Powerful Presentations Tip #6: Great Slides Are By Design, Not Default

Many conferences no longer provide handouts as they green their meetings, and I’m all for anything that reduces paper waste. That said, well-designed handouts (not just slides reprinted in handout form) can be a valuable interactive tool to engage participants in notetaking and other written exercises. While I don’t use handouts for all my sessions, I do see them as integral to many presentations and lament others who forget their potential to enhance learning.

If you are going to do handouts, do so with great intention. Design printed materials that will support and supplement the overall learning experience you are trying to create. Use page layout programs like Pagemaker or InDesign so they are more visually appealing and varied than slide output. Always ask yourself: Is what I am creating worth the paper and ink it will take to produce it? If not you might make it a supplemental file that can be viewed online. You can download a one-page primer on standout handouts (designed no less in model handout form) that I originally published in the September 2007 issue of Associations Now.

So what about slides? Three brilliant books already cover this topic better than I ever could hope to do: Beyond Bullet Points by Cliff Atkinson, slideology by Nancy Duarte, and Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds. Clicking on the book titles takes you to Amazon; clicking on the authors takes you to their web sites where you will find lots of free resources. But let me offer you a few tips I think can be helpful right away.

Just as with the other visuals discussed in tip #5, only create slides to support your overall learning objectives and to help create the desired environment for the presentation. Less will almost always be more when it comes to slides, both in terms of your total slide deck count and the amount of info on a slide. That being said, highly technical talks often require far more information to be visually displayed than other types of presentations, so no one rule fits all situations.

Four types of slides are commonly found in my decks: information, illustration, instruction, and ignition.

Information slides convey key facts, details, and supporting points for what I am discussing.

Illustration slides contain images that support assertions I am making verbally, providing a clear example that enhances the understanding of what's being said.

Instruction slides give participants the information they need for exercises/activities I have them do. While I also verbalize such instructions, having them on a slide is helpful for visual learners and those who didn't catch everything I said.

Ignition slides typically are images, words, or quotes that serve as catalysts or springboards for stories or key sections of my talk. They help ignite participants’ interest in what will follow.

These distinctions might not be how you would divide your own slides, but I find them helpful in clarifying my intention for the slides I create: to inform, to illustrate, to instruct, to ignite.

While having some design skills or intuitive visual orientation definitely is an asset, it’s not a requirement for creating good slides. Just as you might tear out magazine pages illustrating home designs you like, you can do the same thing for slides. I have file folders (both in hard copy and on my laptop) containing slides, handouts, newsletters, and other publications containing examples of good design. I use them for inspiration as I create my decks. I regularly check out slide decks uploaded to Slideshare.net (think YouTube for slides) to see what others are doing.

Having coached a lot of presenters on slide design this year and having redone more slides than I would care to remember, let me give you a eight simple reminders:

1. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should. Slide programs offer lots of options for animations, sound effects, and transitions, but the best decks use these judiciously. Too many slide decks are filled with annoying sound effects and jarring transitions or animations just because they were there to use.
2. Only work with the top 70% of your slide. While the recommended percentage may vary, the advice never does. The bottom of your slide won’t be readable from the back of a large room, so don’t put critical information there. It’s a great place for conference or company logos though I find having those on every slide an unnecessary visual distraction.
3. Limit yourself to only a few fonts or colors and try to use them consistently. Magazines typically use a headline font and a body text font. They also sometimes have a different font for certain sections. Good slides do the same, using any differences consistently as a way of subtly helping participants understand the organization of your slides.
4. Don’t rely on the software’s default settings, particularly with bullet point text. Manually inserting or adjusting line or paragraph spacing can help unite lines of text that are better read together while allowing appropriate white space between points so that the eyes get a breather. And don't let one or two words get orphaned on a separate line because the word wrap kicks them over.
5. Avoid clip art, particularly the art included with the software. Everyone has it. Everyone can use it. As a result, your deck is not distinctive. Plus so much clip art is juvenile or cheesy. Not all of it. But a lot of it. Look instead to royalty-free or low cost photo sites to get high quality images or take pictures yourself with a digital camera.
6. Use text reversed out of colored boxes/shapes for emphasis. It’s a simple way to introduce a lot of contrast into a slide and give prominence to a key point.
7. Don’t use bullet points unless no other design choice will work. Bullet points aren't inherently evil, but they aren’t far from it. Because they are a default software setting they are often overused. If you are talking about four separate points, you don’t necessary need a bullet point or number in front of them. Turn off the bullets on one of your existing slides and see what happens. Often it is just as readable. Or it can be made even more visually appealing by playing with the line spacing or other layout options.
8. Finally, don’t forget white space. Intentional use of white space creates breathing room on your slide and provides variety and contrast. Play with the width of various text blocks so they don’t cover the complete horizontal line of your slide. Move them around on your slide to create open blocks of space.

These are just a handful of the dozens of pointers others found helpful in our slide design efforts. The bottom line? The best slides help tell stories. They reinforce your key points and enhance participants’ understanding and retention of your talk’s content. Ruthlessly review your deck because any slides that aren't doing just this, just don't belong.

BFF Alert

Before you send out a letter and stack of material ...

before you invite me to be your friend on Facebook or join your network on LinkedIn ...

before you type in your letter or email to me something along the lines of "it was so good to spend some time with you at the meeting last week" ...

you might want to think about whether or not I was actually at the event and whether or not we ever met or spoke.

Just because my name was on the list doesn't mean I actually made it to the event (I didn't), that we met (not a chance), or that we had a pleasurable interaction (perhaps in your fantasy life).

When you take any of the actions listed above solely working off the pre-registration list for a meeting, you run the risk of using really personal language in the most impersonal and generic (and in my book, offensive) way.

Powerful Presentations Tip #5: Valuable Visuals Offer More than Meets the Eye

Learning can be enhanced through the effective use of visuals, and visuals involve more than just handouts and slides (they will be covered in detail in the next post). Let’s consider five other visual elements available for your use: (1) you, (2) props, (3) video, (4) wall posters, and (5) flipcharts.

You are going to be the focus of participants’ attention and that makes you one of the most powerful visuals available. If you’re doing a session on “What Current Trends Tell Us About the Future” and you come out wearing a Sherlock Holmes hat, it sets up what could be a powerful opening. Talking about the five hats CEOs wear? You guessed it: have those hats available for reference. Any costuming can quickly deteriorate into a groanable offense with the wrong crowd, so be judicious with your choices.

In addition to considering how what you wear might affect the learning experience, you also need to consider your positioning. Standing behind a podium can be perceived as more professorial or lecturing. Standing freely on the stage can seem more conversational, but for some will appear uncomfortable. In smaller rooms when you aren’t on a riser, moving toward or through the audience can be used to shift their attention, to connect more with individuals. Use your position in the room and the shifts you make to manage participants’ attention.

Costumes essentially are a collection of props, another visual option to consider. When your dental hygienist talks to you about better brushing technique, it is abstract until she takes out an oversized set of teeth an shows you exactly what she means with a toothbrush. When I talk about organizational culture, I often use the expandable Hoberman Sphere as a visual illustrating how an organization’s core values can remain intact as others interpret them and bring them to life in their actions. One or two carefully used props often can be among the most beneficial ways content is brought to life, particularly if they are metaphors for your talk's overall theme or one of its major assertions/ideas. Make them a participant giveaway/takeaway and it will serve as a powerful visual reminder of your content long after the session is over.

Video clips are becoming a more frequent element of talks. Brief clips from cellphones or inexpensive cameras like the Flip Video Camcorder (between $100-$200) can easily be incorporated into a talk. Doing a talk on customer service? Show clips of good and bad example and then talk about the differences. Do Jay Leno-style "person on the street" interviews to quickly illustrate varied perspectives on a key question or issue. Some television commercials can be used to illustrate ideas or reinforce points you’re making. And low-royalty video clips are popping up online much in the way stock photography is sold.

Another easily used, but rarely considered, visual resource is the meeting room wall space. For sessions with fewer than 150 participants, I often will place oversized posters containing a key quote or question on the walls around the room and then use them as meeting places for small group discussions. Or think of them like paintings in an art gallery and have participants roam freely, reviewing the various works, and then returning to their seats for a facilitated large group discussion. Wall-size graphic templates for a variety of group work can be purchased or you can create your own and have them enlarged to poster proportions. Any posting is less likely to raise the ire of the Meeting Room Police if you use artist’s tape to hang your sheets.

And finally, don’t forget our old friend, the flipchart. Just as musicians often go acoustic for a raw, more authentic sound in their performance, using a flipchart can create a more handcrafted, less slick and pre-packaged feel to your session. A variety of low-cost resources are available to help you create simple drawings that chart your content in more meaningful ways. VizThink is a powerful community of visual practitioners offering affordable webinars and other learning opportunities, and The Grove Consultants International offers Pocket Pics, a great picture dictionary offering possible hand-drawn images for more than 100 business concepts.

With all of these options available to enhance the visual appeal of your presentation, you may find handouts or slides aren’t necessary for a particular session. But if they are, my next post will offer you some insights on how to strengthen their contribution to the learning experience.

Beware of Higher Risk, Lower Return

I recently stayed at a large convention hotel of a major brand in a top tier city.

Within four hours of checking in I had experienced more than a half-dozen minor service mishaps, none particularly consequential, but each frustrating in its own right. A previous stay more than a year ago was somewhat similar, but out of brand loyalty, I wanted to give the property a second chance.

So here’s the deal. Hotels rates are dropping like crazy. Choices and incentives abound. Why would anyone choose to stay in a property that based on two experiences now demonstrates itself to be a higher risk, lower return property? I know I certainly won’t do so again.

Higher risk. Lower return. Does that describe your organization? The decision to become a member of it? Attending any of your meetings? Purchasing any of your products?

If so, you’ve got considerable work to do ... and it needs to be done with great haste.

Powerful Presentations Tip #4: Great Content Is Necessary But Not Sufficient

All too often great content falls flat because presenters spend far too little time thinking about the format and flow of their presentation. Bringing your content to life requires thoughtful consideration of options whether you plan on talking from the podium or facilitating a more interactive learning experience.

You will create a more engaging session that attracts and retains participants’ attention, energy, and interest if you answer a simple question for each of your major content threads: what are the various learning formats and teaching techniques that could be used for this segment?

Let’s say part of your session involves helping people better manage various customer service situations. How might you do that? You could:

• Lecture about the major components of good customer service and how they apply to common situations.
• Tell a story about a time when you experienced or managed a challenging customer service situation.
• Show video clip examples of good service and bad service and lead participants in a discussion about what they observed.
• Have people turn to a partner and share a time when they received outstanding customer service. Then facilitate a large group discussion identifying customer service best practices.
• Break participants into triads for a role rehearsal/play with one person being the customer, one being the service staff member, and one being an observer.
• Do a role play/rehearsal in front of all participants and then have a debrief.
• Have participants break into small groups and read various customer service case studies and identify how they would handle them.
• Twitter a customer service tip to your account and have those roll real-time on the screen.
• Do a real-time the participants on how they would handle various customer service situations and lead the entire group in brief discussion of the results.
• Divide participants into two groups. Have one identify the top five qualities of outstanding customer service and one identify the five elements of customer service that most frustrate the customer.
• Any combination of the above or another option not listed.

So how do you decide? The final choice is more art than science, but selecting a technique or format involves considering which approach:

• Might best advance your learning outcomes;
• You can confidently and comfortably lead;
  
• Is most appropriate for your participants’ demographics and preferences;
• Will yield the right level of participant energy and engagement;
• Offers variety from previous formats or techniques used;
• Most helps participants connect the content to the respective contexts;
• Support content segments and formats that will follow later; or
  
• Effectively uses the time available for this content segment.

Once you’ve completed this consideration and selection process for each content segment, step back and examine the overall flow of your session through two lenses: (1) how the content unfolds, and (2) the participant engagement your teaching techniques evoke. Refinement might involve reordering some content so it makes more sense for participants or switching out a teaching technique to be more interactive or perhaps more reflective.

Don't walk away thinking that lecture is evil. A well-crafted talk from the sage on the stage that includes memorable stories, compelling content, and engaging examples often is far superior than a poorly planned session involving highly interactive teaching techniques. And some settings and audiences clearly want to be talked to/with rather than be asked to do group work. Just remember that for every teaching technique you select, other techniques that are potentially more engaging or interactive are always available and should be considered.

Renowned architect and designer Eliel Saarinen once said: “Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context—a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment, an environment in a city plan.” Savvy presenters do the same, always considering how each content segment fits into its larger time block, how each time block fits into the overall session design, and how their individual session fits into the larger conference schedule or ongoing workshop series being offered.

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Beyond Attractive Incentives

Alfie Kohn doesn't like incentives, and I often agree. One of his most recent essays critiques employers offering financial incentives to employees who adopt healthier lifestyle habits and behaviors. In short, he doesn't believe it will work.

His two primary objections are that (1) deeper psychological or sociological issues often are the true cause of these unhealthy habits, and (2) extrinsic motivation doesn't usually last in the long run. No argument from me on either front, but I do think #2 should be considered a constraint to address as opposed to a reason for not trying.

Let's say you offer a $50 reduction in monthly health premiums to individuals who quit smoking. Cash is the initial motivator, and it is indeed extrinsic. At some point, the monthly savings may no longer have its initial motivational appeal. So before the extrinsic incentive loses all its value, the wise employer would help individuals identify and connect with intrinsic motivators that may be surfacing as a result of no longer smoking: feeling better overall, able to engage in physical activities with family and friends, less labored breathing, etc.

So if you offer coupons to customers or discounts to members you need to understand the potential shelf life of the incentives. But with an intentional strategy you might be able to replace some of the initial attraction to save money with an internal awareness of other value being received.

Powerful Presentations Tip #3: The Best Content Begins with B.S.

Admit it. You’re a bit nervous about what this tip might hold. The best content begins with B.S.? Of course, it’s not the B.S. you’re thinking of … nor is it the B.S. most people turn to as they start their presentation design: Bullet Slides.

The best content begins with a blank slate. Once you’ve clarified learning outcomes (tip#1) and context (tip #2), you’re ready to brainstorm possible content. A blank slate approach lets you get your complete thinking out more easily. After doing so you then go back and refine your initial thoughts. Software programs like Keynote and PowerPoint can unnecessarily constrain your thinking at this stage, so I strongly encourage you to avoid using them yet.

What do I mean by blank slating? In general, I’m talking about freeform identification of the content points, stories, examples, quotes, etc. supporting the presentation outcomes. In doing this for my own sessions, I generally mindmap the content around my key outcomes or content points, or I individually write down every thought or idea I have on slips of scrap paper. It’s a glorified brain dump, getting out on paper (or screen) all my ideas about what could be included in the presentation.

After doing this, I organize and label common themes, essentially creating a rough outline/flowchart of the core concepts and supporting stories, examples, and details for each one. I then review my work to see what’s not necessary, what might be missing, what needs to be fleshed out more. I specifically look for ways to streamline my key points and to make them more succinct and memorable. I want to identify the most compelling hooks that will engage people’s attention in the session and that will have the longest staying power after the presentation. Finally, I do some initial prioritization of each supporting content piece (essential, desirable, additional).

Being more of a right-brain thinker, this usually is sufficient for me to move on to the next stage of presentation design. If you are more left-brain, you might want to move this information into a text outline.

To summarize this part of the process: think freely and edit faithfully while avoiding slide design software for this step of the design process.

Paying for Results

I once had a friend who had an interesting idea about her pay when speaking at a conference. In lieu of charging an honorarium for general sessions or keynotes, she envisioned passing an offering plate at the end of her talk and asking people to make a contribution based on how valuable they found her presentation.

While she never actually did it, I'm convinced that the quality of her work would have led to much bigger paydays from the participants than the fee she was charging the sponsoring organization.

Paying for value. It's an idea that seems to be increasingly gaining traction be it artists releasing CDs online and letting you pay whatever you want ... to pay what you can for local theatre performances ... to advertisers paying ad firms based on actual sales changes from the ad campaigns they design as opposed to flat fees regardless of the ultimate results.

Whil I doubt many professional societieis would ever fully embrace this mindset when it comes to member dues or conference registration, I'd sure be curious about what price people would pay to affiliate or attend if they were able to name their own terms. Given the minimal value associated with some memberships and conferences, I'm not really sure just what it is we are paying for or why people continue to do it.

Powerful Presentations Tip #2: If Content is King, Context also is Royalty

After they determine learning outcomes, many presenters immediately identify content segments for their session. Too often though, presenters don’t sufficiently consider context before selecting content, and that’s a missed opportunity. At least four participant contexts should be considered as a part of session design:

Their profession or industry

What’s happening in the participants’ profession? Is it a growing or contracting industry? Is it characterized more by stability or rapid change? What immediate challenges and issues confront it? Who are the critical stakeholders for the profession or industry? What partnerships or alliances are in play?

Their workplace (and their role in it)

Are your participants students, self-employed, small business staffers, or part of a large organization? Are you speaking to front-line workers, middle managers, or executive leaders? What’s the geographic distribution of the participants and what do you need to understand about similarities and differences between various locales? How are workplace decisions made and changes introduced and managed? What workplace factors could influence participants’ efforts to apply the content from your session?

Their overall knowledge, experience, and personal characteristics

What knowledge and experience do participants possess? Is your session a refresher on fundamentals or an introduction of new ideas and concepts? What’s the necessary mix of theory and practice given the participants’ current experience and work challenges? What learning styles do you need to design for and what general participant preferences or tendencies do you need to keep in mind? What are participants' general demographics that can help you select appropriate pop culture references, quotes, content examples, etc.?

And don’t forget

Your session’s placement in the overall workday or conference schedule is one final context to consider. What will happen immediately before and after your training session, and what implications does the timing have for participants’ attention, energy, interest, and expectations?

Considering context at this early stage in your presentation design helps ensure your choices about content, format, and supportive materials are relevant and will resonate with session participants. A session that can be presented to anyone, in any profession, in any environment, at any time will speak to no one with the authority and customization that learners deserve.