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.

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?

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?

Dale Fetherling, the coauthor of my book, died last month. He was one of the good guys, with broad shoulders, a deep voice, and a love of words. I knew him mostly on the professional level, but I liked and respected him and I’m saddened by his death.

His memorial service was quite touching. And I was especially moved by the reflections shared by three of his colleagues.

A eulogy, according to the ancient Greeks and Romans, is supposed to “praise the dead, and inspire or instruct the living.” I think its purpose is to evoke memories of the dead in a way that consoles the living.

The eulogies at Dale’s service did just that. Here’s what I think they got right.

First, because all three eulogists were themselves veteran journalists, they wrote their scripts and read them. They chose their words carefully, making each phrase and each sentence count.

Second, they told stories. Funny stories. “I’ll bet you didn’t know this about Dale” stories. And, since they were talking to people who shared similar experiences of him, “do you remember how he used to do this” stories. Each story brought Dale to life in our imaginations and brought out our affection for him and brought us together.

Finally, they let their affection show. They clearly admired and loved Dale. They grieved his loss. And they let it show. Each one had to pause somewhere in what they were saying — usually in the middle of a story — and choke back a sob before carrying on.

The purpose of a eulogy is the same as the purpose of a funeral. (Speeches are supposed to serve the event in which they are situated.) And these eulogies served that purpose. I left the service feeling that my grief was shared, honored, and eased.

May he rest in peace.

On Saturday a man opened fire with a semi-automatic weapon at a political gathering in Tucson, Arizona. He killed six people (including a 9-year-old girl, three women in their 70s, and a federal judge) and wounded more than a dozen others (including Gabby Giffords, the Democratic Congresswoman for that district).

The tragedy has sparked a lot of debate about the connection between virulent and violent rhetoric, which unfortunately has become a mainstay of American politics these days, and the shootings.

I think it’s too simplistic — and premature — to say that the rhetoric, as ugly and mean-spirited as it has been, is the cause of the massacre. But I think those who say such rhetoric had no connection to the killer’s actions are being disingenuous.

Words — spoken words, specifically – have power. That’s why we use them. And words have consequences. We want them to.

The purpose of a speech is to change the way people think and feel and act. That’s why we give speeches: we want what we say to have an effect. The question we have to ask ourselves is not “do our words affect what other people do?”, but “what do we hope people will do as a result of listening to the words we speak?”

The photo of “Grief” is courtesy of Ann Gav at Flickr.com.

Nancy Duarte, author of Slide:ology, has published a new book that is well worth your consideration.

Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences (Wiley, 2010) is a visually-appealing, thought-provoking book, and richly satisfying book.

I haven’t read it from cover to cover. Its design has always prompted me to open it at random and read a couple of pages, reflect on what I’ve read, and dive in again at some other point. Each open-read-reflect experiment either confirmed my own experience (“that’s so true”) or gave me a new insight (“I hadn’t thought of it that way before”).

I’ve long believed that every speech — or at least any speech that hopes to change the way an audience thinks and feels and acts — tells a story. Resonate shows you what kind of story to tell and how to tell it. Nancy’s insights, gleaned from Joseph Campbell’s work on myths and from modern-day masters of screenwriting, is both insightful and practical. You would do well to buy the book for those insights alone. And then you’ll find so much more to savor. (Her analysis of King’s “I Have a Dream” speech is a marvel; it gives a new way of appreciating a well-known masterpiece.)

Here’s just one example of what Duarte offers: “Create a moment where you dramatically drive the big idea home by intentionally placing Something They’ll Always Remember — a S.T.A.R. moment — in each presentation… The S.T.A.R. moment should be a significant, sincere, and enlightening moment during the presentation that helps magnify your big idea — not distract from it.”

She then lists, explains and gives examples of the five types of S.T.A.R. moments: 1) memorable dramatization, 2) repeatable sound bites, 3) evocative visuals, 4) emotive storytelling, and 5) shocking statistics.

I highly recommend Resonate. Let me know what you think of it.

In my last post, A Speech Is Like a House, I compared various aspects of designing and building a house to creating and delivering a speech. And I compared delivering a speech to painting the house. I think I would change the analogy a bit to say that delivering a speech is like decorating the house. (Painting is part of the decor, of course.)

Ugly decor — a bad paint job and a poor choice of window treatments and the like – can make a great house ugly and unappealing.

And a poor delivery — a lifeless voice, a gazillion ums and ers — can make an otherwise terrific speech fall flat. So delivery is important.

But if a house has no foundation, if its support beams are termite infested, if its walls and floor and ceilings are caving in, no amount of paint can save it. 

If a speech has no goal, no concern for the audience and what it wants to learn, no clearly developed core idea, no unifying structure, no regard for language and style and logic (what used to be called rhetoric), a masterful delivery can’t save it. It’s rotten and it should simply be torn down and thrown away.

But, in my not so humble opinion, delivery is the last thing to work on. (Notice, I did not say the least important thing.) What do you think?

Photo courtesy of Wonderlane at Flickr.

A speech is like a house. And building a house is a lot like building a speech.

• A builder starts with a design.
  A speaker begins with a strategy. Why are you speaking? What is the purpose of your presentation? What is your goal? What do you want to accomplish? Who is the audience and what do you want them to do with the information you’re presenting? What’s the lay of the land — the event, the schedule, the room set-up?
• A builder pours a foundation.
  A speaker builds on an idea. What is your central idea, policy, or proposal? Is it a good idea? Is it sturdy enough to build a speech on? Is it clear? (Can you sum it up in one sentence?) Is it coherent? Is it logical? Is it supported by the evidence?
• A builder creates a structure.
  So does a speaker. Does the introduction create interest in the idea you’re going to develop and provide an overview of how you’re going to talk about it? Does the body of your speech flow logically from one main point to the next? Does the conclusion sum everything up and give your listeners a reason to take action?
• A builder adds support material.
  So does a speaker. What evidence supports your idea? How can you illustrate it? What images, stories, demonstrations let your audience see — either with their eyes or with their imaginations — what you’re talking about? What words, phrases, and sentences best give your idea form?
• And finally a builder paints the house.
  A speaker polishes his/her delivery. Where do you stand to have the most impact? How do you integrate your body language and vocal modulation and pitch with your message? Do you use pauses effectively? Do you convey a sense of confidence and command?

What do you think? Does my analogy make sense? What would you add to it?

Photo thanks to MVI at Flickr.

They say, “Experience is the best teacher.” But it ain’t so.

Experience, in and by itself, doesn’t teach anything. Experience is an opportunity for learning.

The experience of being a parent, for example, does not necessarily give people special insight or wisdom. It doesn’t inevitably make them more loving, patient, or understanding. Sadly, all too many parents are self-absorbed, negligent, or abusive. Being a parent doesn’t, on its own, teach people anything; it puts them in a situation, which has its own demands and rewards, where they can learn — or not learn – how to be a person worthy of being called a mother or a father.

The same is true about learning how to speak.

On the one hand, you have to get up and give speeches. There’s nothing like the experience of being in front of an audience and giving it your best shot. (That’s one reason why I often recommend that people look into Toastmasters.)

On the other hand, giving speeches — even lots of them — doesn’t necessarily make you a good speaker. I listen to experienced speakers all the time who are disorganized, confusing, and boring. Maybe you do, too.

So how do you learn from your experience?

First, observe other speakers. And get critical. By critical, I don’t mean “inclined to find fault or to judge with severity.” I mean “using skillful judgment to determine something’s value or worth.”

Pay special attention to good speakers. And notice what they’re doing. If they lose you or confuse you, ask yourself what happened. Don’t blame yourself. Try to figure out why you got lost or what they said that didn’t make sense to you. And when you get caught up in what they’re saying, take a step back and analyze what they’re doing. How are they relating to the audience? Do they tell stories? Do they use humor? If so, what kind? And pay attention to speakers who aren’t so good.

For example, there’s a speaker I hear rather often. She’s prepared and she has good things to say. But I’m almost always bored. It’s as if she’s lulling me to sleep. One day I decided that since I had to listen to her anyway, I would use the time to figure out what she was doing that I found so sleep-inducing. And I noticed two things. First, she was reading her speech word for word. It’s hard to project energy and vitality when you’re reading a speech. Some people can do it. Most can’t. And second, she had written her speech for the eyes, not for the ears. She used long, complex sentences. They would be fine if you were reading them in a book or a journal, but not fine if you were listening to them. (Okay, I’ll confess it: I’m a fanatic. I can’t simply say someone’s sentences are too long. I had to count how many words were in each sentence. So for three or four minutes, I counted. And I found that her sentences were 45 to 50 words long. And she used, on average, five phrases per sentence!)

So observe good speakers and less riveting speakers. And pay attention to what they’re doing, to what works and what doesn’t work. Ask yourself how you can apply the lessons you’ve learned from them. (I’m not suggesting, by the way, that you imitate them.)

Second, get feedback from people you trust about your own speaking.

I give that piece of advice with some trepidation. Much of the feedback I’ve received over the years and have heard other people receive has been counterproductive. People — even well-meaning, intelligent people — can give some stupid advice about speaking.

Here’s what I do. When people say something nice or not so nice about a speech I’ve given, I ask them to be specific. What did I do or say that they liked or disliked. Where in my speech did I grab their attention or turn them off? What was I doing at that moment? How did they perceive it? How did it make them feel? And I listen real carefully. Then, they go on to tell me how I could fix it, and I listen less carefully. All too often people give advice about how they would do something. They don’t have the ability or the insight to help me do what I do better.

Listen to people’s advice and analyze it. Try it out if it makes sense.

Finally, take responsibility for your own learning. (That’s the theme that runs through my first two pieces of advice.) Observe others, analyze what they do, seek advice, listen, reflect, experiment. Let your experience be the classroom. But be your own teacher.

What about you? How do you learn best to be a good speaker?