What you shouldn’t learn from your teachers

Lately I’ve been lucky enough to go to several universities and talk to students on how to make better presentations. The great thing about talking to university students is that most of them have not yet been spoiled by really bad presentations in the business environment. However, they have no examples on how to make good presentations, so they pull from what they see.

After I’ve given my talk trying to inspire them into being creative and presenting their information in more visual ways, as opposed to using a bunch of bullet points, they all ask me: But how do we learn to make good presentations? My answer usually surprises them, but at the same time puts a smile on their faces: Don’t learn from your teachers.

Photo credit Night Owl City

The reasoning is simple: teachers don’t give presentations, they give lectures. Yes, they usually use powerpoint to explain the subject and then distribute it easily to their students, but that is not a presentation. It’s okay to use powerpoint this way, it’s helping structure the ideas, students can print them and take notes and they can study off of them. The thing is that no one ever told the students that these aren’t real presentations. So when they are faced with giving a presentation in class they imitate what they’ve seen and make slides full of bullet points with as much information as they can.

A presentation is not a way to distribute all the information, we have books for that. A presentation is always going to be a summary of main and supporting points, a way to communicate your point of view or introduce something new. However, since students never learn that presentations are not a list of bullet points, but a way to communicate the essential to drive your point, they graduate from university, start working and make the same mistake! Which puts us in the present situation, as Guy Kawasaki says: 99% of presentations suck.

So how can we solve this problem? Communication and public speaking courses should be required courses in every degree if we want to stop wasting time with bad presentations at work. Failing that, don’t learn from your teachers!

Here’s a list of resources you can check out to learn how to make better presentations.

Tuesday, 20 December 2011 08:00 Written by Byron Stanford 0 Comments

8 Presentation rules you should break

Over time I’ve been asking people I meet if there are any presentation rules they follow. I’ve heard a few that made some sense, and others which are just preposterous. There are two types of rules, I’ve identified, which come from different approaches to presentations: the first style appeared shortly after powerpoint gave the masses the ability to create slideshows; the second type is emerging now, as more and more people advocate for visual presentations. Here’s a collection of rules I think everyone should break.

Rules from early powerpoint days you should break:

1- The 6-6-1 rule: This rule was intended to limit the amount of information showed on each slide, it promotes 6 sentences in each slide, 6 words per sentence and 1 idea per slide. The thing is that this rule probably started the whole idea of filling every slide with bullet points, instead of having simpler slides… BREAK IT! Try using one word or sentence per slide.

2- Tell them what you’re going to tell them; then tell them; then tell them what you told them: This is a very sales oriented rule, and it actually sounds good when you hear it. But people don’t need you to repeat the same thing over and over. In your allotted time you’re going to be able to put forward 3 main points, if you’re lucky. You don’t have the time or need to repeat yourself – BREAK IT! Only repeat what you said at the end, in a short summary.

3- Have a thank you slide: I guess this one came up when people started realizing they were boring their audiences to death and had to thank them for putting up with them – BREAK IT! Have a summary slide at the end with the three main points, this will be the slide they see the longest.

4- Start with a joke: I really don’t know who originated this rule or why – BREAK IT! Start with something that shows your personality or sets the mood for the session. Funny remarks are ok, jokes are just lame.

5- Put your logo on every slide: Repeating the same element on every slide just makes the audience tune it out and not pay attention – BREAK IT! Put your logo on the first and last slide.

Rules from the new, visual, presentation style:

1- Have pictures on slides, even if they are irrelevant: You’d be surprised how many people have heard this one! Pictures are useful to expand on what you’re saying, they help you explain complex concepts; but pictures just for the sake of pictures will only confuse the audience – BREAK IT! Use pictures only when they are relevant.

2- Use images as your background: Some images, because of the contrast, will make your text difficult to read – BREAK IT! If you’re going to combine text and images make sure the text can be read easily on the image or don’t use it as the background for the slide.

3- 10-20-30 rule: This rule was created by Guy Kawasaki. He has to sit through an obscene number of presentations and it’s understandable why he would love all presentations to follow this rule. The idea is to use 10 slides, in 20 minutes and with font no smaller than 30pt. In reality if you try to follow this rule you will find yourself leaving out relevant info or packing a lot of really big text on your slides – BREAK IT, BUT KEEP IN MIND THE PRINCIPLE BEHIND IT! When making your presentation try to use fewer slides, les text (readable to the whole room) and don’t go over 20 to 30 minutes.

Any other presentation rules people should break that you can think of? Leave them in the comments.

Until next time,

Byron Stanford for Project Presentation.

Wednesday, 22 June 2011 13:18 Written by Byron Stanford 16 Comments

My only rule for better presentations

The interesting thing about presentations is that they are totally subjective, although there are some practices that we all dislike when we see a presentation (too much text, background and fonts with little contrast, too many bullet points…), there is no step by step guide on how to make a good presentation.

For those of you who get annoyed at the fact that there are no guides to perfect presentations and those who are curious about how I improved, and still work on improving, my own, here is my only rule: Try something new in each presentation.

The presentation creation process has nothing to do with business and everything to do with design. We all know there are rules for good design, and they should be followed in the creation of each slide and the presentation as a whole; however, there is no guide that can explain step by step how you make a good presentation, since each person’s presentation style and what works for them is different. To make good presentations you need experience to develop an eye for them, to develop a sense of what is a good and a bad presentation. Enter my rule, if you try one new thing in each presentation and watch to see your audience’s response, you can start to identify what things people like in your presentations.

Here is a list of things I included in my presentations and that you can start applying to yours, in no specific order, as I said, this is not a step by step guide:

- Substitute text for images

- Use a slide without text

- Draw attention to the most important word in a sentence by giving it a different color or size

- Use two different fonts for two different purposes

- Don’t use bullet points

- Don’t use slides

- Ask the audience a question

- Post your presentation on the internet before you start

- Give a handout with the most important parts of your presentation or extra information when you finish

- Draw on a whiteboard while you speak

- Don’t speak for the first minute of your presentation, just wait until you have everyone’s undivided attention

- Include a video in your presentation

- Record yourself presenting

- Include Charlie Sheen in your presentation somehow (no specific reason, it’s just fun to see how people work around to fit him in, you can always substitute Charlie Sheen for any other ridiculous person you can think of)

- Put tittles on the bottom of the slide, instead of the top

- Don’t use your company´s template

- Use QR codes to guide your audience to more info about the subject

Now I’m going to list a few things I haven’t tried yet, but which are on my list

- Tweet while I present (not personally, automated)

- Have a poll for the audience

- Do my presentation on-line

- Set a limit to my number of slides (present at Pecha Kucha)

- Present wearing a hat

- Use presentation styles more based on text, like Lessig or Takahashi

- Present in rhyme

These are just some quick ideas, I’m sure there are many I’m leaving out or that will come to me later on. The idea behind changing only one thing is to see what you feel more comfortable with and what your style is, without having to change everything in your presentation. If you realize there is some good advice there about things we’ve already talked about, and then there are others that are just for fun. Who said that presenting couldn’t be fun? Experiment and play with you presentation style!

If you try something new or you think about something I left out add it on the comment section.

Until next time,

Byron Stanford for Project Presentation

Tuesday, 31 May 2011 12:28 Written by Byron Stanford 4 Comments

[Meme] The Presentation Alphabet

by kvanhorn

Started by Carles Caño at presentástico, we bring you our take on the Presentation Alphabet.

A

- Audience. The audience is probably the most important part of your presentation, you’re giving it to them and for them; you want to influence them somehow. Here’s how you make an Audience Needs Map .

B

- Bullet points. The most common element in presentations worldwide, sadly. Bullet Points are for listing things, not for all your content. Read F… Bullet Points .

C

- Clarity. Achieving it in your presentation might not be that easy. Your message has to be understood quickly and clearly. Read Concept Slides

D

- Design. Something many presenters fear, or worse. Design is a part of our lives, you live surrounded by it. Take inspiration from daily things around you and think as a designer when making your slides. Don’t type your slides, design them. Read Can Coco Chanel teach you how to make better slides?

E

- Emotion. It drives people, include emotion in your presentation to cause your audience to act on your material. Presentation lesson from the dark side .

F

- Feedback. After every presentation you should get feedback from your audience and peers to see how to improve the next time. Olivia Mitchell has great advice on using the backchannel to get feedback and other cool things –How to manage the Twitter backchannel.

G

- Graphs. They can be very powerful tools to prove your point or very confusing slides that will confuse and distract. Sowing data effectively .

H

- Handout. Slides are not the right type of document to present information, instead of putting all your information on them, put only the necessary to make your point; you can give detailed information on a suitable medium after the presentation as a handout. Read When not to make a presentation.

I

- Idea. 1 idea on each slide, no more. Nick Smith from Advance your slides made a great presentation Don’t be a powerpoint felon. Guess what tip number one is.

J

- Jokes. They have their place, and it isn’t in a presentation. Use humor, not jokes. How to use humor in your presentations .

K

- Knowledge. If they’ve asked you to give a presentation on a subject it’s because you have knowledge about it, so don’t feel intimidated by who might be in the audience and give a great presentation.

L

- Learn. Always learn from presentations you’ve given. We can all improve at everything we do. There’s a great post by John at Presentation Advisors with 100 tips to learn how to make better presentations!

M

- Multimedia. Images, audio, video… Multimedia can really empower your message and engage your audience. Here’s an article to learn to embed Youtube videos in powerpoint .

N

- Numbers. Many times we’re faced with having to present a lot of data. Raw numbers don’t mean much to people; people find meaning in relationships. When you have to show numbers concentrate on the relationship between the numbers and what it means. For a great example check out Hans Rosling’s presentation on world population trends.

O

- Order. The structure of your presentation is what makes it understandable. Information has to flow naturally from one point to the next. Read Nancy Duarte’s Music has a structure. Your presentation should too.

P

- Project Presentation, of course Find us on Twitter, Facebook or SlideShare.

Q

- Questions. We all know we’ll get questions at the end of the presentation. But do you know what two questions to ask yourself before? Read this great article by Garr Reynolds.

R

- Rehearse. Rehearsal is the only way to perfection. Have you seen those presentations where the speaker seems so natural and to be improvising the whole thing? Those have the longest preparation! Read How to rehearse a presentation.

S

- Story. Use a story in your presentation to keep guide and keep your audience involved. Are your presentations memorable?

T

- Teasing. Tease before you tell. Create expectation from the audience; make them want to hear the rest. Look at how Dan Pink opens one of his presentations at TED

U

- Unlearn. We’ve all learned to use powerpoint in the way its basic template work (title on top and content on bullet points). One of the first lessons I learned from Garr Reynolds was to unlearn all of this and think of slides in a different way; curiously enough we’ve all heard this before from Yoda. Present like Yoda you can.

V

- Visuals. Slides are referred to as visual aids, not as presentation, not as speaker notes. If you’re using slides they should aid you in conveying your message, don’t type your whole presentation on them.

W

- Whitespace. Whitespace is the oxygen for the eye; it lets the eye “breathe” and focus on what’s important.

X

- Xperience (okay, I cheated). Including your personal experiences in your talk will give your presentation credibility and power. Read The magical ingredient by Phil Presents and watch the amazing talk by Scott Stratten in it.

Y

- You. You are the presentation, not your slides. Put yourself out there and don’t hide behind your slides.

Z

- Zen. Presentation Zen is a great website by my mentor, Garr Reynolds. He’s written plenty of material and books combining the elements of Zen and presentations, all very recommend if you want to learn how to create and give great presentations.

I hope you enjoyed the post, if you can come up with other words and links that have to do with presentations, leave it in the comments. Or create your own Presentation Alphabet and link to it!

Until next time,
Byron Stanford for Project Presentation.

Thursday, 31 March 2011 17:13 Written by Byron Stanford 1 Comment

First kinetic typography video

For those of you keeping track, you’ve probably noticed I haven’t posted or been around for a while. This is due to my latest project: I was approached by a group of students from the university I graduated from asking me to help them with a competition for an NGO. The group was to create a presentation that explained a solution to the world water crisis. Winning the competition meant getting the project funded by Water.org. I liked the idea and got on board.

Much to my surprise the project needed much more than a presentation, a video had to be submitted explaining who the group was and the idea we came up with. So, not having much time I barricaded myself to get this video done. Now you can enjoy it, check out the solution we came up with and even vote for our solution! The solution is actually a really good approach to solving the world water crisis; you see, 1 out 4 people die of a water related desease a year; that is a quarter of the world’s population. A huge problem. Water.org has already helped 1,000,000; with this solution we want to reach more that 100,000,000 people in the next 5 years. Help us make a difference.

H2nOmics (Kinetic Typography)

Until next time,

Byron Stanford for Project Presentation

Wednesday, 16 March 2011 12:05 Written by Byron Stanford 2 Comments

Company Solutions

Individual Solutions

Speaking

Category: Project Presentation

What you shouldn’t learn from your teachers

8 Presentation rules you should break

My only rule for better presentations

[Meme] The Presentation Alphabet

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

X

Y

Z

First kinetic typography video

¿Quieres leer Project Presentation en español?

Search

Stalk us!

Join our Facebook Page

Twitter Feed