Oral Progress Report, Collaborative
Context for an Oral Progress Report
If you have been asked to deliver an oral report on a team's progress on a complex project
to your peers, and you have the option of complementing your presentation with a slide
presentation or other visual aids, pay special attention to these points:
 involve all team members in the presentation's creation and delivery
 ensure that your visual material (the presentation slides and screenshots of your work
and major points, for example) is readable and effective
 deliver your presentation with polish and professionalism.
Development and Participation
1. Each team member should participate in the entire process of creating the oral
report: drafting, revising, and delivering.
2. Follow the basic principles of effective oral communication (see page 590) as you
develop the content of your report.
3. Once you have outlined the content that you want to present, coordinate the sections
of your presentation and rehearse your delivery.
4. Each component of your report—introduction, presentation of key points, and
conclusion, for example—should be well integrated with smooth transitions
between speakers.
Visuals
5. Visual and verbal elements should complement one another.
6. Your presentation slides should illustrate the key points of your presentation rather
than being a script. Don't simply read what you project on screen. You may choose
to provide your audience with a slide outline, but make it available after your
presentation, not before, so that your audience will be attentive and not just read
your notes while you deliver your presentation. (See the figure below for a
screenshot of the print dialogue box in PowerPoint that allows you to customize a
slide printing, and in the Thomson Handbook, see page 592 for a sample.) It is also
possible to print out single slides
with personal notes beneath each
one, to prompt you during your
presentation (choose "Notes
Pages" from the "Print what:"
drop-down box on the Print
dialogue box in PowerPoint). Your
notes can include prompts for
encouraging audience interaction,
for example, as shown on page
596.
Figure. You can print multiple PowerPoint
slides per page from the Print dialogue box.
7. Your presentation slides should be both rhetorically and visually effective. You
should test their appearance when projected under lighting conditions similar to
those at the presentation site. Use large sizes of easily readable fonts, and make sure
the contrast between the background and the font color is high so that words can be
read from a distance.
Polish and Professionalism
8. Show polish and professionalism by rehearsing your presentation and sticking to the
time allotted. (One team member should be specifically in charge of keeping track
of time during the presentation.)
9. Be aware of any ambient noise that may prevent people from hearing you. Test
microphones in advance. Before your presentation, have a team member sit in the
back of the audience to see if your voices can be heard.
10. The presentation room's architecture may make it difficult for some people to see
speakers or slides, so consider where you place yourselves and the screen.
11. Speaking slowly and making eye contact are important components of an effective
presentation. Make eye contact with people in your audience, not with the
presentation slides! (The impulse to talk at your slides rather than to the audience is
one you should never follow.)
12. Do not read the content of your slides to the audience. Presume that they will read
them themselves and that you can spend your time filling in details, elaborating, and
providing examples. Nothing will be more boring for your audience than hearing
you read presentation slides with your back turned to them. If you have to look at
the screen to check your progress and to help direct the attention of the audience,
try to position yourself so that you, the screen, and the audience form a triangle.
Never turn your back to your audience.