I came across this video through How (Not) to Present with PowerPoint at Presentation Skills. The video is a condensed lesson into how NOT to present with PowerPoint.
Tag: Presentations (Page 3 of 4)
I have read How to develop self confidence and influence people by public speaking by Dale Carnegie. Here are some of my notes based on the book.
The book has this reassuring quote by Cicero:
All public speaking of real merit is characterized by nervousness.
Dale Carnegie gives this advice: See yourself as a messenger, the message is important. In other words, content is important.
Preparation
Preparation means assembling your thoughts, your ideas, your convictions, your urges. Preparation means selecting, polishing, working them into a pattern, a mosaic of your own. A speech is a voyage with a purpose and it must be chartered.
Outlines
The book lists some types of outlines.
1. State your facts
2. Argue from them
3. Appeal for action
1. Here is a situation that ought to be remedied
2. We ought to do so and so about the matter.
3. You ought to help for these reasons.
1. Secure interested attention.
2. Win confidence.
3. State your facts, educate people regarding the merits of your proposition.
4. Appeal to the motives that make men act.
How to open a talk
The book lists these alternatives:
• Arouse curiosity
• Begin with a story
• Begin with an illustration
• Use an exhibit
• Ask a question
• Open with a quotation
• Tie your topic up to the vital interests of your audience
How to close a talk
The book lists these alternatives:
• Summarize, restate, outline briefly the main points covered
• Appeal for action
• A terse sincere compliment
• A humorous close
• A poetical qouotation
• The climax
This book overlaps in parts with Dale Carnegie’s The quick and easy way to effective speaking. I prefer that one.
Garr Reynolds, Presentation Zen, has created a page with Presentation Tips on his own site. The tips are three main areas: Organization and Preparation, Delivery and Slides. There are also Samples and Tutorials.
Olivia Mitchell at Speaking about Presenting has created a collection of her Best Posts to help you with every aspect of your next presentation.
Presentation Skills has tips around
• Planning and writing the presentation
• Using visual aids effectively
• Overcoming presentation nerves
• Delivering the presentation confidently
• Answering questions competently
While browsing around at Presentation Zen I came across Living large: “Takahashi Method” uses king-sized text as a visual.
Takahashi uses only text in his slides. But not just any text — really big text. Huge text. Characters of impressive proportion which rarely number more than ten, usually fewer. The goal, he says, is to use short words rather than long, complicated words and phrases.
I can see a point in using text only since images might distract the audience. Keeping the text short, easy to read and easy to remember is also a good idea.
I have read The quick and easy way to effective speaking by Dale Carnegie. The book is outdated in examples, copyright is in 1962. Still, there are useful tips about public speaking in the book. Here are some of my notes based on the book.
Every talk has one of four major goals. Pick the one that suits you, the audience and the occasion.
1. To persuade or get action.
2. To inform.
3. To impress and convince.
4. To entertain.
Notes about preparation and delivery.
• Only the prepared speaker deserves to be confident.
• Be sure you are excited about your subject.
• Be eager to share your talk with your listeners.
• The listeners shall feel that what you say is important to them.
• Talk in terms of your listeners’ interests.
Ask yourself how knowledge of your subject will help your audience solve their problems and achieve their goals. In other words, “What’s in it for them?” Then proceed to show them that, and you will have their full attention.
If the purpose of your talk is to inform then make the talk easy to listen to and easy to remember.
If your aim is to convince, remember that it is more effective to stir emotions than to arouse thoughts. Feelings are more powerful than cold ideas.
The book mentions the classic recipe for a talk: First tell them what you are going to tell them; then tell them; then tell them what you told them.
If you ever get to introduce a speaker, follow the T-I-S formula:
+ T stands for topic (of the speech).
+ I stands for importance, connect topic and audience.
+ S stands for speaker, introduce him/her.
Lifehacker writes about Take your PowerPoint slides Beyond Bullet Points where it says that Bullet points on a screen make information harder to understand, not easier.
In PowerPoint slide design – the basics Olivia Mitchell focuses on design tips for the Assertion-Evidence format. At the top of the slide is a simple sentence which expresses the message of the slide, the assertion. The rest of the slide supports that assertion. There are more tips in PowerPoint slide design – adding elegance and in The Top 7 PowerPoint slide designs.
PowerPoint Design in 2009: Six most recommended tips is a great post and I totally agree with this statement:
The slides should be simple, clear and easy to understand.
The third tip One idea per slide is a great one, it goes well with the Assertion-Evidence format mentioned above.
Read more:
Here’s a quick way to make over a bullet-point slide
New evidence that bullet-points don’t work
How to persuade other people to ditch the bullets
A great site about professional presentation design is Garr Reynold’s blog Presentation Zen. He has a beautiful style, an Asian touch, which is elegant and powerful.
I subscribe to the blog and will refer to several of Garr’s blog posts in my Presentation category.
I have bought his book ‘Presentation Zen’ and will post a review on it once I have finished it.
Update.
My review is here: Presentation Zen is a great book.
I really like Olivia Mitchell’s site Speaking about Presenting which has this introduction: The aim of this blog is to help you with your next presentation. You find:
– Helpful articles to help you with every aspect of your next presentation
– Reviews of books and blogs on presentations and public speaking
– Analysis of great speeches and presentations.
I will refer to several of her blog posts in my own posts in the Presentation category.
I am scheduled to speak at Øredev 2009, an IT Conference for Sharing Knowledge.
Øredev is the premier conference in Europe focused on the software development process. Nearly 1000 programmers, developers, engineers, educators, testers and managers gather to share their knowledge and experience.
My presentation is scheduled on November 5 in the track Aspects of Leadership and is titled Project success by helping project members realize their full potential. I intend to talk about how coaching can be used to improve collaboration in projects. A rough outline is in the program:
• Introduction.
• Laying the foundation and ensuring common definitions.
• Coaching the PM to develop him professionally and as an individual.
• Coaching a project team as a group, as well as the individuals within the group.
• How the PM can develop coaching skills and use them in his work.
This is my first major public speech which is somewhat horrifying. My own learning process will result in blog posts about presentation in this blog.
Update November 8, 2009.
The presentation went well and I realized that I really like the role of speaker, talking about a subject that matters to me. I had the benefit of working with a speaker’s coach and mentor which helped a lot.
Update April 3, 2010.
You can now watch Speaker at Øredev 2009, the video
On Twitter I got a link to a great video by CreativityWorks, Busting the Mehrabian Myth (video is below). So, what is the Mehrabian Myth then? Olivia Mitchell writes about in Why the stickiest idea in presenting is just plain wrong:
The stickiest idea in presenting and public speaking is that the meaning of your message is communicated by:
* Your words 7%
* Your tone of voice 38%
* Your body language 55%.
These figures are based on a formula first proposed by Albert Mehrabian in 1967.
I think we have all heard these numbers in connections with presentations, that How (tone, body) is more important than What (words, content). But Albert Mehrabian makes a reservation:
Please note that this and other equations regarding relative importance of verbal and nonverbal messages were derived from experiments dealing with communications of feelings and attitudes (i.e., like-dislike). Unless a communicator is talking about their feelings or attitudes, these equations are not applicable
Max Atkinson’s Blog: Body language and non-verbal communication has a great cartoon strip and raises these questions:
1. How come it’s much easier to have a conversation with a blind person than with someone who’s completely deaf?
2. How come we can have perfectly good conversations in the dark?
3. How come telephones and radio have been such spectacular successes?
4. How come we have to work so hard to learn foreign languages?
I had taken the formula more or less for granted (heard it often) and I am pleased to see that I was wrong. Words do matter!
Busting the Mehrabian Myth – video
Read more:
Albert Mehrabian’s studies in nonverbal communication : Speaking about Presenting
Create Your Communications Experience: The Visual Dominates – Mehrabian Revisited
Six Minutes – Best Public Speaking Tips and Techniques: Weekend Review [2009-06-06]
Albert Mehrabian – Wikipedia
YouTube – Mehrabian Myth! WORDS DO MATTER!
This was originally posted at Forty Plus Two, another blog of mine.
The post is also at my business site: Words Do Matter – Busting the Mehrabian Myth.
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