The Learning Round Table co-sponsored (along with ALA) a Battledecks competition at ALA, and (perhaps I’m understating this) a good time was had by all. Below is the video to prove it!
Battledecks is a fun improv exercise that challenges contestants to deliver a presentation on the fly using an unknown slidedeck containing random (and often hilarious) slides. The contestants are judged on their ability to create a coherent presentation that incorporates the slide content smoothly. Laughs and getting through all of the slides on time are a plus.
If you think Battledecks looks like fun, consider a competition at your next Staff Development Day. Between contestants, judges, and slidedeck makers, there’s lots of opportunity for involvement—and as you can see from the video below, the audience is pretty involved too!
A big thanks to Janie Hermann for coordinating the Battledecks event, and to all of our judges and slidemakers! A special thanks to our good friend John LeMasney of 365sketches.org for designing and sharing (through Creative Commons license) a wonderful Battledecks logo!
I recently had the pleasure of co-presenting a full day preconference with my wife Suzanne. (The workshop, entitled, “What’s Your Style? 9 Paths to Personal and Professional Development” was based on the Enneagram personality System) I’ve co-presented with others many times over the past 15 years and strongly believe that, for a number of reasons, co-presenting can be very beneficial and raise the overall quality of the workshop and the experience of the participants.
For starters, if you are co-developing a workshop as well as co-presenting it (which is common), the quality and organization of the material greatly benefits from a joint perspective. With two brains reviewing the content, errors are reduced and points are clarified. Likewise, the logical sequencing of the content will also be improved. We all know (probably from some amount of bitter experience) that what is crystal clear and logical to us as presenters, is not always so clear to those we present to. The benefits of co-developing a workshop are magnified when presenters have different styles, and if you have a choice I encourage you to find someone most unlike yourself to present with. Be warned that presenting with someone very different can create friction. But you can choose to reframe that friction by reminding yourself often that the differences which cause friction are the same differences which will improve the quality of your presentation.
Based on my very recent experience in co-preparing and co-presenting with someone who had a VERY different style than me, here are nine reflections on co-preparing and co-presenting a full day workshop.
On Preparing
Play to your strengths: Inevitably, you and your co-presenter will have different strengths. If you don’t know each other well and/or haven’t presented together before, spend some time discussing what each of you does best, and then make an initial plan to divide the duties and tasks based on your strengths.
Set benchmarks. Assess progress. Reset benchmarks. Working with someone else will generally take more time than working alone. Also, it’s not uncommon for two people to have very different senses about when certain things need to be done. For example, I can be cool as a cucumber even when I haven’t finished writing a talk a day before it’s going to be given. My wife is stressed when she doesn’t have a talk written and practiced two weeks prior. Setting benchmarks for progress and frequently checking in on progress is a useful way to keep everyone’s stress level down, while moving forward on deliverables at an even pace.
Work separately and together. Schedule Business Meetings. I found great value in coming together with my co-presenter to set goals and deliverables, moving apart to work separately, and then coming back together to review, refine, and integrate each other’s work. Setting regular business meetings, on a calendar, with an agenda of what you would like to accomplish, goes a long way towards creating a high quality, well-sequenced presentation in a way that is manageable, and not overwhelming.
Have a Full Dress Rehearsal. No matter how good your lesson plan is, you WILL find problems and areas for improvement during a full dress rehearsal. Better to find them during rehearsal then during the actual presentation. ‘Nuff said.
Mind your version control and coordinate backups. My wife and I used a shared dropbox folder to share all materials. She could see and revise what I was working on and vice-versa. On the off-chance that dropbox disappeared overnight, I also had our home computer backing up to an external hard-drive. When all documents and powerpoints were finalized, I put one complete set of everything on three laptops (two were mine, one was my wife’s) and also put a complete set on two flash drives, one for me and one for her. When we made the inevitable last minute changes, I made sure to update in dropbox and refresh all backup copies accordingly. Being the least detail-oriented person in the world, I’m also the one to overcompensate the most when necessary!
On Presenting
Set Ground rules with each other. It is possible that you and your co-presenter have different ideas about what is appropriate behavior when one is presenting and the other isn’t. One of the biggest areas of possible conflict involves whether or not it is ok to interject, correct, or otherwise interrupt your partner while they are presenting. One of the great values of co-presenting is that your partner is well-positioned to read the facial expressions and body language of participants and is likely to be more cued in to times when participants are confused, and in need of clarification. For that reason, I encourage everyone that co-presents to open themselves to the interjections of their presenting partners, and allow for a free back-and-forth regardless of who has the floor. Additionally it is good for each presenter to….
Have complete copies and understanding of each other’s script and materials. Having complete copies of each other’s scripts (and/or outlines, and/or key points) can greatly increase the quality of the presentation for two reasons: 1) It ensures that no highly relevant points are forgotten or glossed over (if they are, your co-presenter can either alert you or interject.) and 2) It frees each presenter up from having to memorize or read excessively directly from notes. It frees us up to make more eye contact, speak more naturally and conversationally, and connect more deeply with the audience, because we know we have a safety net of sorts; our co-presenter won’t let anything important get missed.
Leave specific timing off of the participant agenda and modify timing/content on the fly. I suppose this could go under “Preparing” too… I highly recommend having a few versions of how the actual presentation can play out–a few different agendas that you share with your co-presenter but not with participants. Additionally, it is good to have additional modules (activities) and content that you don’t necessarily plan to use, but could slot in depending on timing (if you’re running short) or the interest of the participants. When my wife and I recently co-presented, we noted on our private agenda where certain portions could be expanded or moved, and where other modules that we had “in the can” could be inserted. Throughout the day we adjusted our presentation. The participant agenda was worded broadly, and only noted beginning, ending, and lunch times, which allowed us to keep to their agenda while making significant adjustments to ours along the way.
Restrain yourselves from talking too much. My growth as a presenter over the past few years has been to present less, and facilitate more. When I present, especially when I present on a topic that I’m passionate and knowledgeable about, I want to cram 20 hours of material into 8 hours of workshop. A few years ago Dr. Marie Radford shared some invaluable feedback with me after I guest lectured for her. In a nutshell, she said, “Less is more.” She advised me to cut, cut, cut the material, and spend more time talking with the students and less time talking at them. She suggested I give them the concepts and then invite them to reflect and discuss, and in that way the learning would be grounded in their own experience. So I pass along Marie’s helpful advice, as it becomes doubly tempting with two presenters to, well, present! Be extra mindful to structure your presentation in such a way as to present the key concepts, and then allow the participants to speak, question, reflect, challenge, and discuss — even if that means you don’t cover everything. (That’s what handouts are for! And websites.)
I firmly believe that a co-presented workshop — especially a full-day workshop — has the potential to be better organized, more complete and nuanced, and more engaging than a workshop presented solo. Yes, it’s likely going to be more work for you (if you’re counting the hours and minutes of prep time), but it is also an opportunity for you to learn from someone with a different style, a different knowledge base, and a different viewpoint. Ultimately, preparing and presenting a workshop with another person can be an engaging and rewarding experience for all involved, and I encourage everyone to give it a try!
A small meme developed on Twitter yesterday prompted by the following tweet by David Wedamen, “Just had a GREAT idea from @brandeislibn. Conferences should be built around TEACHING not PRESENTING. Wouldn’t that be something?” (Thanks to Michael Stephens for retweeting and bringing to my attention.)
Alice Yucht built on the idea with her tweet, “how about Conferences should be about LEARNING, not Show-n-Tell ?”, which got me thinking about how we approach conferences, and conference presentations, in the library profession. If the goal of the conference is that attendees will learn, what do conference presentations have to look like to achieve that goal?
I believe the goal of presenting should be to a create a change in the listener; a change of behavior, thinking and/or feeling. Any good teacher or trainer will tell you that to be effective in creating that change, you must begin with the learning objective(s) in mind, and work backwards from there to design the lesson or the talk.
CONFERENCE PRESENTING: THE CART BEFORE HORSE?
Wedamen’s tweet points out an interesting feature of many library conferences—they seem to be designed around topics that presenters wish to present on, more than they are designed around, or focused on, the learning that participants need. In too many conference presentations speakers design their talks as core dumps of data, or long, dry recountings of “how we did it good”, without giving enough attention to the key question, “As a result of hearing me speak, people will do/think/feel_________ “(fill in the blank).
The answer to that question is the main organizing principle, the guiding star, of any well-constructed talk. Leaving out all of the other variables that go into an effective presentation (emotion, humor, pacing, eye contact, vocal variety, body language, visuals, questions, room environment, acoustics, etc.) it is very difficult to have a successful presentation if what constitutes success is a mere afterthought (or worse, if success is constituted by the fact that the speaker got a chance to speak at a conference…)
PUT THAT HORSE BACK! TEN THINGS YOU CAN DO TO EFFECTIVELY PROMOTE LEARNING WITH YOUR TALK
Courtesy Flickr User: gruenenrw (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Ask, “What do I want them to do, think, and/or feel as a result of hearing this program?” Ask and answer this question before you write one word or create one slide. The answer to this question is your OBJECTIVE. Let the objective guide you continually as you construct your presentation, throwing aside anything that does not help achieve the goal of the talk.
Share your objectives with the audience at some point during your presentation–preferably during the first few minutes. If the audience knows what you intend to achieve with the talk it will give them context that will help them make meaning and ground the learning. It will also help them evaluate whether you have effectively achieved your goal. Or not.
Have a strong opening.The first two minutes of your talk gives you a great opportunity to grab and hold the audience’s attention, but it’s likely that you already have their attention during the first two minutes. It’s the next 58 that present the challenge! So what do I mean by a strong opening? I mean an opening that engages the audience, creates some positive expectation for the rest of the talk, and/or provides a framework for the learning that is about to take place. Olivia Mitchell, who blogs over at Speaking and Presenting, suggests three possible openings – Organized Opening, Story Opening, Dramatic Opening — and discusses when/why to use each.
Use examples to illustrate your points. For example… Don’t just say, “Merchandising your collection is good.” Say, “When we created a ‘recently returned’ display at the front door and displayed them all covers out, 98% of them recirculated within the same day and our circulation stats increased 20%.” Examples support the learning by attesting to the truth of your message, and also help ground the learning by clarifying and fleshing out your meaning.
Use simple, clear, engaging visuals to reinforce your points (or don’t use them at all.) Good visuals can help you focus the audience’s attention, help them make meaning, and promote future recall, by connecting intellectual ideas with visual representations. As for bullet points… I’m not one of those people that believes bullet points should never be used, but if you use them, do it sparingly, with a large readable font, and a supporting image (if room permits.)
Tell stories. Our brains are actually wired to enjoy stories. And because stories have the power to simultaneously engage the listener both cognitively AND emotionally, they are highly effective in getting your point across (assuming you know your point–see #1). And speaking of engaging the listener…
Appeal to emotions as well as reason. Unless you are presenting on the planet Vulcan, your audience probably consists of human beings, and research shows that it is our emotions that lead us to act. If your goal is get listeners to DO SOMETHING, you need to rouse some feeling within them by appealing to their empathy, their self-interest, or some combination of both. As the Heath Brothers suggest in Made to Stick, you want to appeal, “not only to the people they are right now but also to the people they would like to be.”
Practice, Practice, Practice:There is no substitute for practicing your talk, preferably in front of others, to work out the kinks, identify and clarify muddied points, and become comfortable with the material. When you know your talk cold you will relax, let you personality show, and more easily connect with the audience. You may have noticed that it’s difficult to connect with a presenter who reads his talk in a monotone and seldom glances up from his notes. Conversely, it is very easy to tune out and start twittering during such a talk.
Have a strong closing, and telegraph when it’s coming. You don’t have to bring tears to the audience’s eyes, or bring them to their feet. But you do need to let them know that you’re wrapping it up, and use the closing as an opportunity to reinforce your goal. You can do this by simply restating your main points and asserting why/how the listener will benefit by doing what you want them to do. Or you can end with a provocative question (engaging them cognitively), or with a story (engaging them emotionally). However you choose to close your presentation, use vocal variety and word choice to telegraph that your are concluding so the audience realizes that it is now appropriate to clap wildly.
WHAT ARE YOUR IDEAS? I’m leaving #10 blank for suggestions. What do you do to effectively promote learning in your talks? What have speakers done that have helped you as a learner/listener?
If you’ve ever taken a class (or read a book or article) on how to speak effectively in public you’ve probably heard the refrain, “find your voice.” Usually this is meant as an exhortation to let your unique, authentic, personal style shine through no matter what the talk or situation. While there is great value in knowing your style, I suggest that speakers who aspire to move beyond the novice level should seek to find not only their voice, but their voices.
Expanding your Palette
We all have a natural speaking style or “voice”. Our voice is more than just our timbre, accent, or pacing, although these characteristics are certainly part of our overall style. Our voice may also be colored by our tendency to be either casual or formal; highly structured or stream-of-consciousness; sedate or inspirational. Whatever your natural speaking style I assure you, there are situations to which it is well-suited and appropriate, and situation to which it is NOT well suited. There will be situations where you own natural voice, or style, will detract from your goal, and the adoption of other styles, will enhance your ability to get your message across.
Since the ultimate goal of any speaking engagement is to effectively communicate with the audience, and (hopefully) create some change in their thinking or behavior, it is therefore important to be able to tailor your style to a specific audience, in a specific time, at a specific place. That is why it is helpful to have a palette of voices to choose to from depending on what we are trying to accomplish in any given talk or training.
Step One: Know Thyself
The first step to effectively using many voices is to be aware of your natural style. You must know what it is you do, if you want to consciously choose to do something else. While painful for many, there is no better way to learn your own natural voice than to video yourself speaking. (yes, I’m afraid you then need to watch the video. Repeatedly.) Once you know and are comfortable with your natural voice, the next step is to begin expanding your palette of styles. Ideally, you should be able to choose from a variety of different styles, changing or modifying your natural voice as the needed. Some situations will call for a casual folksiness, while others will call for a confident professionalism. There are situations that require upbeat enthusiasm or inspiration, while in other situations your effectiveness will be increased by a sober, dispassionate style. Being able to slip into appropriate styles at the appropriate times will greatly enhance your effectiveness as a presenter.
Step Two: Know Others
There is really only one way to consciously incorporate other styles into your speaking toolkit: Watch other speakers with an eye for differing styles, and then practice speaking like they do. A great resource for seeing top tier speakers with markedly different styles is the archive of “TED Talks” available at: http://www.ted.com/ . TED Talks are eighteen minute talks billed as “riveting talks by remarkable people”, and boy do the speeches live up to the hype! After watching a few TED Talks, you’ll quickly see that there are a myriad of effective styles. Watch Sir Ken Robinson (http://www.ted.com/talks/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html)
They have vastly different styles. Watch their body language and use of gesture, their pace, their level of formality and choice of words. Each talk is brilliant and engaging, but in very different ways. Try watching one TED Talk every week and keep a notebook with notes on the elements of each speaker’s style, and how those elements make them more or less effective. Also think about when and how those elements might increase your effectiveness if you were able to use them at will.
Step Three: How do you get to Carnegie Hall? (Practice)
Once you know your own style, and have identified elements of other speakers’ styles that you might like to use, the next step is to get out there and start speaking. In addition (or instead of) speaking to community groups, colleagues, or library customers, consider joining (or starting) a local Toastmasters chapter. Why Toastmasters? Because the very structure of Toastmasters requires you to give many speeches in a variety of styles. Some speeches require you to focus on body language, others focus on being inspirational, persuasive, funny, well-researched, or simply to-the-point. Another great benefit of Toastmasters is that you will receive detailed constructive feedback on all of your speeches—which is at least as valuable, if not more so, than watching yourself on video. Finally, Toastmasters gives you an opportunity to see others giving speeches, so you can continually observe a variety of styles noting what works, what doesn’t, and why. Toastmasters offers speakers that rarest of gifts; a place to try new things and practice in a safe environment.
Speaking in Voices: Putting it All Together
Whether you choose to join Toastmasters or not, I encourage you to try on new voices and find some safe forum for giving talks that are outside of your comfort zone. Learning to speak in a variety of voices is like learning to act outside of your natural personality style: All of us can do it – and to be effective there are times when all of us have to do it– but it takes conscious effort and energy.
I knew that the presentation was going to be after a lunch and part of a long, full day, so I made certain style choices with a goal of getting and holding the audience’s attention, and re-energizing them to get through the rest of the afternoon. The choices I made to achieve that goal were:
speaking with greater vocal variety (varying speed and pitch)
using many engaging visuals
using humor
increasing movement and gesture
using no notes (the first time I’ve done a truly noteless talk—but I wanted to be more free to move/gesture)
All of these conscious choices were outside of my natural style, which meant that this seven minute talk took more time, energy and preparation then many longer talks I’ve done. Many of the elements (the visuals, the humor, the gesturing, the vocal variety) I had practiced as separate skills in many Toastmasters meetings over the past few years, so when it came time to put them together I was able to choose from a fairly rich palette of voices.
My ultimate goal is to be able to easily choose from many styles (Inspiring, Passionate, Funny, Serious, Whimsical, Practical, Irreverent, Self-deprecating, Authoritative, Provocative, Authentic, Motivational, Challenging, Helpful, Informative, Scholarly, Folksy, etc.) and body/voice techniques (Pitch, Inflection, Speed, Volume, Diction, Pauses/silences, Gestures, Body Language, Eye Contact, etc.) and effectively create the right mix, at the right time, for the right audience.
What’s Your Story?
I’d love to hear from you about how you’ve developed your style. What are you tips, tricks and triumphs? Who inspires you to reach a little further, and stretch just a little bit more out of your comfort zone? If you have any good links to videos that you’ve found helpful let me know (or better yet, add them to this shared bookmark group: http://groups.diigo.com/groups/clenert)
