Your presentation is running out of time. How can you maintain control without sacrificing quality?

I once sat through a presentation in which the speaker had too many slides for the time allotted. He got halfway through his deck and began speed-talking through slides and then skipping them altogether. It was annoying as an audience member because the information he was skipping looked fascinating. It also left me with the impression that he was winging it which is a disservice to the audience. I strongly believe in the "power of three." When outlining your presentation, try to condense and prioritize your main points into three sections (or chapters). Keep those points tight and focused. Practice your delivery. Add or delete content where appropriate. Practice again.

Clarify the top take-aways….summarize with simplicity. Have someone else give you visual cues for time remaining so you can monitor effectively. Don’t rush through content as it prevents retention of your message. Be pro-active: Practice! This helps you calculate timing per slide and deliver with consistency. Manage your slide volume by starting preparation with your conclusions and take aways in outline form versus creating your slide sequences based on building out the deck. Build your presentation from your conclusions to support the key-takeaways. This ensures minimization of unnecessary information that can lead to you going over time.

“The art of communication is the language of leadership.” – James Humes I always prepare a few impactful rhetorical questions and striking facts ahead of time, ensuring I can quickly engage my audience and maintain their interest throughout the presentation.

A text-dense or complex visual can become a time-consuming "rabbit hole of explanation" — compelling a speaker to dive too deeply or attempt to cover everything. In contrast, simple, clear visuals offer a time-pressed speaker the flexibility to go into the right amount of detail and the ability to condense information on the fly.

When giving a presentation, I run through it beforehand several times with my phone timer. If I'm given an hour to talk, I plan for 45-50 minutes of content. I watch the time markers of each section of my presentation. If I run overtime, I start looking for ways to "trim the fat" in my deck. I am mindful that I'm talking to humans. They have a lot on their minds, limited attention spans, and crave simplicity. And above all, they appreciate concise presentations with a chance for Q&A.

Be plain and explicit. It is easy for your audience to be distracted when it is almost time. This is mostly true if you have the unfortunate privilege of delivery a presentation close to EOD on a Friday. What can help is just saying "Hello, everyone. I know it is a Friday and we're all in a hurry to go home or go to a pub right after to get the weekend started great. But if you bear with me for just 5 minutes more, we can put this behind us so we don't need to take more of your time next Friday."

Time management starts way before you give your presentation. It starts in the planning of your presentation. Plan your presentation to fall in five minute segments, each with clear objectives. Time these out ahead of time as you practice it over and over and over, allowing for extra space for audience reaction, etc. Then decide which segments can be dropped if you run out of time. Always know where you need to be at every segment. I always know that at ten minutes before the end I need to be starting my closing segment - no matter what - because I have to do my power close. Always better to plan your speech to fall short of your time, to allow time to relax and add some extra thoughts.