I love the bit where he contrasts spending on malaria and baldness.... but some of his graphs, even at huge scale are clumsy, gaudi and could be much much better.
Watch. Then reflect on what you would like to emulate and what you would like to avoid in your own presentations
Friday, 6 February 2009
Impact and Passion, but the graphs.....!! oh dear
Wednesday, 4 February 2009
Humour in Creating Groups
One way to lighten the mood, open people's minds and de-stress people during presentations and workshops is by using humour.
There are very gentle, subtle ways of encouraging a playful or light-hearted attitude during your workshop that don't rely on telling jokes or things outside your natural personality.
It is an essential element of learning that everyone gets a chance to apply new knowledge or practise new skills. As they say "you don't learn to ride a bike by reading a manual."
When using interactive exercises, you will need to create pairs, or small groups for these interactive elements, and in doing that you easily add humour. Here are some suggestions for creating groups:
1) Using sweets - especially retro ones that cause a stir and get people talking. Have a bag with different kinds of sweets (say four of each kind if you want groups of four) and hand them around as a lucky dip. Things like refreshers, lover hearts, gob stoppers for example. If you do this at the beginning when people arrive, you can then ask them to remember the sweet they have already eaten!
2) Using badges - by badges of 70s, 80s, or even 90s bands (ebay is the perfect place to find them) and do a lucky dip again, or lay them out for people to choose. Choose the decade depending on your audience - some will remember swooning over David Cassidy or the Bay City Rollers and some would just go "who?"
If you have created pairs and want to determine who goes first, instead of just asking the group to decide, why not use the following statements to determine who goes first:
* the person with the most vowels in their full name
* the person with the longest fingernail (any finger on any hand)
* the person who has the most nieces and nephews (aunts and uncles etc)
* the person with the biggest watch
* the person with the most unusual thing in their pocket or purse
Think of some unusual methods to form groups and pick who goes first and you will add an element of surprise into your workshops, that automatically raise them above the run-of-the-mill expectations.
Good luck and please share your own ideas for forming groups here on the light the spark facebook page....
There are very gentle, subtle ways of encouraging a playful or light-hearted attitude during your workshop that don't rely on telling jokes or things outside your natural personality.
It is an essential element of learning that everyone gets a chance to apply new knowledge or practise new skills. As they say "you don't learn to ride a bike by reading a manual."
When using interactive exercises, you will need to create pairs, or small groups for these interactive elements, and in doing that you easily add humour. Here are some suggestions for creating groups:
1) Using sweets - especially retro ones that cause a stir and get people talking. Have a bag with different kinds of sweets (say four of each kind if you want groups of four) and hand them around as a lucky dip. Things like refreshers, lover hearts, gob stoppers for example. If you do this at the beginning when people arrive, you can then ask them to remember the sweet they have already eaten!
2) Using badges - by badges of 70s, 80s, or even 90s bands (ebay is the perfect place to find them) and do a lucky dip again, or lay them out for people to choose. Choose the decade depending on your audience - some will remember swooning over David Cassidy or the Bay City Rollers and some would just go "who?"
If you have created pairs and want to determine who goes first, instead of just asking the group to decide, why not use the following statements to determine who goes first:
* the person with the most vowels in their full name
* the person with the longest fingernail (any finger on any hand)
* the person who has the most nieces and nephews (aunts and uncles etc)
* the person with the biggest watch
* the person with the most unusual thing in their pocket or purse
Think of some unusual methods to form groups and pick who goes first and you will add an element of surprise into your workshops, that automatically raise them above the run-of-the-mill expectations.
Good luck and please share your own ideas for forming groups here on the light the spark facebook page....
Wednesday, 28 January 2009
Wednesday, 21 January 2009
Decluttering Your Materials
Continuing on the theme of paring down your presentations and workshops, so that you can focus on the NEED TO KNOW information, it is now time to reflect upon your materials...
We've all seen presentations containing tens or hundreds of similar slides with a handout the size of Encyclopaedia Britannica as we leave...
We've all laughed at Don McMillan's brilliant parody of cluttered PowerPoint slides on YouTube (and if you haven't, just follow this...http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=cagxPlVqrtM )
But in the spirit of decluttering, ask yourself these questions:
* What information do my listeners or learners really need to take away from this event? ... Can I fit it only a credit card as a takeaway?
* What slides or images do my learners really need to look at during my event?... Can I eliminate slides all together?
* For each piece of NEED TO KNOW information, what would be the simplest way to convey that to my learners?
Don't think that if you have shunned PowerPoint for flipcharts then you are off the hook. Last weekend I saw some dreadfully cluttered, overly colourful flipcharts where the presenter was trying too hard...
Let's say that you have presentation with a year's worth of figures (broken down monthly) that you need to present - perhaps your instinct is to choose a bar chart to display them. But it might only be a single month that counts - a peak in August, or tumble-weed blowing through the cash tills in February.
So do you display them all, then use your laser pointer to highlight the key month...
Or, do you have a single figure or percentage next to the name of the month on a slide and tell your audience why that figure is important?
Which is most likely to grab their attention? Which one tells the most powerful story?
Look at all the materials you use during your presentations and workshops and eliminate any that do not 100% enhance your learners' experience during your event.
Then you can use the fire test. When decluttering your house, you pick a single box of items you can save in a fire. So in a similar vein if you had only a handful of slides/ notes/ handouts which of these would you pick?
Now look at the ones you didn't pick - how could you either eliminate them, or make them great enough to be in your final selection?
Remember - what your audience takes away from a presentation is not determined by the pages in your handouts.....
Keep your message simple and strong and they will take it away in their minds and hearts instead.
We've all seen presentations containing tens or hundreds of similar slides with a handout the size of Encyclopaedia Britannica as we leave...
We've all laughed at Don McMillan's brilliant parody of cluttered PowerPoint slides on YouTube (and if you haven't, just follow this...http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=cagxPlVqrtM )
But in the spirit of decluttering, ask yourself these questions:
* What information do my listeners or learners really need to take away from this event? ... Can I fit it only a credit card as a takeaway?
* What slides or images do my learners really need to look at during my event?... Can I eliminate slides all together?
* For each piece of NEED TO KNOW information, what would be the simplest way to convey that to my learners?
Don't think that if you have shunned PowerPoint for flipcharts then you are off the hook. Last weekend I saw some dreadfully cluttered, overly colourful flipcharts where the presenter was trying too hard...
Let's say that you have presentation with a year's worth of figures (broken down monthly) that you need to present - perhaps your instinct is to choose a bar chart to display them. But it might only be a single month that counts - a peak in August, or tumble-weed blowing through the cash tills in February.
So do you display them all, then use your laser pointer to highlight the key month...
Or, do you have a single figure or percentage next to the name of the month on a slide and tell your audience why that figure is important?
Which is most likely to grab their attention? Which one tells the most powerful story?
Look at all the materials you use during your presentations and workshops and eliminate any that do not 100% enhance your learners' experience during your event.
Then you can use the fire test. When decluttering your house, you pick a single box of items you can save in a fire. So in a similar vein if you had only a handful of slides/ notes/ handouts which of these would you pick?
Now look at the ones you didn't pick - how could you either eliminate them, or make them great enough to be in your final selection?
Remember - what your audience takes away from a presentation is not determined by the pages in your handouts.....
Keep your message simple and strong and they will take it away in their minds and hearts instead.
Monday, 12 January 2009
Decluttering Your Message
The New Year is a great place to start putting some new habits into practice, so let us have a little clear out - or in some cases a really big clear out....
Let us start by decluttering your message.
Many of you will have heard of the 80/20 or Pareto rule...
Well the same applies in presentations and workshops: 80% of your impact will come from just 20% of your message,
So now is the time to declutter your message so that you get clear about the 80% that really makes a difference. Using the Pareto rule, mandatory training could be cut to 20% of the time it usually takes by cutting to the chase.
Using Post-It notes, write down all the key things you normally say in your presentation (that last a few minutes at least). Count the notes and work on getting down to one-fifth or 20% of that number.
There are two rules now for dealing with each note: Ditch It or Do It.
If you feel it falls into the 80%, ditch it.
If you feel it falls into the 20%, keep it and keep doing it.
This is a great method for getting clear about what you should be saying and what you pretty much can leave out with very little detriment to your listeners....
Now you have something sleek and elegant - and can design some interactive exercises that reiterate your core message, rather than adding in non-core fluff.
Keep an eye out for part 2, where I will talk about decluttering your materials.
Go the 2nd December 2008 to find out more about the NEED TO KNOW basis for content design.
Let us start by decluttering your message.
Many of you will have heard of the 80/20 or Pareto rule...
Well the same applies in presentations and workshops: 80% of your impact will come from just 20% of your message,
So now is the time to declutter your message so that you get clear about the 80% that really makes a difference. Using the Pareto rule, mandatory training could be cut to 20% of the time it usually takes by cutting to the chase.
Using Post-It notes, write down all the key things you normally say in your presentation (that last a few minutes at least). Count the notes and work on getting down to one-fifth or 20% of that number.
There are two rules now for dealing with each note: Ditch It or Do It.
If you feel it falls into the 80%, ditch it.
If you feel it falls into the 20%, keep it and keep doing it.
This is a great method for getting clear about what you should be saying and what you pretty much can leave out with very little detriment to your listeners....
Now you have something sleek and elegant - and can design some interactive exercises that reiterate your core message, rather than adding in non-core fluff.
Keep an eye out for part 2, where I will talk about decluttering your materials.
Go the 2nd December 2008 to find out more about the NEED TO KNOW basis for content design.
Friday, 12 December 2008
Memorable Body Language
If you want to know how to use your body language and facial expressions to convey feeling, emotion and story, then look no further than this video. It is surprising and humourous, combining into a short yet powerful experience.
Tuesday, 2 December 2008
Editing Your Content: the NEED to know basis
Last week I sat through a number of presentations at a networking event. The event was designed to help women grow their business and one of the topics was marketing.
The presenter had great charisma and personal style - she was passionate and enthuiastic about her topic, which she obviously knew a great deal about. She spoke without notes, which meant she could engage with us directly. She even made her talk interactive by asking questions of the audience to demonstrate how some of us had approached marketing for our own businesses.
But she talked about nearly every aspect of marketing known to man: from blogs, to social networking, local and national media, radio interviews, direct marketing and so on and so on. I knew we were in trouble when I saw her handouts - copies of her bullet point ridden slides (never a good sign).
I left in feeling totally overwhelmed - and I was not alone. Various people made comments about how they needed a break now to take it all in.
I was left with that feeling "I am sure I have learnt something, I am just not sure what".
She was suffering from an inability to focus and edit her ideas down into manageable chunks.
As a result her NEED TO KNOW ideas got lost amongst the rest of what she said.
Whatever the presentation or workshop you are designing, before you start cramming in every thing you have learnt in the last ten, twenty or thirty years, think about this...
What does your audience really NEED TO KNOW?
You might brainstorm lots of ideas, but it is vital that you pick out just one thing that you really feel is the most important thing for your audience to learn. You can add in a few more (depending on the time available), but do make sure that you know what thing or few things you really want your audience to leave with.
The presenter had great charisma and personal style - she was passionate and enthuiastic about her topic, which she obviously knew a great deal about. She spoke without notes, which meant she could engage with us directly. She even made her talk interactive by asking questions of the audience to demonstrate how some of us had approached marketing for our own businesses.
But she talked about nearly every aspect of marketing known to man: from blogs, to social networking, local and national media, radio interviews, direct marketing and so on and so on. I knew we were in trouble when I saw her handouts - copies of her bullet point ridden slides (never a good sign).
I left in feeling totally overwhelmed - and I was not alone. Various people made comments about how they needed a break now to take it all in.
I was left with that feeling "I am sure I have learnt something, I am just not sure what".
She was suffering from an inability to focus and edit her ideas down into manageable chunks.
As a result her NEED TO KNOW ideas got lost amongst the rest of what she said.
Whatever the presentation or workshop you are designing, before you start cramming in every thing you have learnt in the last ten, twenty or thirty years, think about this...
What does your audience really NEED TO KNOW?
You might brainstorm lots of ideas, but it is vital that you pick out just one thing that you really feel is the most important thing for your audience to learn. You can add in a few more (depending on the time available), but do make sure that you know what thing or few things you really want your audience to leave with.
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