Episode #87: Giving Presentations: It Is Harder Than It Looks Folks

Senior leaders in Japan often ask a quiet but costly question: “Why do our presentations feel flat even when the content is strong?” The uncomfortable truth is that great presenting is not automatic—not even for professional actors. It’s a trained, multi-skill discipline that most businesspeople in Japan have never been properly taught.

When you coach presenters or present regularly, your sense of difficulty can get dulled. You’re immersed, practiced, and used to juggling multiple performance demands at once. So it’s easy to forget how cognitively heavy presenting is for most people—especially in a second language.

In a recent Japanese-language video shoot for our core courses, this reality snapped into focus. I shoot videos almost every day in English, but producing the same content in Japanese raises a different level of challenge: accent, phrasing precision, and the far higher expectation of grammatical perfection in Japanese delivery. That’s why we chose a native Japanese actor for the role.

Mini-summary: Expertise can numb our memory of difficulty. Presenting—especially in Japanese—demands far more simultaneous control than most people realize.

Watching a professional actor work from a teleprompter was eye-opening. Teleprompter reading is a serious skill. It requires intense concentration, drains energy quickly, and explains why newscasters rotate speakers or cut away to visuals with voiceover. With repetition, the actor improved fast.

But something critical was missing: the ability to deliver the script and smile naturally, use congruent facial expressions, and gesture with meaning while the words raced past.

Presenters must do more than speak. At the same time, they:

• engage the audience with steady eye connection,

• read reactions for agreement or resistance,

• adjust facial expression to match meaning,

• reinforce intent with purposeful gesture.

These are “multi-track” leadership behaviors, not just performance habits—and they don’t develop automatically in Japan’s acting culture.

Mini-summary: Acting in Japan often emphasizes correct delivery. Presenting requires additional layers—audience connection and congruent nonverbal leadership.

When evidence is unclear, presenters need a quizzical expression and a tone that signals real uncertainty. When certainty is high, slow confident nods, stronger vocal tone, and direct eye power create trust.

Credibility isn’t a single action. It’s the combined effect of:

• words,

• vocal tone,

• facial expression,

• gesture,

• posture,

• eye connection.

When these align, the audience feels certainty and clarity—not just information.

Mini-summary: Audiences believe alignment, not words alone. Congruent nonverbal delivery is a credibility engine.

Many people quote Albert Mehrabian’s 7–38–55 ratio as if it means “words barely matter.” That’s not what he found.

His point was about incongruence:
when what you say conflicts with how you say it, only a small fraction of your verbal meaning gets through. The audience is pulled toward voice and body language instead.

That was our actor’s issue. The words were fine, but the face, gestures, and body language didn’t support them. Coaching fixed this by teaching him to make nonverbal communication serve the script.

Mini-summary: Mehrabian is about mismatch. If delivery and message don’t align, your words lose impact.

Here’s the harder cultural reality: the baseline for professional presentation in Japan is often low. Many people—even skilled professionals—quietly assume that being average on stage is normal.

During the shoot, the actor excused his difficulty by saying, “Japanese don’t really know how to give proper presentations anyway.” That mindset is exactly the problem: widespread low standards become self-permission to avoid professionalism.

In 日本企業 (Japanese companies) and even 外資系企業 (multinational companies) operating in 東京 (Tokyo), this creates a massive competitive gap. The bar for being in the top tier is unusually low here—and that’s an opportunity if you train correctly.

Mini-summary: Cultural tolerance for mediocre presenting keeps standards low. Training is the way to stand out fast in Japan.

I recently attended a business talk from the president of one of the world’s most famous brands on an exciting topic. The delivery was “fine,” but forgettable. No impact. No memorable message. No audience capture.

In business, “not bad” often equals “no value.” If people can’t recall your meaning, your presentation failed—regardless of brand or title.

Mini-summary: Executive status doesn’t guarantee impact. Without trained delivery, even big-name talks become invisible.

It’s not DNA.
It’s not pedigree.
It’s not brand luck.

It’s training.

Presentation excellence is a learnable, repeatable skill set. With the right プレゼンテーション研修 (presentation training) and エグゼクティブ・コーチング (executive coaching), business professionals can move into the top 1% of presenters quickly in Japan—because the competitive bar is still low.

Dale Carnegie Tokyo brings:

• 100+ years of global training expertise,

• 60+ years working with Japan’s leading companies since 1963,

• proven methods for leadership presence, persuasion, and audience engagement.

Mini-summary: Presentation ability is trained, not inherited. In Japan, focused training produces rapid, category-leading improvement.

• Great presenting requires congruent words, voice, and body language—not content alone.

• Even professional actors may lack presentation-grade nonverbal skills in Japan.

• Japan’s low baseline makes top-tier presentation a fast, high-ROI advantage.

• Training is the difference between speaking at people and capturing them.

Founded in the U.S. in 1912, Dale Carnegie Training has supported individuals and companies worldwide for over a century in leadership, sales, presentation, executive coaching, and DEI. Our Tokyo office, established in 1963, has been empowering both Japanese and multinational corporate clients ever since.