the maxim from Sun Tzu, the military strategist:  ‘Every battle is won, before it is fought’ .

So, what can you do to pre-suade before a virtual presentation? What works?

• Send out a teaser
• Ask for contributions from your audience beforehand
• Send your purpose and agenda ahead
• Have a snappy title
• Identify key decision makers and lobby them in advance
• Get yourself into a resourceful state  by warming up. Your audience will pick up on your nerves. However, they will be energized if you are confident and relaxed. Warm up your voice beforehand. And then use it to its maximum effect.
• Look directly into the camera . Surprisingly few presenters do this. The camera lens is the equivalent of eye contact. Avoid looking at your audience or looking down at your notes or across to your slides. These behaviours can make you look shifty, nervous or that you are losing interest. Instead look at the lens.
• Use a spike.  You have 8 seconds to grab the audience’s attention at the start of any presentation. You need a quick, clear way to convey your thoughts to your audience. A spike is a sentence or phrase that gets to the heart of your presentation. For example, a mobile communications director said to an investment group: ‘50% of the world’s population have neither made nor received a phone call’. Jeremy often starts his keynotes by saying ‘presenters are made, not born’. At one of our recent leadership skills training with Sodexo, a presenter started a presentation on sustainability with ‘there are 70 harvests left in the world’. Memorable!
• Use humour  and surprise your audience. Here is how my frieNeil Mullarkey did it in his latest Corona video:  Business Not As Usual
• Control time  – we suggest virtual presentations need to be no longer than 20 minutes. Start on time, allocate specific time for all activities and finish as agreed.

The old-style webinars in which you start speaking, have no engagement and finish your soliloquy an hour later are dead in the water. If you are still delivering these – stop immediately.

You have great platforms to choose from now. Maybe you can decide which to use, or perhaps they are mandated by your organisation.

Get to know the technology. Otherwise you’ll fall into the trap of either blaming it if things go wrong or you’ll miss out on simple ways to use technology to engage every audience.

Get the basics right first:

• Buy a decent webcam if you need to
• Consider an audio or Wi-Fi upgrade
• Make sure you are well light
• Ensure your camera is at eye level
• Reduce clutter behind you
• Silence your pop ups

Online, if the technology fails, your whole presentation can fail. If possible, get a colleague or technical expert to help. Especially if there are large numbers on the presentation.

Always do a technical run through, as well as practise your presentation.

Finally, when setting up your meeting, select the “Mute upon entry” option. This makes sure that your participants join with their sound off, so you don’t get background noise that can disrupt the flow of your presentation.

As with many new things, technology can be daunting to start with. You can get can up to speed and master these challenges quickly.

Engage throughout. The days of long, boring webinar broadcasts are increasingly consigned to the dustbin of virtual presentation history.

Engage in the first 2 minutes and never go longer than 5 minutes without giving your audience another activity.

So how do you make your presentations interactive and engaging?

• Run polls and create immediate word clouds showing audience thoughts or ideas
• Ask questions and get responses in the chat area
• Break out into groups and brainstorm options or solve problems
• Run a quiz and gamify your sessions
• Create a virtual hot seat

I strongly recommend  Mentimeter . This software builds interactive virtual presentations to elicit curiosity, increases the fun quotient and informs using the power of the audience.

You need to encourage active and individual engagement. Why?

Research shows that a person appearing to have a heart attack on the underground or subway is less likely to get help the more people there are on the train. This phenomenon is known as diffusion of responsibility. If everyone is responsible, then no one feels responsible. Avoid this in your presentation by giving people tasks that they can actively engage in so there is nowhere to hide.

For example, define a problem that can be solved quickly, assign people to groups, emphasise a task time limit and tell them you will take ideas from each group. This will encourage real focus and responsibility.

So, in summary, 4 key distinctions with virtual presenting:

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Socialization in Online Learning

Online courses have become an increasingly common way for students to access course content. They present both unique opportunities and challenges, particularly in relation to student socialization. For an overview of the opportunities and challenges of transitioning a course from a face-to-face to online context, the reader is referred to this  brief article .

The concept of socialization can be used in a number of ways. But here, it refers to the process by which individuals establish connections with others and adopt the standards and values of society needed for fruitful social interactions (Irwin and Berge 2006; Maccoby, 2008). The information below addresses the opportunities, challenges, and best practices related to student socialization in online courses.

Opportunities in online learning

Online classes undeniably offer unique opportunities to students. They afford educational access to students who otherwise would not be able to take desired or required courses due to schedule, distance, or other factors. Online courses also provide a chance for more students to meaningfully participate in, and engage with, course discussion and activities. For example, students who are less likely to speak up in class may be more forthcoming in online forums, and online peer-review may be less intimidating for female students compared to face-to-face peer review (Moneypenny et al., 2018).

Both online and on campus classrooms can be communities where every student is able to productively engage with one another in an environment where well-structured learning successfully refines the knowledge of the participants (Abercrombie, 1979). A big difference between “communities of learning” and some traditional forms of education has to do with varying perspectives on who holds knowledge in the classroom. Traditionally, the emphasis has been on individual knowledge and performance, with the expectation that students will acquire the same body of knowledge at the same time (Bielaczye and Collins, 1999). In a community of learning, however, it is not necessary for each individual to assimilate everything that the learning community knows; instead, everyone knows who has the relevant expertise to address any given problem (Bielaczye and Collins, 1999). Research indicates that students participating in collaborative learning tend to perform better than those completing independent work (Means et al., 2010) because peers serve as an additional learning resource by sharing personal knowledge in discussion. Sharing amongst peers may facilitate the adoption of multiple perspectives on task completion or subject matter within the class (Weinberger et al., 2007). Prioritizing community building in the design of online courses has the potential to improve both student experience and learning outcomes.

Challenges of socialization in the online learning setting

Despite the advantages of collaborative learning, online learners can experience frustration associated with online learning experiences. Capdeferro and Romero (2012) found that students’ frustration in online collaborative learning experiences adversely affected their emotions and learning outcomes. Student attitude was a significant predictor of frustration. For example, students who join an online collaborative learning environment with a negative view of group work can be apathetic or resistant to it, experiencing a higher level of frustration. Potential barriers to student learning and socialization in the online setting include: time lapses between interactions, lack of clear communication norms, the absence of visual auditory conversation cues, and a perceived imbalance in commitment, responsibility, and/or effort amongst members of a working group (Irwin and Berge, 2006; Capdeferro and Romero, 2012). Transitioning students from sharing and explaining information to building knowledge, which may include more challenging ways of thinking or pressing for deeper understanding, can be difficult in online classes (Wallace, 2003). Additionally, while work has been done to conceptualize and understand the social interactions and limitations of online learning, more work is required to connect these concepts to subject-specific learning (Wallace, 2003). For example, different challenges may exist for an online course in philosophy versus biology and require different strategies to mitigate them.

Mitigation and best practices

Diversity can exist in what appear to be unlikely places, such as online classrooms and very small cohorts of students. Consequently, freshmen taking online courses can interact with perspectives unlike their own. The key to success is creating an environment where those interactions successfully occur. Several researchers have highlighted the role of the instructor of online courses as critical for fostering an environment where everyone has a voice and mitigating the limitations of online courses (Irwin and Berge, 2006; Wallace, 2003). By introducing thoughtful questions, mediating discussions, facilitating student-student interaction, and encouraging participation by all students, instructors can create a platform for the exchange of differing ideas and expanding perspectives. Good pedagogy, leading to positive online learning experiences, can impact students’ attitudes, resulting in greater willingness to adjust expectations and engage in online learning (Irwin and Berge, 2006).

Developing a sense of social presence and community can be important for student satisfaction and learning in online settings (Wallace, 2003). One specific way to begin establishing a community of learning and idea exchange in online classes is through introductory forums, welcome discussions, or personalized homepages. As the course instructor invites students to introduce themselves, share their background, and verbalize their goals in the course at the beginning of the semester, students may be better able to establish rapport, trust, tone, expectations, and etiquette in the group (Xie and Ke, 2011; Delahunty, 2012; Brookfield and Preskill, 2012). The instructor can also participate, which allows students to get to know the instructor as well as see expected behaviors and etiquette modelled (Hulett, 2019). Similarly, one study found that student blogging is an effective way to increase emotional connections between students online (Lee and Bonk, 2016).

Once a community of learning has been established, classroom discussions can draw attention to greater diversity of viewpoints and help students learn how to formulate and critique arguments, distinguish fact from opinion, distinguish assertion from evidence, judge the relationship between assertion and evidence, organize thoughts, and more (see  Discussions that Teach ). While the specific mechanisms may differ depending on context, effective discussion-based teaching—whether online or face-to-face—employ four principles:  research  (continuous evaluation of the effectiveness of teaching strategies and adjusting as needed),  responsiveness  (particularly instructor responsiveness to student concerns),  respect  (acknowledging each student as a real, distinct individual while recognizing appropriate boundaries), and  relationships  (creating ways for students to get to know the instructor and vice-versa). Brookfield and Preskill (2012) provide detail on applying these principles in the online classroom.

Summary and conclusions

Online classrooms present both unique opportunities and challenges to instructors and students. Overall, the literature emphasizes that the instructor is critical for encouraging socialization and a sense of community in online learners. Facilitating effective discussion is a vital pathway to socialization, whether in a physical classroom or online.

References:

Abercrombie, M. L. J. (1979).  Aims and techniques of group teaching . Guilford: Society for Research into Higher Education.

Bielaczyc, K., & Collins, A. (1999). Learning communities in classrooms: A reconceptualization of educational practice. In Reigeluth, C. M. (ed.),  Instructional design theories and models, Volume II.  Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Brookfield, S. D., & Preskill, S. (2012). Discussion as a way of teaching: Tools and techniques for democratic classrooms. San Francisco: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Capdeferro, N., & Romero, M. (2012). Are online learners frustrated with collaborative learning experiences?  The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 13 (2): 26-44.

Delahunty, J. (2012). “Who am I?”: Exploring identity in online discussion forums.  International Journal of Educational Research, 53 , 407-420.

Irwin, C. & Berge, Z. (2006). Socialization in the online classroom.  E-Journal of Instructional Science and Technology, 9 (1) .  Retrieved from  https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ846714.pdf

Hulett, K. H. (2019). Community from a distance: Building a sense of belonging in an online classroom.  The Scholarly Teacher: Applying Evidence-Based Strategies to Enrich Student Learning blog.  Retrieved from  https://www.scholarlyteacher.com/blog/community-from-a-distance-building-a-sense-of-belonging-in-an-online-classroom

Lee, J., &Bonk, C. J. (2016). Social network analysis of peer relationship and online interactions in a blended class using blogs.  The Internet and Higher Education, 28 , 35-44.

Maccoby, E. E. (2008). Historical overview of socialisation: research and theory. In J. E. Grusec & P. D. Hastings (eds.),  Handbook of socialization: Theory and research , 13-41. New York: The Guildford Press.

Means, B., Toyama, Y., Murphy, R., Bakia, M., & Jones, K. (2010).  Evaluation of evidence-based practices in online learning: A meta-analysis and review of online learning studies . Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Education.

Moneypenny, D., Evans, M., &  Kraha, A. (2018). Student perceptions of and attitudes toward peer review.  American Journal of Distance Education 32  (4), 236-247.

Wallace, R. M. (2003). Online learning in higher education: A review of research on interactions among teachers and students.  Education, Communication & Information ,  3 (2), 241-280. Online available  here . 

Weinberger, A., Stegmann, K., & Fisher, F. (2007). Knowledge convergence in collaborative learning: Concepts and assessment.  Learning and Instruction, 17,  146-426.

Xie, K., & Ke, F. (2011). The role of students’ motivation in peer-moderated asynchronous online discussions.  British Journal of Education Technology, 42 (6), 916-930.

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2024 U.S. Banking Industry Outlook Survey

Future-proofing banking: The enterprise transformation imperative

"When in doubt, choose change"

U.S. banks face a difficult growth environment due to compounding macro- and microeconomic headwinds, geopolitical instability, intensifying regulatory scrutiny, and other near-term challenges putting pressures on earnings. At this critical juncture, the KPMG national banking practice sees significant opportunity for banks to choose change—embark on an accelerated journey of enterprise-wide transformation.

The U.S. Banking Industry Outlook Survey captures the challenges and opportunities faced by the banking sector amidst economic, regulatory, and technological disruptions, from 200 banking executives surveyed on their views on current industry trends and topics in March 2024.

Download the Paper

Explore the 2024 Banking Industry Survey results

Discover insights on the trends that are shaping the industry's present and future and key takeaways banking executives should consider.

Key Insights

are confident in their banks’ growth prospects

of respondents believe profitability will grow inorganically

are making significant strategic adjustments in response to geopolitical uncertainty

of CEOs respondents believe profitability will growth through cost transformation

say GenAI is an integral part of their institution’s long-term vision and strategy

think regulatory supervision and enforcement in the area of cyber risk will increase

The path to growth for banks is accelerating their enterprise transformation to be the bank of the future. Modern technology platforms are the foundation, allowing banks to leverage the latest technologies to enhance operational efficiency, customer retention and attraction, and resilience through the next wave of challenges.

Peter Torrente

US Sector Leader, Banking and Capital Markets, KPMG LLP

Growth expected despite compound volatility

The industry has been facing a confluence of pressure on earnings: high interest rates, low stock prices, credit uncertainty, a slow M&A market, geopolitical conflicts disrupting world markets, unprecedented regulatory scrutiny, and impending regulatory uncertainty following the U.S. presidential election.

Yet, there are signs of a brighter future ahead, especially among larger, growing banking institutions. Our survey finds bank executives, as a whole, relatively confident in the growth outlook of the banking sector.

How confident are you in the growth prospects of your organization over the coming year?

Economic and geopolitical risks persist

Which of the following risks poses the greatest threat to your bank's growth over the next 3 years? (select top 3)

Refining the multichannel customer experience

What digital channels are being prioritized for investment in 2024? (select all that apply)

Establishing security, privacy and trust

Unlocking the power of GenAI

The banking sector recognizes the extraordinary promise of GenAI in shaping their future strategies and remaining competitive. As a general trend, banks have stopped seeing GenAI a proof of concept and started seeing it as a capability.

Many banks are actively exploring and implementing GenAI for a diverse range of use cases, with some of the most common applications directly correlated to current top agenda items for industry—cybersecurity (67 percent), fraud (51 percent) and compliance and risk (41 percent). As budgets and resources to fight cybercrime, protect data and customers, and comply with intensifying regulatory requirements have skyrocketed, banks executives are looking to GenAI as a potential solution.

Which active use cases for Gen AI does your organization have in pilot or production phases?

Steps you can take to establish a standout ESG M&A due diligence program:

Modernizing the payments ecosystem

How does your organization generally view the ISO 20022 Compliance Mandate?

Regulatory intensity dominates resources and attention

How will regulatory supervision and enforcement activity change in the following areas over the next 12 months?

How KPMG can help

Only future-ready banks will thrive in 2024 and beyond. The KPMG national banking practice sees today’s environment of converging economic and industry challenges and disruptions as a catalyst for change—a not-to-be-missed chance to take advantage of the current and emerging opportunities that surround us.

KPMG can help banks navigate the evolving banking landscape, with deep industry expertise, fresh thinking, and leading-edge tools and methodologies.

Meet our team

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Shaking up the competitive landscape: Q1'24 M&A trends in financial services

Q1'24 FS M&A sees deal volume falling due to concerns about interest rates, inflation, and politics, Basel III, interest rates, and politics, steering firms towards strategic reassessment.

Ten Key Regulatory Challenges of 2024

Strengthen the cards you hold

Top of mind banking and capital markets issues

What’s top of mind for banks? Regulatory updates, the credit market environment, and digital transformation.

Ten Key Regulatory Challenges of 2024: Mid-year Look Forward

Putting the cards on the table

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Volume 36, Issue 3, 2024

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Where is Harry Maguire? Why Man Utd star isn't at Euro 2024 after England snub

Harry Maguire says that he is "absolutely gutted" not to be making the trip to Germany for the Euros, having been almost ever-present at international competitions under England boss Gareth Southgate

• 10:26, 14 Jul 2024

Harry Maguire has been left out of Gareth Southgate's Euro 2024 squad after failing to recover from a calf injury in time.

31-year-old Maguire has been almost ever-present in Southgate's England squad since the player-turned-manager took the reigns back in 2016, having appeared at the World Cup in 2022 and 2018, as well as the Euro side which made the finals in 2021 (after the 2020 competition was postponed through Covid). The Manchester United centre-half has made 63 appearances for his country at senior level so far and is "absolutely gutted" to be missing this summer's tournament in Germany.

A muscle issue which struck during training with the Red Devils in April has left Maguire sidelined ever since, meaning he missed United's FA Cup final victory over Manchester City in May. And prolonged problems mean that the faithful defender would not be available for selection as the tournament gets underway this week.

Addressing his absence, Maguire said: "I am devastated not to have been selected to play for England at the Euros this summer. Despite my best efforts, I have not been able to overcome an injury to my calf. Maybe I pushed myself too hard, to try and make it.

"Simply, I am absolutely gutted. For me, representing England is the highest honour. It means everything to me. If I can’t help the team as a player, I will support them as a fan – along with the rest of the country. Go and win it, boys. Next, I will return to the supervision of the Manchester United medical team in order to prepare for next season."

Maguire joined a list of seven players who have been cut from Southgate's squad for the Euros, alongside Jarrad Branthwaite, Curtis Jones, Jack Grealish and James Maddison. Speaking on his selections for the tournament, Southgate said: " Harry has made some progress but it has been complicated and we definitely wouldn't have had him in the group stages.

"There were too many hurdles to get through without really being clear of where we might get to. Given that we haven't got a clean bill of health across the rest of the backline as well, the decision became that we needed cover and players that are fit and ready to go from the start.

"It was another really difficult call. You know how I feel about Harry Maguire and what he has done for England and what he has done for me as a manager." Maguire enjoyed a decent 2023/24 campaign with Manchester United - making 31 appearances across all competitions. He would help Erik Ten Hag's side reach the FA Cup final against bitter rivals in Manchester City, and while United would run out 2-1 winners Maguire would be absent due to his aforementioned injury.

Maguire was also a part of the Euro 2020 England squad which would make it all the way to the final of the tournament, scoring in a 4-0 quarter-final victory over Ukraine and starting in the final against Italy. The game would end in penalties after a 1-1 scoreline could not be separated.

And while Maguire would bury his spot-kick against Gianluigi Donnarumma, the Three Lions were sent home empty-handed after Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka missed their high-pressure one-on-ones. Germany and Scotland kick off Euro 2024 at 7pm on Friday from the Allianz Arena. England's first game comes against Serbia at 8pm on Sunday (June 16), with Denmark and Slovenia also in their group.

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The Three Lions are through to the final of the Euro 2024 tournament and you can get your hands on the brand new Nike home and away kits.

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Current Affairs: Passage of the Day - 15 July 2024 | Current Affairs: Daily, Weekly & Monthly - CLAT PDF Download

Directions: Read the passage carefully and answer the questions that follow. NITI Aayog, on Sunday, announced the launch of the GearShift challenge as part of the e-FAST India initiative. The hackathon is in collaboration with Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Bangalore, Smart Freight Centre India, CALSTART/Drive to Zero, and WRI India. It "will help foster innovative business models for the adoption of zero-emission trucks (ZETs) in India, and also address the nation's pressing economic and environmental challenges," NITI Aayog said. As part of the hackathon, students, transport service practitioners, academics, and researchers will develop innovative business models that address financial, technical, and operational challenges in the adoption of electric trucks. In the first round, teams will submit their initial business models addressing a specific barrier -- technical, operational, or financial -- that is supported by high-level strategies and research. Those shortlisted will then present detailed business models with an implementation roadmap, backed by both primary and secondary research. The proposals will be mentored by industry leaders to ensure practical and impactful solutions, NITI Aayog said. "India's freight sector is vital to the economy, ensuring the smooth delivery of goods to over 1.4 billion people. With road freight accounting for a staggering 55 per cent of India's annual diesel consumption and nearly 40 per cent of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions from road transport, there is an urgent need to transition to more sustainable solutions," the apex public policy think tank said. It noted that the "electrification of freight transportation is a key priority, as electric trucks offer a transformative opportunity to reduce emissions, improve air quality, and enhance energy security." "The GearShift Challenge marks a pivotal move towards sustainable freight transportation in India," NITI Aayog said. The hackathon will tap into the creativity and expertise of participants, and help generate practical solutions that will accelerate the adoption of zero-emission trucks. It will both benefit the economy and the environment. [Excerpt from Economic Times “NITI Aayog Launches Hackathon for Zero-Emission Trucks” Dated 15/07/24]

Q1: What is the primary aim of the NITI GearShift Challenge? (a) To promote the use of zero-emission trucks (ZETs) in India (b) To develop new diesel engines for trucks (c) To increase the number of petrol stations in India (d) To create new public transportation systems

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