"If you want me to speak for an hour, I can start now. If you want me to talk for five minutes, it will take awhile" -- Paraphrased from Winston Churchill, UK Prime Minister WWII
I believe we are losing the art of public speaking. Web conferencing and PowerPoint are the unintended weapons in this battle. "Let's have a quick one hour meeting (where I will read you my slides)". Is your head hurting yet?
You know the drill: You can read slides as well as the presenter. So... What do you do? You work on your next presentation or read email while the presenter drones on with virtually no one listening. On a one hour call with many 'listeners', the lost productivity is immense.
Contrast this scenario with a good TED talk. 20 minutes maximum and EVERYONE gets it. You may not agree with the speaker but you remember just about everything that was said. Can you really say that about your last 60 minute teleconference?
Here are my 4 simple tips for better presentations:
- Tell a story. Have an introduction, body and compelling ending. People notice when you take them on a journey that ends with a thought provoking conclusion.
- Don't just read your slides. It puts everyone to sleep and gets them doing other things rather than paying attention to you. The best way to avoid this trap: don't make your slides into a document. Some people will complain because they will be forced to listen. But I think that's a good thing.
- Engage your audience. Ask questions, tell stories and add commentary that is specific to your listeners Don't change your slides. Just talk about specifics that your audience is interested in.
- Be responsible. A 1 hour presentation to 40 people consumes one week of collective time! Preparing and presenting good content is one of the best ways to get maximum return on this investment of human capital. The common time slot is often an hour. Try using half that. Trust me. No one will complain that you finished early with a compelling and concise presentation. In fact, they will love you for it!
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About Friday (Off) Topics: To celebrate TGIF, I dedicate Fridays to random topics that I hope you are interested in.
Great blog!!
ReplyDeleteYour point 2 is absolutely critical, and they require proper slide design (at which I am admittedly bad).
Yet many in my various audiences have been relentless at asking to get the slides, sometimes even ahead of time!
My slides are not consumable on their own. They're not documents, but are meant to augment spoken word. And I'll never change that. When pushed, I'll add a bit of context to speaker notes, but it's always incremental work because I don't script my slides.
I can't stand having a presenter reading their slides to me. Near the top of my dislike list!
I agree with you Mario. Slides cannot be consumable on their own. If they are, why do we need a presenter to read them to us?
ReplyDeleteWhen someone asks for my slides, I think quietly to myself: "I have failed to get the message out" :)
Realistically, people want something to take with them. So let's think of something better... Like a TED talk!
That's what I believe we have to move towards: When someone ask for slides, we tweet them the URL to our YouTube video where we can tell the whole story. It's a PITA, but what's the alternative?
Record and YouTube the presentation ... brilliant!!! Seriously - I might actually try it!!
ReplyDelete