All Hail Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs never ceases to amaze me. Every time I watch one of his keynote speeches, I am struck with some new idea or a tip that I can use it my next presentation. APPLE launched its 2nd generation iPad on March 2nd, to everyone’ amazement Steve Jobs was there. As we all know that he has been suffering from a rare form of pancreatic cancer and he was on medical leave from January of this year. I was so much shocked when I saw him walking onto the stage, the ability to put his vision, his work above all inspires me.

The keynote speech was just awesome. Someone seeing him for the first time would not even realize that he suffering from cancer. That much was his commitment. I always like the way he presents, first he introduces about the statistics of the sales from the previous year, gives a gist of the new product line up, then delivering it in detail. He does not just sell or show his products, he inspires his audience. I don’t know how others felt about the presentation, but I am inspired to the fullest extent and I am going to buy an iPad 2 very soon. It’s the coolest, magical and revolutionary device I’ve seen till date.

Steve Jobs’ keynote is always unique one. Some Key points from his presentation.

1. Introduce the theme of the presentation.
2. Not just sell the products, inspire your audience and customers.
3. Give chance to the people involved to give demo of what they have created. Do what you have to do, and nothing more or less.
4. Appreciate the key people involved.
5. Give an seductive demo of the product.
6. Give the audience a hands-on experience of the product.

Perfect Preparation – Presentation

“Practice doesn’t make perfect, only perfect practice makes perfect” – Vince Lombardi

Organizing your presentation properly and planning for the visuals is the most part of any presentation. A well-organized presentation will keep the audience glued to the presentation with ease and also increase our chances of accomplishing the objectives. I think of the old chestnut of public speaking, “Tell them what you are going to tell them; tell them; and tell them what you have told them”. This statement;

1. Recognizes the importance of the reinforcement in learning,
2. Completes the communication for the listener,
3. Informs people who arrive late of what they missed,
4. Recognizes the importance of organization, highlighting and summarizing the main points for the audience,
5. Serves to clarify the main themes for the audience.

According to Nick Morgan, author of Giving Presentations, a good organization of the presentation comprises of the following four,

#1 A Compelling Opening

During the opening, use a hook - a comment, question, relevant story, statement of an example - to get your audience' interest and attention.

For presentation on Eco-Textiles

Good morning to all, we are gathered here to learn more about a very sensitive issue regarding Textiles and mother earth.

So how many of you think we need to take an action against this and reduce the harmful effects of textile industries?....Well, almost all hands are up...Well, we have a solution for this. We introduce the new Eco-Textiles, which are produced without the use of any chemical processes, a complete eco-friendly solution to change the world.

You also do the following in the opening:

• Define the purpose

• Establish the credibility
• Describe the importance
• Preview of the points to be covered in the presentation

#2 Need or problem statement

• Clarify the audience why it should care about your message
• Develop a clear need or problem that you and the audience will solve together

• Introduce relevant arguments, examples to support

• Get the involvement of the audience

• Get their feedback

#3 Solution

Make the audience understand how the problem should be solved.

• Help the audience visualize the benefits of the solution

• Involve them in developing a path forward
• Phrase your solution in terms of the audience' needs

#4 Call to action

• Reiterate the key message

• Integrate opening into closing comments

• Recommend action
• Suggest agreement
• Obtain commitment
• Provide closure.

Another very important side of the presentation is the timing or the length of the presentation. The timing of the presentation is often decided by the organizers. In other instances, you can decide the length of your presentation.

Some points that can help you in both situations are:

• Take as much as time you need to convey your key message

• Make it till the points are clear or shorten them to the time limit appropriately

• Make fewer points and make them well

• Ending clearly, its better than not completing the talk and rushing at the end

• Plan on what to delete when the time is short

• Allow time for question answer session

The key points to take away from this article and the last two articles,

1. Objectives, Observers and Context – Presentation,
2. Words of your voice!!! are,

• Identify the Presentation objective, It will drive everything you do.
• Learn as much as you can about your listeners, their biases, and their expectations.
• Address your topic from the audience’ perspective.
• Tailor your presentation to accommodate the context – the physical environment, time, and significant ongoing event that may affect the listeners.

Words of your voice!!!

Hermann Hesse once wrote, “Everything becomes a little different as soon as it is spoken out loud”. It is very important that we chose our words very careful in a presentation. After deciding the objective of your presentation, and understanding the audience and the context of the presentation, the preparation doesn’t end. The next thing is deciding what to say to those audiences and that is never an easy task. Have you ever been in a situation in which you know your objective and the observer but don’t know the exact combination of words to convince him. You are in good company if you answered YES. So, it is very important and a very necessary thing to decide what you want to say.

HBS pocket mentor guide mentions a three step process to answer the question, “What should I say?”.

1. The key message of the presentation should be defined first. Key message is that one point which you want your audience to remember or the action they should take. In case of a technical presentation, say we have to make a presentation on the developments of the 3D fabrics. The key message here is the developments and not the explanation about 3D fabrics.
2. Identify the arguments that supports the key message, imply the emotional background of the message and make the audience why they should care. Well, this is the case of the business presentation. For a technical presentation in the schools or colleges, you ought to identify the theories, examples, statistics that are related with the key message and define them in your presentation to make them understand the key message.
3. Know when to get the response of the audience. It’s very important to keep them active throughout the presentation. When you feel like the audience is losing interest in the presentation, you can chip in a humorous story or an anecdote to bring back their attention to the presentation. In the same line, you should know when to get their opinion on the points being discussed.

Statements without supporting argument is always a opinion, and people care less about your opinions. So, it is important that you have supporting data for all the statements which you make. People need proofs and and not opinions.

The key message should be very critical and support the objective of the presentation. It should be understood by the audience and the related content should convince your audience. Effective presenters use arguments that combines logic and emotion.

Objectives, Observers and Context – Presentation

Someone said “Watch your thoughts, for they become words. Watch your words, for they become actions.” Is it not very true. One word can raise or bring down an entire nation. One word can inspire people. One word can change the path of the future. The point here is, our words define everything ahead of us. That’s what makes the presentations a very important part of business and other walks of life. What we speak or what we put forward defines our personality and the points we expect.

A presentation is a powerful communication tool which are used to persuade listeners to take a particular course of action, convey information and provide a forum for discussion, gain commitment and engage people in problem solving. There are many types of presentation designed for specific purposes; Sales presentations to outline the benefits and give listeners a reason to buy, Business plan presentations which puts forward the future plans articulating the company goals… Whatever our presentations are about, its very important to keep it short, simple and powerful and never dump a lot of information. We should know that Brevity is the soul of wit.

The presentations should be based on the size, the type of audience, the time of the day, the audio-visual setup available, and others. We should never let loose ends while preparations. Every single details of the presentation should be analyzed and rectified clearly. Have a clear and focused thinking,think about the audience, the context of the presentation and the objectives of the presentation. HBS pocket mentor mentions that a clear objective something that is related to the outcome you want from the presentation. An objective can be of persuasion, discussion about some ongoing project, feedback about an introduced work method, or a sales objective. We are the ones who need to clearly define what our objective is?. Start by asking yourself, “What do I want my audience to do as a result?”.

You should know your audience well. Presentations is considered as an interactive media between the presenter and the audience. The better you understand your listeners, the more you can customize the presentation. You should be able to answer the biggest questions like how and why the listeners are related to the topic of presentation, what they expect from it? do they know about you? what is going to be their reactions towards the presentation? and other questions in the same line. The more you understand your audience or the people at the other side of the encounter, the more chances that you win.

The other very important thing to be noted is the context of the presentation. Check on the

environment, the setup of the presentation area and the procedure, the time of the presentation i.e. whether you are presenting in the last or first or somewhere in the middle, the time allotted for your presentation and others. We should be ready in the boots, before the presentation. Its better to be on the shore rather than get in the water and blame the cold. So prepare yourself better taking into consideration the Objectives of your presentation, your audience and the context of it.

Giving Presentations– HBS Pocket Mentor

Recently I read a book from Harvard Publications on how to Give Presentations.  Though many of the points covered in the book are known to us, we seldom use it. The book succeeds in compiling all the points to be taken care of while preparing for the presentations and also on the presentation day. The points given in this book are mostly related to the business presentations made in the industries but is also true with the case of high school and college presentations. The book gives excellent guidelines to gather info on audience, your presentation report and presentation itself.Right from knowing the objectives for the presentation, plan-prepare and the after presentation reviews, Dr. Nick Morgan has given excellent ideas, tutorials, pros and cons to give better presentations.

I suggest you guys get this book, you can purchase it online at Landmark or Flipkart.

A New Beginning

Public Speaking and presentation are two traits which I always wanted to develop in me. Since my tough years during military schooling, I have utilized all the opportunities, I’ve got. The extempore speech competitions, impromptu speeches, organised debates and many more during the school years and paper and poster presentations, seminars: all these have been of great help and fascination to me. I am always different on and off the stage. On the stage, I am always expressive about the central idea but thats not what happens off the stage, and I have always tried to bring about a balance between them.

This blog is for anyone who wants to improve their presentation / public speaking skills and other related skills. We can work together and change ourselves together into a better person.

Become Better Everyday!!! Cheers!!!