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Recently, I attended a presentation by a smart, experienced professional whose goal was to provide an informative overview of his area of expertise to his colleagues. Unfortunately, he did not succeed in communicating his message effectively to the audience. How he prepared and delivered his PowerPoint slides interfered with his ability to share information with the audience.

What did he do wrong? First of all, the slides were crowded and hard to read. Also, instead of making eye contact with the audience, he spoke to the slides on the screen or buried his eyes in his notes, which he read from almost verbatim. Finally, he stood in front of the projector light so we could see his silhouette against the screen instead of the words on his slides.

This was not the first presentation he had ever delivered. His mistakes had been made permanent by years of practice, which shows that practice doesn’t make perfect, it makes permanent – so you have to practice the right things in the right way in order to be effective.

Here are 7 tips for incorporating a PowerPoint presentation smoothly into your speech (and they also apply if you’re using Apple’s Keynote presentation):

1. Speak to the audience, not to the screen; turn your body so you face the audience.

2. If you need to look at your slides to help you stay on track, position your laptop as a “confidence monitor” so you can see the slides on your laptop screen while still facing the audience.

3. Stand to the side of the screen so you don’t block it. And use a remote control so you can advance your slides without having to be tied to the laptop.

4. Make sure your slides are legible from the back of the room. Avoid crowding your slides with too many words or images and make sure the font size is large enough. Also be sure that there is enough contrast so that the font color can be easily seen against the slide background. If you find yourself saying to the audience, “I know you can’t read this,” you’re in trouble. And have each slide focused on a message, rather than just a data dump of everything you know about the topic.

5. Be mindful about where your eyes are looking and be sure to make eye contact with all sections of the audience.

6. Don’t write out your entire presentation and read it word for word; you will bore the audience. If you try to memorize every word, you will be stuck in your head, worried about forgetting a word, instead of focused on the audience. And if you do forget a word, it will be difficult to find it amid the pages of your memorized script.

7. To use notes effectively, create a one-page outline of key phrases in large font so you can quickly glance at it and find your place. Tape or staple it to heavy cardstock paper so you can easily hold it with one hand or keep it on the lectern. The heavy paper will not flap around as you handle it and you will be less likely to fold and crumple it if you’re nervous. And if you place it on a lectern, it’s less likely to blow away.

The next time you have to incorporate a PowerPoint presentation into your speech, refer to these 7 tips. Effective slide creation and delivery can support your message and help you successfully communicate to the audience.

Imagine a world without paper. Although we have things like email to communicate with people across the globe, paper has a huge part to play in the life of everyone. Whether you are writing the shopping list, drafting that all important business proposal or printing out some work done on your computer, paper has a huge functionality, without which we would struggle to satisfactorily live our lives.

When at work you will most likely be surrounded by paperwork all over desks which can look unsightly and disorganised. Messy desks are the most common reason for important documentation getting lost, so in any form of business it is vital that you are organised and keep all paperwork secure and together.

The most popular sized sheet of paper is A4, so an A4 box could be the perfect solution for keeping things like invoices, letters and bills. Your box need not be black as a variety of colours are usually available which can liven up a dour looking office. You could even colour coordinate your A4 boxes so that you can instantly recognise where a particular batch of paperwork is. Most boxes will also come supplied with a plastic sheet or strip of paper on the side so that you can note what the contents are, especially useful for locating documentation quickly.

If you have a batch of information that you need to show to a potential client or business partner, then presentation binders offer the best way of guiding them through your work. You can also choose the capacity of your binder, the more capacity you have, the bigger the amount of paper you can store in it.

Recognition within the work place also has an important part to play so that staff can easily be differentiated. A badge holder can help you identify a staff members name and job title.

So you’re a recent college graduate seeking your first full time job. As such, are you willing to accept any salary that a company offers you? You’re probably excited just to be offered a job and don’t want to rock the boat, right? I bet you’re thinking to yourself that you’re in no position to negotiate a salary. Well, you’re wrong.

Most people are too afraid to negotiate their salaries and while you may feel that it won’t affect you right now (you’re just happy to have a job offer, especially in the current state of the economy), not negotiating your salary can impact your salaries in future years. Having worked alongside hundreds of graduate job seekers the most common response I get as to why a new graduate did not negotiate their salary is because they were afraid the employer might take their job offer away. I can tell you that this cannot be further from the truth. The hiring process is a long and time consuming process (also a costly process – think about how many hours go into the selection process), and a company is not going to take back their job offer because you want to negotiate your job salary. In fact, employers actually expect to negotiate salaries and as such often offer lower salaries than what they can pay for the role.

My advice is simple. Don’t wait until you have been in the job for 1 to 2 years before you ask for a pay rise. Negotiate your job offer. You have nothing to lose!

Researching is the key to negotiating:

We all want to be paid as much money as possible. This goes without saying. However, the key to negotiating is to present a valid case as to why you deserve a higher salary. Before you begin your negotiation you need to know your market value. What is the market rate for your type of position? Using online salary tools is a great way to find out what other graduates in similar roles and similar geographic areas are getting paid. This is important as comparing your salary as someone who may live in a large city to a person living in a remote area will be different. In addition to using salary tools, use your own networks, speak with people within the industry, contact your career services office at your university and search forums and blogs.

When the time comes to begin the negotiations, be confident and be prepared to justify your worth. Back up your negotiation with examples. Most importantly, just be yourself. Remember that the interview process is not just about the hiring manager finding out if you’re a good fit for their organization, but it is also about finding out if the company is a good fit for you.

Negotiating can be an uncomfortable and frightening experience, but once it’s over and you have secured a higher salary you will be smiling all the way to the bank!