Life After PowerPoint!

I apologize for not posting anything new for the last 11 months. My energy has gone into developing a new blog, which took more of my time and attention than I had anticipated.

You can see my new blog at ChristopherWitt.com.

It focuses on leadership, speaking, technical presentations, and selling ideas.

Those four issues have always been my focus. So why the change? Why transition from LifeAfterPowerPoint.com to ChristopherWitt.com?

I still dislike PowerPoint. I still believe it’s a mediocre piece of software that is, more often than not, poorly used. And I still advise leaders and anyone who wants to influence and inspire audiences to avoid using it.

I’m not in any way disowning the core message of my book, Real Leaders Don’t Do PowerPoint.

But I don’t want to be defined in reaction to PowerPoint. I don’t want to debate its pros and cons. I don’t want to be thought of as the anti-PowerPoint person. (Edward Tufte deserves that title.)

I want, instead, to broaden the discussion. Specifically, I want to explore the place where leading and speaking intersect. Which is why I’ll also examine selling ideas and technical presentations. After all, shaping, articulating, and presenting ideas—selling ideas—is one of the primary tasks of leaders. And technical experts of all stripes are increasingly becoming the leaders of today.

So, please, if you’ve enjoyed what I’ve written here in LifeAfterPoint.com, check out my new blog at ChristopherWitt.com.

When you sign up for my free newsletter there, you’ll receive my 32-page eBook, How to Sell Ideas.

A front-page article in today’s Wall Street Journal reports, “the Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research, a group of Mormon academics who defend the faith, will wrestle with the challenges presented by the two presidential candidates [Mitt Romney and John Huntsman, both Mormons].” The church intends to counter anti-Mormon arguments and misunderstandings.

That’s all well and good. Who wants their faith–or anything they cherish, for that matter–misrepresented?

But then I came upon a line in the article that made me believe the apologists have their work cut out for them: “Otterson [the church director for public affairs] used a blog post to challenge opponents who label the church a ‘cult’…”

Over the years I’ve had many opinions of the Mormon Church, but until someone said it wasn’t a cult, I never thought it was one.

That’s the risk you run when you deny something. By saying you’re not something, you immediately make people think of the very thing you’re denying.

Remember President Richard Nixon’s most (in)famous line? In a televised question-and-answer session during the height of the Watergate scandal, the President defended his reputation. He claimed “I’m not a crook.”

Up until that moment, his opponents had been calling him many names–none of them kind. But from then on, the only name that stuck was “crook.”

By negating something (not “x”), you risk affirming it. I suggest, instead, stating the positive. The church’s public affairs guy should have said what the church is, avoiding the word “cult” altogether. The President should have claimed that he was an honest man.

Of course, you may want to use this technique–affirming by denying–to your opponent’s disadvantage. It’s a sneaky thing to do. It’s not always ethical. And it can backfire on you, when people see through your intentions. But here’s how it works. Think of something bad about your opponent or your opponent’s position, and then say that you do not believe it or you’re not saying it or it is not true.

If you say, for example, “My opponent is not evil, he’s just incompetent,” you implant the idea in your listeners’ minds that he is both evil and incompetent.

If you say “I’m not saying her idea is risky and foolish…”, that’s exactly what you are saying. And it’s what people hear.

So be careful when you assert that something or someone is not something.

Do you have any examples to add to my own? (Please do not post anything negative about the Mormon church.)

Leaders speak to influence and inspire their audiences — not primarily to convey information.

And telling stories is one of the best ways to influence and inspire. Stories grab people’s interest and attention. They engage people’s imaginations and emotions. They’re memorable. They move audiences beyond — not counter to — their critical, nit-picking minds.

And they invite people — both the person telling the story and the people listening to it — to let their guards down and to become vulnerable. They are disarming, which is a good thing in today’s highly polemical world.

I recently gave a workshop for the executive leadership team at a major healthcare system. The person who brought me in warned me in advance that the executives prided themselves on being hard-nosed, bottom-line professionals who weren’t into “touchy-feely crap.”

I started by telling one of my own stories. I had them reflect on how stories work and on how important they are for leaders. (Howard Gardner, the Harvard professor, said “Stories constitute the single most powerful weapon in a leader’s arsenal.”) And then I had them tell stories to each other.

I had them tell a story of the person who influenced them most in their professional life. It was a safe topic to begin with, and everyone had a great story to tell. People began to relax. Then I asked them to tell a story about the person who influenced them most, having nothing to do with work. Finally, I asked them to tell a story about a turning point in their lives, when they made a choice that forever altered the way they act or think or feel. And I asked them what they learned from those experiences — what the moral of their story was.

There was no holding back. No defensiveness. People wanted to tell their stories. One person’s story inevitably made someone else want to tell his or her story.

When leaders tell stories, they make themselves real, vulnerable, human. And they invite others to respond in kind. That’s a good thing, to my way of thinking.

Here are two books I recommend on the subject:

The Way of the Storyteller, by Ruth Sawyer, blends literary history, criticism, analysis, personal anecdote, and how-to instructions. It includes stories from around the world and a comprehensive reading and story list.

The Story Factor, by Annette Simmons, is a more contemporary study. It illustrates how to tell stories to persuade, motivate, and inspire audiences in ways that cold facts, bullet points, and directives can’t.

What’s your experience with stories? Do you have any books to recommend?

I don’t know about you but over the past couple of years I’ve noticed a significant change in the way people work.

People have always been overwhelmed, at least since the early 90s. Now they’re even more overwhelmed. They are running around as if their hair is on fire. They are in a reactive mode, dashing from one meeting to another, attending to the latest crisis, putting out fires. What they’re not doing is analyzing, reflecting, or planning.

So when I work with people — individuals or teams — helping them prepare major presentations, I have a two-fold challenge.

First, fewer and fewer of my clients (the people preparing, rehearsing, and giving the presentations) have enough time or focus to do it well.

I recently worked with one team, for example, that set aside five days to work with me on a proposal for a job worth 60 million dollars. They ended up working with me for less than half that time. Two days for a major proposal! They were constantly called out of the room — often by their bosses — to do something that “just can’t wait.”

Second, my clients are presenting to audiences who lack the time and focus to attend to the presentation well.

So you’ve got people whose hair is on fire presenting to people whose hair is on fire.

As a result, presentations have to be simpler, clearer, and briefer than before. The problem is, it takes time, attention, and skill to make presentations — especially about complex issues — simple, clear, and brief.

What have you noticed?

Image courtesy of lovstromp at flikr.

Bruce Gabrielle sent me his book, Speaking PowerPoint: The New Language of Business. Get it here.

Since I’m the author of Real Leaders Don’t Do PowerPoint and no great fan of the software, I put off reading it for some time. But I’m glad I finally got around to it. I’m about half way through it, and I find it one of the best books on the subject I’ve come across. If you use PowerPoint, I strongly urge you to pick up a copy and give it a read.

I haven’t changed my mind. I still believe that leaders shouldn’t use PowerPoint. They should be giving speeches, which are meant to influence and inspire, not making presentations, which are about communicating information that people can understand and put to use.

To influence and inspire your audience you have to appeal to their emotions and imaginations, which is done better by telling stories and relying on the power of the spoken word.

To inform people and enable them to take action, you need to use visual aids. PowerPoint is the most commonly used visual aid in business (and elsewhere) today. Bruce makes a great case for its use and for how to use it effectively.

Speaking PowerPoint is almost 300 8-by-10-inch pages. It’s crammed with great information. Much of it reads like a manual, making it something you’ll want to refer to from time to time, not read through in one sitting. But I suggest you read the first 60 pages or so to get started.

I especially like the distinction Gabrielle makes between boardroom- versus ballroom-style presentations. I quote what he says in length because I think it’s so important:

Ballroom-style PowerPoint has a single use: to provide visual support for a speaker. It contains little text and so doesn’t work well as standalone reading. Without the speaker, the slides make little sense.

Boardroom-style PowerPoint may have several uses. It may be read standalone at a computer screen — a reading deck — or printed and discussed in a team meeting — a discussion deck –or presented to a roomful of decision-makers — a briefing deck. Sometimes a single deck has to work in all three situations. The audience wants to read your slides before the meeting, or after the meeting, or instead of attending the meeting. They want to forward your deck to others in the company. Boardroom-style slides need to work as both presentations and standalone documents.

In ballroom-style presentations the speaker speaks and the audience listens. There may be opportunity for questions and answers at some point, but the speaker is not looking for feedback or lengthy discussion. The speaker controls the pace of the presentation.

Boardroom-style PowerPoint involves decision makers of different levels in the company. When you present to a vice president, they do not meekly listen; they have questions, they will challenge assumptions, they will tell you what they want to see modified. When you collaborate with colleagues, they have opinions and want to shape the deck. So boardroom-style PowerPoint is interactive.

Because boardroom-style slides are intended for a different kind of audience and different kinds of uses, the typical PowerPoint advice does not apply. In fact, the typical advice is often the wrong thing to do. [My emphasis]

If you’ve read Speaking PowerPoint, what do you think? Do you like the distinction Bruce makes between boardroom- and ballroom-style presentations?

I just came upon Speaking PowerPoint: The New Language of Business, a book by Bruce Gabrielle. Although I’ve only read the first two chapters, I’m very impressed with it. I’m write more about it when I’ve read more.

Have you  seen it? What do you think about it?

When you’re presenting a lot of technical information, you owe your audience three things:

• Explanation: What does your information mean? The facts don’t speak for themselves. It’s your responsibility to study and evaluate them, and to come to some understanding of what they mean. And then it’s job to help your audience understand them.

State your thesis or your conclusion up front. If you set out fact after fact after fact, thinking you’re building your case, you’ll lose your audience’s attention. Begin, instead, by stating the meaning of the facts and then present the facts.

• Evaluation: What is the value, the significance, or the import of the matter you’re discussing? Why should the audience — or should the audience — care about it? Is it — whatever it is (a trend, a new market, a product idea, etc.) — a good thing or a bad thing? A threat or an opportunity or a blessing in disguise? A matter of urgency or something that can be considered later? How does it rate in comparison to other matters?

What’s at stake in making an evaluation is your judgment — your professional opinion based on experience, knowledge, and careful consideration. Many presenters, especially technical presenters, are hesitant to offer their judgments. (They seem to think that doing so might compromise their objectivity.) But I think you owe your audience the benefit of your judgment.

• Recommendation: What do you recommend doing with the matter you’re discussing? In business at least, knowledge isn’t an end unto itself. Knowledge informs — or should inform — action. After you’ve understood and evaluated the information at hand, what do you think should be done about or with it?

If you’re presenting to people who have the authority to make the final decision, you may want to offer a couple of recommendations (no more than three). But you should be prepared and willing to weigh in on which option you think is best.

Answer these three questions – 1. What does it mean? 2. Why should we care? and 3. What should we do? — and your audience will thank you for it.

Do you agree or disagree?

I’ve been appalled and saddened by all the images coming out of Japan. And I keep looking at them with a sense of grim fascination. It’s like the proverbial train wreck that I can’t stop watching, only bigger and badder.

Clearly I’m not the only one fascinated (“show me more”) and appalled (“how tragic”) by the images. You can’t escape them.

Images pack a wallop like nothing else. They hit us where it gets our attention: in our emotions and our imaginations. That’s why using them in a speech or presentation can be so effective. And that’s also exactly why using images can be problematical.

Let me back up for a moment to explain why using images — espeically videos — can be an iffy thing.

Here are the dynamics that I hope a speech addresses:

• Connection
  To make the audience feel part of the experience, event, or audience — to give them a sense of belonging.
• Identity
  To help the audience know more about themselves individually or as a group — what makes them who they are, their history, their shared values and mission.
• Emotional engagement
  To stir up some feeling — excitement, curiosity, love, anger, fear, hope — about the message. To make them care about it in some way.
• Information
  To teach them something new.
• Meaning
  To help them understand, to make sense of what they’re learning or of what they already know, because facts and data on their own don’t mean much of anything.
• Assessment
  To show them the value or worth of what’s being addressed. (The cynic, Oscar Wilde said, “knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.”)
• Decision
  To help them know what to do with what they’re learning. How do they use what you’re giving them? How do they decide between several different options, one of which is always to do nothing?

Different speeches / presentations have different goals, of course, so they will emphasize different dynamics. A technical briefing will be more concerned about transmitting information and meaning, for example, than a motivational speech. (Most technical talks, unfortunately, spent too much time and energy presenting information and too little making sense of it, and — to their detriment — they leave emotions completely out of the picture.)

So now let me get back to the point I tried making earlier: using images in a speech can be problematical.

Images can engage emotions so powerfully that they overwhelm every other consideration.

On their own, images do not covey information or meaning. They do not address the thing’s worth or value. And they do not provide the wisdom to help decide what can be done, what should be done.

Powerful emotions, stirred up by images, can make people willing or eager to learn and to decide. (That’s the upside.) But powerful emotions can be their own justification. They can move us so profoundly that we need do nothing else.

What do you think?

After years of working with organizations that perform an after action review following a major project or proposal, I’ve begun using the process in less formal settings both with teams and with individuals.

According to Wikipedia, “An after action review is a structured review or de-brief process for analyzing what happened, why it happened, and how it can be done better, by the participants and those responsible for the project or event.”

You can use an after action review to help you understand and learn from any number of events: an interview, a meeting, a speech, a sales presentation, a performance review, a team project, a corporate retreat, even a difficult conversation that you’ve been avoiding.

To conduct an after action review, ask yourself these four questions:

1. WHAT WAS SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN?

What were your goals, objectives, and expectations? What was on the agenda? What outcomes and outputs were intended?

Evey speech and presentation has — or should have — a goal. What did you want the audience to do as a result of listening to you?

2. WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED?

Simply describe and note what occurred without comment or judgment. You might want to start by listing events in the order they occurred. Or you could focus on the key events, themes, or issues that developed.

So many things happen before, during, and after a presentation that contribute to its success or failure. Review as many of them as possible. Then ask yourself, did your speech achieve its goal?

3. WHAT ARE THE REASONS FOR THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHAT WAS SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN AND WHAT DID HAPPEN?

The point of this inquiry is not to assign blame or to give a grade to the effort. Its purpose is to identify strengths and weaknesses, to propose solutions, and to adopt a course of action that will correct problems or improve future performance.

Analyze both the things that worked well and the things that didn’t work so well. Did your opening work?Did people laugh at your humor? Did the room set up work for you? Were you able to answer the questions people raised?

4. WHAT DID YOU LEARN?

What did you do that you want to keep doing or that you want to remember to do in the future? What do you want to do differently? What changes do you want to make?

Giving a speech is both an art and a skill. We can master it only by learning from our experience, by honestly appraising our performance, and by asking ourselves how we can improve.

What do you think? How do you review your speeches and presentations? What kind of questions do you ask yourself?

Photo courtesy of Matt Hutchinson at Flickr.

One of the best ways to master the art of speaking and speechwriting is to read and analyze great speeches.

I just came upon such a speech, posted by Vital Speeches of the Day.  It’s by Rosalie Silberman Abella, Justice, Supreme Court of Canada. It’s titled, “The World Is Not Unfolding As It Should: International Justice in Crisis.” Read it here.

I find it both intellectually challenging and emotionally gripping. She’s not afraid to engage her audience’s intellect. She doesn’t dumb things down or overly simplify complex matters. And, at the same time, she doesn’t treat her subject as if it’s a purely academic concern, divorced from our real world, devoid of human pathos.

She’s grieved by what she sees happening in the world, and she thinks we should be too.

Her words have power, not just because of the thoughts and emotions they express, but because of the way she strings them together. Here are a few quotes I like:

Democratic values, while no guarantee, are still the best aspirational goals in my view, because without democracy there are no rights, without rights there is no tolerance, without tolerance there is no justice, and without justice, there is no hope.

The world was supposed to have learned three indelible lessons from the concentration camps of Europe:
1. Indifference is injustice’s incubator;
2. It’s not just what you stand for, it’s what you stand up for; and
3. We must never forget how the world looks to those who are vulnerable.

When we talk about democracy, we’re not just talking about elections. To say democracy is only about elections is like saying you don’t need the whole building if you have the door. Elections tell democracy it’s welcome to come in, but elections are only the entrance. Without a home, democracy can’t settle down. It needs an edifice of rules and rights and respect to grow up healthy and secure.

Give it a read. And let me know what you think.