Why You Shouldn’t End Your Talk With a Question-and-Answer

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As seen in Inc. 

Move your Q&A to get more interaction and end your talk with a bang

You’re on stage delivering a great talk. You’ve practiced the presentation for weeks, perfected your delivery over years, and researched the topic your whole life. The audience is following your every gesture, gasping with surprise at revelations, and laughing in delight at your jokes. You have them in the palm of your hand. Then the talk ends with a whimper.

Instead of walking out on a wave of applause, your presentation ends with a standard question-and-answer session. While some questions add depth to your points, others seem to be off base. While you politely answer each question, you see the audience getting restless, shifting in their seats, checking their phones. As you finish the last answer, and no one raises a hand for another question, the session ends in awkward silence. You walk out to the sound of people shuffling out of the auditorium.

What if you could end your talk on a high note and make your talk more interactive at the same time? Instead of following the traditional talk with a Q&A at the end, here is a modest proposal to shake things up for your next talk.

Put your Q&A at the beginning.

Who says you have to end with questions? Have people submit questions before the talk is given and then gear the presentation to hit on the points of most interest.

Take a timeout in the middle.

Rather than making your talk speaker focused, make it more audience focused. Open up your talk to questions halfway through. This is a great way to check for understanding in your audience and get them more engaged. The questions can also guide the remainder of your presentation.

Make the Q&A the penultimate act.

Instead of ending with the Q&A, do what bestselling author and keynote speaker Dan Pink does. Pink will do his standard 45-minute presentation, then take questions from the audience, and end with a few more minutes of presentation after the Q&A. He found by adding a wrap up after the Q&A, he can end the talk on a high note.

Use a strong moderator.

Instead of fielding the questions yourself, get a little help from a friend. A strong moderator can add depth to the questions, keep the discussion on track, and move things along at a good clip. Your audience will stay engaged and people will leave feeling they got a little something extra.

So the next time you plan to give a talk, think about how you want to handle questions. Shake it up, end your talk on a high note, and keep people buzzing about your ideas long after you’ve left the room.