“Oh my god, this guy’s presentation has 120 slides in it! I can’t wait for lunch.” Ever been there? “How long is this presentation supposed to last, again?” you ask yourself as you glance around looking for a clock to gauge how much agony you’re going to endure. Yep, you’ve been there too. It’s the classic boring presentation meeting that you’re politely attending, hoping there’ll be a power outage so you don’t have to sit through the whole PowerPoint.
Better yet, you hope your Blackberry has enough battery life to allow you to digitally escape by doing the Crackberry Prayer (that’s your head bowed down and both your hands cradling your mobile device as you reply to the text message from your friend who’s lucky enough not to be at the meeting).
You’re experiencing “Death by Powerpoint” which is a popular presentation by Alexel Kapterev. There’s even a video that’s laugh-out-loud funny and wildly-popular on YouTube by Don McMillan. It’s worth watching just to lift your spirits. I embedded it below just because you need to laugh!
But more importantly, I found a book by Garr Reynolds called Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery (Voices That Matter)
the lessons to all of my speaking engagements and it’s improved my audience response and sets me apart from other presenters almost every time I get up to speak. Garr challenges the conventional wisdom of making PowerPoint presentations and encourages you to think differently about the design and your delivery. Even though many presentations are best done without multimedia (just a marker and flip chart will do), he focuses on those where PowerPoint (Microsoft) or Keynote (Apple) are appropriate tools to enhance your “story.”
Here’s What I Like About the Book
- He points out, in a more authoritative way, that most presentations suck because we default to reading bullet points and get trapped into the templates provided with the software – hence, “Death by PowerPoint.”
- To reach an audience, you need more than data – you need a story, good visuals, an emotional connection with the audience and some humor or “play.” Think of the last time you saw that with a presenter – rarely!
- You have to let go of the past and think outside the box (amen to that!). Dump the templates and ask yourself What’s my main point? Why does it matter?
- This sounds so basic, perhaps sarcastic, but he says you must take the time to plan out your presentation ahead of time. Don’t be lazy and just type into the templates. Think about your audience. What can you provide them that will actually help them. etc. I wish more people truly did this – and, more importantly, had the courage to decline a presentation invitation if they haven’t – there’d be a lot less “deaths.”
- This advice, which drives my government coworkers absolutely crazy, is one of the best pieces of advice I’ve taken away from this book:
“Never, ever hand out copies of your slides, and certainly not before your presentation. That is the kiss of death. By definition, since slides are are “speaker support” material, they are there in support of the speaker… YOU. As such, they should be completely incapable of standing by themselves, and are thus useless to give to your audience, where they will simply be guaranteed to be a distraction. The flip side of this is that if the slides can stand by themselves, why the heck are you up there in front of them?” – Davis S. Rose.
- He also goes into detail about how can craft your story and identify what makes messages stick. This is key to making your effort worthwhile. So spend the time to learn the tricks to connect.
What I Don’t Like About the Book
- It can be a little too much “Zen” and not enough real world examples. I’d like to see a few more case studies. He does put a few towards the end, but it would be better if they were examples along the way.
- There’s not enough reference to outside materials (videos, blogs, etc) to allow me to absorb more concepts and see them in action. The authro does have his own blog which I’m just starting to thumb through.
Read This Book – It’s Worth the Time
This book is worth every penny I spent on it – and if you have to do presentations – it will be worth every penny you spend. I strongly recommend you borrow a copy from a friend and read it – or buy a copy to have handy everytime you’re faced with building a new presentation that will make you look like a rock star!
You can buy your own copy here – Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery (Voices That Matter)
** In full disclosure, I have an Amazon Associates link that tracks back to me – so if you buy a copy I will make 30 cents, or something like that. My review is based on my true love for this book, not the life-changing pennies I accumulate to pay for the web hosting of this blog – but a sincere thank you to those who do click the link and buy a copy.
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