A big thanks to Chrystie for including me in the LITA 08 Design for Participation program. It was a great way to get my presentation feet wet with WebJunction.
As I was working on my slides for the program, I flashed back to a library-school instruction course assignment that tricked me into evaluating various presenters and presentation styles.
A byproduct of that work was a collection of rules and or tips I compiled and shared with the class. It was a good exercise then—anything that keeps me from being the dork at the podium is a good thing—and it keeps on giving; I’ve used the work to prepare for many presentations since (thanks, Mike!).
You probably have some similar guidelines or tips you use (please share!); here are a few that have worked for me:
- Text is boring. Animations are distracting. A middle ground can be images that evoke concepts and text used as graphical elements. Of course, that didn’t stop me from including a some boring text and a few animations in my last deck (which is why this tip #1. Maybe I’ll remember to do better next time).
- Like Elvis, keep your slides everywhere (in the cloud, on a flash drive, on your phone, on a friends phone. Whatever it takes). There’s nothing like that feeling of panic when your machine won’t come out of hibernation right before your presentation.
- Notes are optional. Or not. My actual need for a ginormous, tree-killing stack of 3×5 cards is inverse to the amount of time I spend creating them.
- The AV guy is your new BFF. My cord-plugging/key-toggling skills can go head-to-head with anyone in the high school AV club. But that doesn’t mean I have to get down on the conference room floor in a suit if a paid professional is willing to help.
- Bring a drink. Your hosts may not have liquid refreshment and that’s when you’ll, cough, cough, need it. (Water. Not vodka, at least not until after. See note #8)
- Inverse Time Syndrome: A fear of not filling my time makes me go faster. Worry about going over? I normally do. Fight this through preparation (see rule #3.)
- Alternative tools can be nutty fun. Whiteboard? Wii? Video? Flickr? Nothing but your soothing voice? Sometimes PowerPoint or Keynote is the only acceptable choice. Occasionally, though, you’ll have an opportunity to try something new. It’s all about knowing your audience.
For example, I had this wacky idea to chuck the slides and project our scribble and doodle-filled notes from a yellow legal pad. To me it was a metaphor for the WJ brainstorming activities we described in the talk. Chrystie, knowing the audience, thankfully threw down some veto power on that one.
- Have fun from the start! By the end of the talk I’m normally pretty loose and enjoying myself. I really need to to remember this so I can enjoy things from the the first slide (But whatever you do, don’t go all rogue on Rule #5 as shortcut. It will go badly.)
- Watch good presenters present. Meld their ideas to create your own style. Al Gore and Steve Jobs come to mind as true podium gurus. You don’t have to be a fan of these folks to admit they know their way around a slide deck. My personal favorite? Lawrence Lessig. In fact, just remembering some of the magic he worked in Seattle last year with a single word on a black slide makes me giddy. Ahhh…
Those are just a few of my go-to reminders. I’m sure I’m missing a some. Do you have any presentation tips or rules? Please share them with the community!
Great tips! As to #2, I was once giving a presentation for a job interview and was unable to access my presentation on their computer using the CD-ROM I’d burned or the flash drive I had with me. Luckily, I’d also uploaded it to my server, so I downloaded it from there and was good to go. The Systems Librarian tells me that it was something that my preparation for the worst really impressed him and definitely helped me get the job.
once I brought my laptop to a presentation so that I could be in “full control” of my slides (which I had, in character, most recently edited the morning before). when I arrived on site for the program I realized that I had forgot my power cord. The presentation was to be 2-3 hours and there was no way I was going to get through it on battery. I quickly pulled out my trusty memory stick, where I had my happy back up. never, ever, ever go to a presentation w/out a back up (or two).
to this i would add, use slideshare to get other ideas for presentations that you think work well and/or that resonate with you. this can help you develop a personal style.
my personal development plan: get to a point where (1) i don’t get nervous at the beginning of a program and (2) i don’t have to write the whole thing out from start to finish in order to feel comfortable with the presentation.
Great ideas! I might also add that it’s a good idea to show up early and make sure all the technical aspects of the presentation are taken care of. It’s hard to give a good presentation if you flustered and starting 15 minutes late because you couldn’t get your presentation to work on the venue’s AV system, or if the fonts went all weird or the sound system isn’t working or…
You get the picture.
If you don’t mind, I’d like to mention a blog I recently started that’s all about all the things that can go wrong when you’re giving a presentation (or when you’re supporting someone else’s presentation efforts). It’s called Breaking Murphy’s Law (http://www.breakingmurphyslaw.com).
I hope you like it and find it useful.
Thamks!
Thanks for the comment, Meredith. There’s a reason “be prepared” is the boy scout motto. I actually know someone who had the exact same experience. Their backup, combined with grace under pressure got them the job.
And Chrystie, shhhhhhhh …. you tipped me off to this “writing the whole thing out” habit, but you don’t have to spill the beans to everyone
. It obviously works well for you. I don’t think anyone would have ever guessed, so no apologies necessary.
Chrystie, for the first year that I presented, I did that as well. I started to find that it actually added to my nervousness when I did that, as I felt like I had to stick to the script and was less comfortable ad-libbing. I switched to writing a very basic outline and practicing the talk a bunch of times. Then I gave up the outline and just practiced. Now, I practice my talk perhaps once before doing it and my talks usually end up changing every time I give them because I’ll throw in some anecdote I hadn’t thought of before. But it took a while to get to this point. I think the goal is to challenge yourself a bit more each time by giving up a piece of your safety net.
interesting! i actually did my last program with an outline, as you say, and very little practice, and it went quite well (i think). maybe you’re on to something…