Simon started out by saying that PowerPoint abuse is widespread and the [...]]]> Simon Morton founded Eyeful Presentations, which offers presentation consultancy and design services for businesses of all sizes from offices in the UK, US and Holland. His topic was “Blended Presenting –Using a Presentation Toolkit to Ensure Greater Audience Engagement.”

Simon started out by saying that PowerPoint abuse is widespread and the answer is not prettier PowerPoint. He talked about the importance of story flow and starting the process of developing your presentation on paper. One main point of his was that not all aspects of the presentation need to be in PowerPoint. An example he gave was Steve Jobs, in his presentation introducing the Mac Air, pulling it out of an office memo envelope.

Two of the non-PowerPoint options Simon mentioned were doing a demo and writing on a flip chart.

One memorable quote:

Delivering a presentation without the audience in mind is like writing a love letter & addressing it “to whom it may concern.”

Jan’s first topic was about designing slides. Here are some of his points:

In the morning, we heard a keynote by Nick Morgan. His main point was that the only reason to give a presentation is to change the world. Is [...]]]> Day 3 was the last day of the Presentation Summit and had fewer scheduled sessions.

Nick Morgan on using stories to lead an audience to action

In the morning, we heard a keynote by Nick Morgan. His main point was that the only reason to give a presentation is to change the world. Is it a coincidence that I had just started a new website called ChangetheWorldMarketing.com before coming to the conference?

Nick gave us a 4-step structure for a presentation:

1. Start by answering the question “why,” not with an agenda slide or executive summary. He recommended starting with an “explosion,” a story or interesting statistic.
2. Cover the problem for which you have the solution, making it an emotional journey.
3. Explain your solution
4. Lead them to action. His tip here was that if you get the audience to do an action in the room, they are more likely to take the big step. You can do this by having the audience do an activity, perhaps writing something down.

Nick also listed 5 universal story lines to use:

1. Quest
2. Stranger in a strange land
3. Revenge
4. Love story
5. Rags to riches

Connie Malamed on planning online learning

Connie Malamed is an instructional designer and author of Visual Language for Designers. You can see my interview with her here. She explained 5 steps for creating self-running courses:

1. Analysis: Purpose, audience analysis, content
2. Design: Objectives, organization, creative strategies
3. Development: Collecting assets, storyboarding, writing scripts
4. Production: Selecting an authoring tool, finding graphics, recording audio & video, producintg interactions, animations, screencasts
5. Testing: Running through every possible path, subject matter reviews, and user testing

Design for the artistically challenged

At the end of the conference, several people did very short presentations, including me. I spoke on “Slide Design for the Artistically Challenged.”  It was a blend of two other presentations, I’ve done, but you can see one of them online here.

Some of the points he made:

Carmen Taran was the afternoon keynote speaker. Those of you who are attending the Outstanding Presentations Workshop heard her present and she is always lively [...]]]> In the afternoon of the first day of Presentation Summit 2011, I heard 2 excellent presentations and wanted to share them with you.

Carmen Taran: I Can’t Remember %#&$!

Carmen Taran was the afternoon keynote speaker. Those of you who are attending the Outstanding Presentations Workshop heard her present and she is always lively and interesting. She started with a funny story of going to Stockholm, Sweden to see some specific sights and then getting so involved in traveling around that she forgot to see the sights she came for!

That led to her discussion of what people remember. She said that people remember incongruity and the unexpected. (Maybe those are the same thing.) She also noted that attention is important for memory. That’s why a good start to a presentation might include mentioning a shocking statistic, asking the audience a question or evoking emotion in some way–such as by telling a story about spending thousands of dollars to visit a city and forgetting why you came.

On the other side, some good ways to kill the start would be to give people a handout, launch into a long introduction of the company, or speak out familiar phrases like, “I’m so grateful…” or “Thank you for taking the time to…”

Carmen talked about using creativity and contrast to help people remember. She suggested that presenters spend the time necessary to let their creativity come out.

Olivia Mitchell: Why Johnny Can’t Present–Time to Transform

Olivia Mitchell (whom many of you heard speak at last year’s Outstanding Presentations Workshop) talked about how to wean a presenter from bullet points. She explained that presenters are scared of dropping them and they want to conform, be safe.

She used a Buddhist metaphor of a rider on an elephant. The rider represents the mind and the elephant represents emotions and instinct. She explained that you need to talk to the emotions; logic doesn’t work. Here 3 main points were:

1. Provide models: Show what they have now and what could be
2. Provide an alternative safety net: Provide notes or design slides so they can still act as a prompt without bullet points. Rehearsing also helps. Finally, Presenter View shows the presenter the notes while showing the audience only the slides.
3. Start with one slide at a time: Provide baby steps so the presenter doesn’t have to make big changes all at once.

First, Austin is a pretty city on the Colorado River. It has a great music scene and [...]]]> I’m at the Presentation Summit 2011 conference in Austin, TX and thought I’d share some quick takeaways from the speakers so far. I’m behind on posting, so you’ll see more content over the next couple of weeks.

First, Austin is a pretty city on the Colorado River. It has a great music scene and an interesting motto, perhaps unofficial. Here’s a tee-shirt that was for sale in a store in the Austin airport.

Wayne Michael on “Keeping your audience on the same page”

My first session was with Wayne Michael, a CPA who creates graphics for presentations to clients of the Accounting firm he works for. Without being an artist, he does a great job of visualizing complex tax-related topics.

He spoke on how to keep your audience on the same page as you are by providing visual cues that show relationships and avoid disorientation. Specifically, he showed us ways to avoid the look of one slide going to another, which creates a complete break in content.

Some of his techniques were:

• Keeping a menu along the side of the slide that highlights the current section
• Shrinking to a corner — Zooming an image out and moving it to the corner of the slide, then introducing new content, so that the previous content is still  visible
• Faded layering — covering most of the content with a semi-transparent rectangle to focus the audience on one section of a complex process and then adding some explanatory text about that section
• Creating a tab — a rectangle that slides in from the edge of the slides, displays some text, and then disappears, allowing the image to cover the entire slide.
• Using transitions that create continuity — He especially recommended the Push and Pan transitions

 Tip: In PowerPoint 2010, when you apply the Pan or Push transition in a direction, let’s say Push Right, and then you go to the previous slide, the transition reverses, becoming Push Left in this case. And the Pan transition keeps content on the slide master still, moving only the content on the individual slides. Try out these techniques!

Sandy Johnson on “Normal shapes, extraordinary icons”

Sandy Johnson, a top presentation designer, showed us some techniques for creating icons and buttons  in PowerPoint. She used simple clip art and shapes to create professional-looking graphics. Some of her techniques were:

• Inserting a circle, and going to Format tab, Shape Effects, Bevel, 3-D Options and increasing the top Width and Height values to get a 3D look
• Using the Subtract Shapes tool to create cutouts (See my tip on this tool.)
• Creating highlights (See my tip on creating highlights.)

Ellen Finkelstein can train [...]]]> Will you be at the Presentation Summit conference next week? I’ll be there from Sunday, September 18 through Thursday, September 22. If you’re there, please find me and say hello! I’ll be at the Help Desk between most sessions, so I’m easy to find. I’d love to meet you!

Some of the points he made: