Presentation and Public Speaking News

• Public Speaking

When it was first published, Garr Reynolds’ first book Presentation Zen took the traditional world of presentations by storm. It brought the presentation revolution to a wider audience of enthusiasts. We propose to revisit five essential principles from the book that have stood the test of time and can still be considered as best presentation practices today. Plan analog. There are many theories that try to explain how creativity works, but one thing is sure. None of them advise you to get in front of your computer, launch PowerPoint and start hammering at your keyboard to add bullet points after bullet points. If anything, PowerPoint is going to kill your creativity and focus by distracting you from the essential. This is why Garr Reynolds and most creatives start their process with a pen and paper. iPad Pro with Apple pencil? Why not, but only if you are comfortable enough to use it effortlessly. Having to constantly break your flow to work out “how the hell do I do that?” is a sure creativity killer. Start with the end in mind. This simply means that before you start preparing, you should know exactly what result you expect from your presentation. This will help you sort out the content that must be included in your presentation from the content that can be left out. Remember that your goal should not be just to inform or entertain: ask yourself what is the change that you would like to see in your audience. Eat until 80% full. Many presenters tend to put too much stuff in their presentation. Why? Because this is what they learned in school: to give the most complete answers possible. And because they fear that otherwise their presentation will seem too simple or incomplete. But in presentations, complexity and data overload are your worst enemies. So, just as a good meal doesn’t overstuff you, resist the temptation to add those two extra slides that are nice to have but not indispensable. Use full bleed pictures to maximize their visual impact. The use of beautiful pictures that cover the whole slide is is something that has become a trademark of Garr’s presentations, and you should not hesitate to steal it! No other picture layout has the same impact, beauty and simplicity. Connect with the audience. Don’t try to sound “important” or like the teacher you had at school: it will only make you seem aloof and condescending, cutting the invisible but vital link with your audience. Instead, deliver your presentation as if you were having a conversation with a large group of friends. You will sound much more natural, authentic, and you will make people want to listen to you! To learn more about Garr Reynolds and Presentation Zen, you can visit his popular blog. If you want to help your employees deliver better presentations, contact us for details of our exclusive Presentation Zen for Business course, designed by Ideas on Stage together with Garr Reynolds.

• Gadgets

2021 already presents many challenges, not only for leaders and executives but for everyone in the white collar sphere who needs to communicate with their colleages, clients and partners. With online talks raising the bar and audiences increasingly critical, leaders with confidence issues, performance anxiety and low self-esteem have to stay on point. The task of gaining confidence while battling nerves and getting out in one piece is exhausting. Coaching, meditation, rehearsal, visualisation and psychotherapy are all strategies that professionals have turned to over the years to conquer the fear.

• Public Speaking
• TedX

Ikigai is a Japanese concept that means “a reason for being.” Ikigai is the intersection between what you love, what you are good at, what you can be paid for and what the world needs. If you ever want to speak at TED or TEDx event, you should find the ikigai of your presentation. It should be at the intersection of: What you love, or in the context of a presentation, what you really care about. What you are good at, so that you are legitimate to speak on stage. What you can be paid for, or in the case of TEDx, what you can be invited for. What the world needs, so that the topic reaches a wide audience. It is fairly close, yet different, to the three stakes that you should have in any presentation (what matters to you, what matters to the audience, what matters to people outside). By looking for the ikigai, you can avoid potential pitfalls such as

I write this on the first full day of the 46th President of the United States Joseph Biden’s tenure in the White House. After 4 exhausting years for America and the wider world, the page has turned from the failings of an introspective, corrosive and divisive mandate into a bold, courageous and reactive new era, acknowledging first the gravity of America’s collective problems and seeking to solve them through consensus and action.

Zoom has become one of those tools that most people use, but how many of us have actually followed a training course on how to use Zoom properly? Not so many. At Ideas on Stage we have been using Zoom for years, so when the 2020 pandemic hit, we didn’t discover Zoom, but we did start to discover new features: some that we hadn’t needed before, and some that Zoom introduced as its usage exploded.

The COVID 19 pandemic has forced all of us to adjust and has pushed roughly 35% of the workforce to an exclusively online existence. While this is fortunate and frankly would have been impossible 15 years ago it doesn’t come without its challenges. As we struggle to maintain our routines, stay connected with our co-workers we have to continue the regular meetings attendance, trainings and webinars and we often have to give them ourselves. 

Many of us are starting to approach presentations in the right way, taking the time to fix our objectives, analyze the audience, study the context, put together some coherent arguments, good visuals and even find the time to rehearse. Just as we are now spending longer to prepare our presentations properly, in a world of ever-increasing social media and ever-dwindling attention spans, our presentations are getting shorter in order to be more effective. What this means is that the inevitable question and answer interaction that follows is now more important than ever, yet we still don’t spend enough time preparing the Q&A session.

A battle still rages for hearts and minds in the city built on speeches. Let the US election of 2020 be a lesson to all leaders of tomorrow. I am a frequent visitor to Washington DC. Having a key client on Pennsylvania Avenue, I have had the pleasure of getting to know the city and its people, working the day and socializing the night, breathing the atmosphere and drinking its politics. Washington DC is a city built on inspiration; it is built on speeches. There is a litany of references: Martin Luther King’s 1963 ‘I have a dream’ speech, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s inauguration (‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself’) and Ronald Reagan’s Challenger disaster speech… the list goes on. There are hundreds.