Are you tethered to your PowerPoint presentation?  Do you keep going back to the laptop to advance to the next slide?  Not sure which slide is coming up next?  It doesn't have to be this way.  You can move around the room and make contact with your audience.  You can engage them without having to rush back to the laptop.  You can know which slide is coming up next.  Freedom is within your grasp.

Get yourself a remote to advance your slides.  It doesn't have to be super fancy.  You need to be able to move onto the next slide, move back to the previous slide, and blank out the screen.  Having a laser pointer is a wonderful added bonus as you will be able to move away from the projection screen.  Get a remote that feels comfortable as you may be holding it for some time.  Once you get a remote, make sure to practice with it.

Turn on the Presenter View in PowerPoint.  When PowerPoint is in Presenter View, it will show your slides just like it did before on the projection screen.  Your laptop though will now show you the upcoming slides and your notes for the current slide.  Imagine how liberating this is.  Your laptop is facing you, giving you silent cues, and all your audience can see is the projected slide.  When you use Presenter View, you no longer need to look back at the projection screen.

PowerPoint's Presenter View is a topic in itself.  I have created an eBook entitled "PowerPoint Presenter View - Untethering Yourself from the Grasp of PowerPoint".  The eBook details how to get started with Presenter View, how to customize it, and how to use it most effectively.  More details on the eBook here.

Being able to move freely about the room and engage your audience without being hindered by PowerPoint is liberating.  I share many more of these techniques with my coaching clients.