January 2012
12 posts
2 tags
Carl Zimmer at the NYAS on Science Ink
Like Mr. Zimmer himself, I don’t have any tattoos. He joked about not being fond of needles. For me it’s more about how distracted I get by bright shiny ideas. I don’t know that I could come up with something I’d always want or I’d have to keep adding and end up with a mishmash of stuff. But I find great beauty in many tattoos, so science plus tattoos, I was there.
...
3 tags
“I not only use all the brains that I have, but all I can borrow.”
– Woodrow Wilson (via thoughtsdetained)
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Laser pointers are for cats
I recently attended a lecture where the presenter used a laser pointer. And about halfway through I wanted to wrestle it away from him. I was starting to twitch and suddenly sensed some connection to my feline friends. He had two screens with his slides showing but at times he would wave the pointer about on one of the screens.
It was utterly distracting and added absolutely nothing to my...
4 tags
Another thing we could learn from the journalists
A few weeks ago I wrote about using effective subject lines, taking a page from the newspaper editors’ playbook. Today I’m borrowing another page. Don’t bury the lead in your emails. There may be reasons to build suspense in a novel or even in some types of presentations, but emails, not so much.
Put the lead front and center. People don’t read whole emails. They read the...
“Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe.”
– H. G. Wells
“Of all of our inventions for mass communication, pictures still speak the most...”
– Walt Disney
5 tags
Rosling Presents with IKEA Props →
I much prefer his 3D container bar charts to ones in PowerPoint. This is one of the best uses of props I’ve seen recently.
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Don't Present Like a T-Rex
I was visiting the natural history museum this weekend and made a stop at the T-Rex exhibit, among others. Of course, one of the first things you notice about dino boy is how small and seemingly ineffectual his arms are.
But he’s in good company. I’ve seen a series of speakers recently who are trying very hard to get past the “I don’t know what to do with my...
“When it comes to customers, feelings are facts.”
– Simon Cooper, President & COO, Ritz-Carlton Hotel
Quotes for Public Speakers (No. 112) | Manner of... →
“He is one of those orators of whom it is well said, ‘Before they get up, they do not know what they are going to say; when they are speaking, they do not know what they are saying; and when they have sat down, they do not know what they have said.’” — Sir Winston Churchill
“Commit to being great, and you will be. If you commit to change the world, you...”
– Scott Schwertly, How to be a Presentation God: Build, Design, and Deliver Presentations that Dominate!
Redefining the Cheap - Fast - Good Triangle
There’s the old idea that among cheap, fast, and good you can only pick two when working on a project. But what if we redefined the points on the triangle to cheap, fast, and short? That might work. Maybe every training initiative or presentation package doesn’t need to be a big deal. Maybe you just need a job aid or a 15 minute presentation instead of an hour.
Attention spans and...
December 2011
14 posts
50 New Year’s Resolutions for Public Speakers |... →
Out of the 50 I bet each of you could find at least a few of these to call your own. Or maybe set out to add a new one each week throughout the year.
“Communication is everyone’s panacea for everything.”
– Tom Peters
3 tags
Sometimes you just want some plain numbers in your...
While automation is usually a good thing in our documents, sometimes we need to go a little lower tech. Automatic numbering in Microsoft Word certainly makes life easier and helps keep complex documents better formatted than plain text, but sometimes what we need, especially if we are sharing content with others using different applications, is just plain text.
Automatic numbering uses a type of...
10 Ways Public Speakers Should Be Like Santa Claus →
A favorite post from this holiday season. Santa may have finished his rounds for 2011 but you can make sure you make it onto your audiences’ nice lists by following the 10 ways of the jolly old elf.
Prepare thoroughly.
Don’t be afraid to ask for help.
Make a list and check it twice.
Deliver the right material for the audience.
Create memorable sentences or phrases that will resonate...
“Communication is about being effective, not always about being proper.”
– Bo Bennett
“No one ever complains about a speech being too short!”
– Ira Hayes
“Ask yourself, ”If I had only sixty seconds on the stage, what would I absolutely...”
– Jeff Dewar
“Good communication is just as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to...”
– Anne Morrow Lindbergh
“Effective communication is 20% what you know and 80% how you feel about what you...”
– Jim Rohn
“Communication works for those who work at it.”
– John Powell
3 tags
I give you permission to talk to yourself
No really. Go ahead. Talk. Out loud. To yourself. Get up. Walk around. It’s really the only way to practice your presentation.
I know you think you are practicing as you sit there flipping through your slide deck going “and here I’ll talk about this” and “there I’ll go through that.” You sit there going blah, blah blah in your head and guess what, blah is...
“Extremists think “communication” means agreeing with them.”
– Leo Rosten
“Communication is a continual balancing act, juggling the conflicting needs for...”
– Deborah Tannen
3 tags
White space not white noise
There have been countless articles about leaving white space on the printed page and in graphical presentations. The brain needs the white space. The eyes need the white space. The text or graphics deserve the white space to make them stand out. To make them special. Noticed. Really observed.
But so do the ears. The same brain that needs visual resting places and focal points needs auditory rest...
November 2011
2 posts
4 tags
Extra, extra read all about it
Back in the old days paper boys stood on street corners and shouted out headlines to get the attention of passersby. Today more people read headlines on television screens or computer screens. And of course we spend more time reading lots of things on computer screens. Like emails. Countless emails flood our inboxes every day. And how do we sort through them?
Well one way is the subject lines....
“Make sure you have finished speaking before your audience has finished...”
– Dorothy Sarnoff
October 2011
7 posts
3 tags
Free Exploring Your Vision for Your Work Webinars... →
2 tags
The atomic method of creating a Powerpoint... →
I’m always on the lookout for different methods to help people design better presentations. Different situations call for different types of presentations and it never hurts to try different techniques and then incorporate aspects that work for you. There’s no one right answer.
My latest find was Seth Godin’s atomic method:
The typical person speaks 10 or 12 sentences a...
4 tags
Interviews are about both of you →
Too often people go into interviews and I would suggest reviews or evaluations (once they have a job) without giving thought to what they want to ask. Rather than having a conversation these events turn into tests. The interviewer is placed in the position of authority and mastery and the interviewee is the student, trying to give all of the right answers, without stopping to consider that he or...
4 tags
Make sure your PowerPoint does not look like...
I recently had the opportunity to hear Jan Schultink present a webinar as part of the Outstanding Presentations Workshop series. Among his many great points was a statement to the effect of the one above: Make sure your PowerPoint does not look like PowerPoint.
It struck me that in this simple statement lived so much of what is wrong with many presentation visuals. The second you look at it you...
5 tags
Why, why, why, why, why?
There’s a lot to be learned from kids. And asking why, sometimes to the point of exhaustion (ours, not theirs) is one of the lessons. Too often we don’t get all of the necessary information because we stop short of asking why. Or we don’t get through all of the layers of the problem because we didn’t ask why one more time.
Some people use the Five Whys method of analysis...
5 tags
Think different but stick to your core values →
For those interested in presenting, Steve Jobs has always been a role model. Books and articles have been written about his presentation style. His product launches have had countless views on YouTube. But in one of his recent blog posts on Presentation Zen, Garr Reynolds has a link to a very different presentation Steve Jobs gave back in 1997. It was an internal company presentation before the...
September 2011
7 posts
7 tags
Telling stories to and about people
In the current evolution of presentations one of the big themes is stories. It was an arching theme of many of the presentations at the Presentation Summit and was the subject of Bruce Gabrielle’s webinar yesterday as part of the Outstanding Presentations Workshop series.
Bruce reminded us that 50 to 75% of information transferred between people is in the form of a story. This isn’t...
The First Hour →
I know a number of you have started early morning/first thing of the day rituals in recent times. Just thought I’d pass along Michele Martin’s article from her blog The Bamboo Project, cause it’s relevant.
I loved her phrasing of: “Starting with my email inbox inevitably sets me up for a day of reacting to other people’s agendas and unproductive...
Caring for Your Introvert →
yensid1138:
Do you know someone who needs hours alone every day? Who loves quiet conversations about feelings or ideas, and can give a dynamite presentation to a big audience, but seems awkward in groups and maladroit at small talk? Who has to be dragged to parties and then needs the rest of the day to recuperate? Who growls or scowls or grunts or winces when accosted with pleasantries by people...
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“A good speaker with bad beginnings is like a fitness trainer who smokes.”
– Carmen Taran
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Effective Presenting 101 … in haiku
words alone are fine unless retention is sought then add a picture
create new brain space hot coffee requires a cup lest is just spills over
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Sadly I've seen the cousins of all of these →
Click through if you dare.
Actually it’s a good practice exercise to take samples like these and think about how you would have created them to effectively communicate the messages and engage the audience rather than assault them with slides like these.
August 2011
2 posts
4 tags
Watchmijatovic:
Awesome electric folding bike concept.
Aside from the great design concept, I especially like the use of story to frame the development of the concept and connect viewers to where his passion for this bike comes from.
Acting, Reflecting and the Cycle of Learning →
I love her comment that reflection is the white space of our days. And the whole idea of pre-emptive reflection reminds me of the proverb: “He who fails to plan, plans to fail.”
July 2011
6 posts
Peter Drucker once noted →
“As soon as you move one step up from the bottom, your effectiveness depends on your ability to reach others through the spoken and written word.”
We Give Books →
Read to your child or borrow a child or just read a tale and relive your childhood love of reading and you can help another child get a book and develop their own love of reading with the We Give Books program.
We Give Books is a new digital initiative that enables anyone with access to the Internet to put books in the hands of children who don’t have them, simply by reading online.
We...
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Presentations Summit →
I’ll be there this year, learning, participating and volunteering. You can be there too! Seats are still available. Click through to read more about it.
The world’s finest user conference for presentation professionals heads to the middle of the country and to Texas’ coolest destination, downtown Austin. Count on the Presentation Summit to deliver information, insight, inspiration, and a...
Avoid the Frequent Mistakes Made By Most Webinar... →
I sat down with the folks at Bloomfire to take about some commom mistakes I’ve seen with webinars. As more an more training and presenting moves online, we all have to adjust to the new tools and skills, and advantages and disadvantages, of this change. We could only touch the tip of the iceberg of this topic but I welcome your questions and comments.
Design Envy · Google Demo Slam: Epic Docs... →
This is what can happen when one thinks outside the box and slides and creates.
“First-line indents and space between paragraphs have the same relationship as...”
– Typography for Lawyers, Matthew Butterick