Life After PowerPoint!

Paul Tilich, a well-respected Protestant theologian of the 20th century, once said:

“The fatal pedagogical error is to throw answers, like stones, at the heads of those who have not yet asked the questions.”

My paraphrase is this: The fatal presentation error is to throw solutions, like stones, at the heads of those who have not yet realized the problem.

Figuring out why the audience would want to do what you want them to is the main question you have to ask yourself during the planning phase. And the easiest way to answer that question is to discover how your idea will help them solve a problem.

Many presentations are designed just this way. It’s such a common format that it even has a name: “the problem/solution model.” But here’s the problem with the model — all too often presenters mention the problem in passing only to jump to the solution.

Here’s my suggestion instead. Make them hurt. Or at least make your listeners understand the problem and feel its pain.

Your proposal — your solution — will require people to invest some time or energy. You want them to do something with what you’re proposing, right? It will cost them. So they will resist, until and unless they realize how much the current situation — the problem — is already costing them.

So if you’re building your presentation around a solution, be mighty sure that your listeners understand the problem and feel its pain. Then, and only then, start talking about your idea, your solution. Just make sure that the pain (time, energy, etc.) of adopting and implementing your solution is less than the pain of not changing.

Do you spend much time talking about the problem and its associated pain? If so, do you have any suggestions or advice about how to do it well?

Photo courtesy of Martin Dougiamas at Flickr.

The lively hosts of LifeTips at Odeon.com, Bryon White and Amanda Smith, interviewed me last week, February 26. As often happens in radio interviews, the conversation ranged over a number of topics. We stuck mostly to the area I’m most familiar with — presentations by leaders and by technical experts.

Bryon raised a question about something that was new to me: word cloud. It is, according to Wikipedia, “a visual depiction of user-generated tags, or simply the word content of a site, used typically to describe the content of web sites.” The words that are used most frequently are represented in larger or more colorful fonts. Byron was interested in how you could use a word cloud to analyze a presentation. You could, say, enter the text for your speech — if it’s written — into a program and create a word cloud. The word cloud would, in turn, show you the words you use most frequently.

How often you use a word is important. (Repetition reinforces your message.) And you might be surprised by the words you use most frequently. But I’m more concerned with the type of words you use — with their clarity, concreteness, and power to evoke a response in people’s imaginations and emotions.

I went to Wordle where in about two minutes flat I created the word cloud you see here. It’s fun. Give it a try.

Have a listen to the interview and let me know what you think. (If it’s taking too long for the interview to begin, you can go directly to the site and listen there.)

Max Atkinson, author of one of my favorite books on speaking (Lend Me Your Ears — All You Need to Know About Making Speeches and Presentations) is taking a poll on his site.

I’ve already voted. Why don’t you?

If you haven’t noticed it yet, there’s now an end of year poll with one simple question:

How many inspiring PowerPoint presentations have you attended during 2008?

If you’d like to vote, you’ll find it on the left, just below the Blog Archive.

Max Atkinson’s Blog.

To be effective a speech or presentation has to be clear, relevant, and useful. To the audience, that is.

If you’re not clear — if your audience doesn’t understand what you’re talking about — you may as well sit down and stop wasting everyone’s time. Being clear won’t always gain you people’s cooperation. (They may actively oppose you once they understand what you’re proposing.) But confusing people will always shut them down. Each and every time.

If your idea isn’t relevant — if your audience can’t figure out how it applies to them — same thing. Just sit down and get it over with. It’s your responsibility to let your audience know right up front how your idea / product / service will benefit them. Don’t make them guess.

And your idea has to be something your listeners can use. Show your audience how they can use your idea / product / service to solve a problem, achieve, a goal, or fulfill a need.

All of this presumes you know your audience.

The strategies, techniques, principles, and rules of public speaking that we speech coaches talk about are only aids. They are how-tos, and their purpose is really only to help you create a presentation that is clear, relevant, and useful.

Here’s how Lisa Braithwaite says it:

We can talk all day about logistics, like notes or no notes, lectern or no lectern, PowerPoint or no PowerPoint, props or no props. We can talk all day about the fine points of delivery: authenticity, eye contact, crutch phrases, humor, stories and whatnot.

But if your content is not relevant to your audience, you are wasting their time.

If your content is not applicable to their lives, you are wasting their time.

If your content is not based on real, practical solutions and tools, you are wasting their time.

Speak Schmeak is the blog of public speaking coach Lisa Braithwaite

What do you think? Is there some other quality you look for in an effective presentation?

Executive Briefing

Thinking about executive presentations — something I do more than most, I was struck by what I experienced at the meeting of a professional association the other week. You know the kind of meeting. A little bit of networking. Something to eat. And a shortish talk.

The networking at this meeting was fine. Smart, successful, and engaging business leaders. The food was OK. (You don’t go to these things expecting great food.) The talk was disappointing.

I have this theory that every speech should be built around one idea. One, single idea. It’s got to be what I call a “Big Idea,” mind you. Something that makes people see things from a different point of view. Something that gives meaning and a sense of urgency to a lot of disparate information. Something that has the potential to change people’s behavior.

Yesterday’s speech had too many ideas. It was what I call a “shotgun speech.” The speaker peppers the audience with ideas—way too many ideas—hoping that one of them will hit some undefined target.

The speaker used PowerPoint, which I really don’t like. (It’s fine for technical presentations, if it’s used well, but not for most other speeches.) For a 45-minute speech, he had over 60 slides, and they were complicated slides, with lots of words and graphics. He also gave us a 20-page workbook, which contained most of the material on the slides and which occupied most of our attention.

It was way too much. Too much information. Too many ideas. Too much of his talking and of our lack of participation. Too little focus.

And the funny thing was, a formula on one of his slides said: Clarity + Simplicity = Success. I wish he had applied that formula to his speech.

What do you think? Do you like speeches that are crammed with information? Or do you prefer ones that are more tightly focused?