The Onion was a little late to the party coming up with Gore Wins Oscar, Nobel Peace Prize for Slide-Show Presentation. Quips about that hit Twitter when the Peace Prize was announced. But they do it in that wonderful way of theirs…

“The Nobel Committee was deeply moved by Mr. Gore’s passion for making a clear, concise, easy-to-watch slide show,” Professor Geir Lundestad, director of the Nobel Institute, told reporters in late October. “[The slide show] truly displayed how well-placed transitions—be they dissolves, wipes, or splits—can really tie a presentation together.”

Added Lundestad: “Also, the slides with multi-image animation were cool.”

Dear PowerPoint critics, Edward Tufte, et al,

(Cartoon by Hugh McLeod, hat tip to Adriana Lukas, Media Influencer)

Scott at Presentation Revolution offers this very true-funny post:

“…after four years we still have not seen a drastic change in the way presentations are built, designed, and delivered today. The bottom line: most presenters are insane…

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”

Now, I love what Ethos3 is doing. Meet Henry is brilliant. AND, I do enjoy this post about insanity.

BUT (Yeah you saw that coming. Sorry Scott.)

To play devil’s advocate, why WOULD there be drastic change on the whole? We’ve been mediocre at presentations for millenia. Cicero, Carnegie, lots of smart folks been chipping away at it. Same for how people overall put together memos, writings, music… Drastic improvements don’t follow just because we realize things matter, or even how to improve them. Some can, and do, make drastic improvements, but overall?

As much as communicating well matters, it’s just one thing successful people need to be good at. Presentations “built, designed and delivered” by individuals probably won’t get drastically better anymore than emails will on the whole improve. Or fitness. Or personal finance. The many who know what they *should* do, don’t. And most books on the topic offer little beyond formulaic “rules” and tricks.

When it really really matters, well, that’s when Scott and I earn our keep. We help people do their jobs better by communicating effectively.

Now, if an individual kept schlepping into meetings with the same awful slides and never understood why they weren’t making progress, sure. Insane. If an organization could not break through its “sliditis”-dependent tendencies, well… ok, maybe a lot of large organizations are pretty insane.

All this said, YES, a thousand times, I wish everyday presentations were evolving faster. But I do think the major presentations, the big conferences, we have seen some pretty cool stuff. We just gotta keep plugging away at it and showing where excellence can take us.

Try this out: Short-term (”working”) memory test. Easy for some, wicked hard for others. Chances are that you thought, while taking it, you would do fine. They are all short, familiar words, right?

Recalling them cold is another thing altogether. Unless you are good at hacking your own memory, recalling a random sequence of unrelated facts is tough.

Now that you know, use this to boost your presentation skills. Good logic flow connects the dots to make related points easier to recall. Repetition, storytelling and other techniques help make your points memorable. Building emotional connections between each concept and what is already familiar to the audience is probably the most important thing you can do to get the audience to remember — and repeat — what you’ve said. People recall what they are interested in. They more readily remember relevant things, things they feel they need. Your job is to pique that interest.

UPDATE: Also seen on Lifehacker, a bonus link on communication in Body Language

In honor of Mother’s Day… Knowing who exactly you help and what problems you solve can be used to “mom-proof” your networking spiel. These points apply equally to your presentations.

Would your mom, or any given relative, understand what you do? Does your family understand it? If your answer is “well, it’s much too technical,” brush up on features vs. benefits. Keep pushing until you find the real-world reason underlying the technicalities. Express it well enough that you and the people who know you can get it out briefly and easily.

I’m not suggesting you enlist the family for bus. dev., BUT since opportunity can arise anywhere, you need to keep your network conversant in “just what it is that you do”. Make it easy for the connectors in your life to think of you when they meet someone potentially interesting. Don’t make them do the figuring out.

If you can’t articulate what your contribution is, who will be able to repeat it on your behalf? If your audience can’t connect with your ideas, are they going to remember or pass them along?

Coincidentally perfect segue from yesterday’s post to this gem on Presentation Zen which asks

Why does it matter? What is your contribution?

Garr’s post covers it all — relevance, empathy, branding, contribution… Your job is to put all these into your next presentation.

1. Define both your objectives and your audience. Thoroughly.

2. Open strong, maintain interest, close strong

3. Organize, organize, organize; then practice, practice practice

4. Match the message to the medium to the audience

5. “Script” it by speaking, not by writing (use a coach or a scribe)

6. Use visual gimmicks and effects sparingly, if at all

7. Clarity: Discern between what you can vs. should include

8. Communicate, DO NOT RECITE

9. Arrive early, finish early

10. YOU are the EXPERT – own your subject

Bonus: Some great presentation rants from the blogosphere… Kathy Sierra, Ririan Project (via Lifehacker), Bert Decker , Presentation Zen on the “Lessig Method”, Guy Kawasaki, cazh1 ’s roundup of articles

Guy Kawasaki points out: “World’s Best Presentation” winners announced. While a slide deck is not, in my book, “a presentation”, this was a pretty cute contest idea by SlideShare, the online .ppt sharing forum angling to become the YouTube of PowerPoint. And the winners are rather pretty.

In fact, the ballad of Henry & Erica is freaking brilliant. I wish I put it together, it tells the Pistachio story brilliantly. I would love to see the Sustainable Food Lab succeed on it’s noble mission, and having been engaged in India, I can personally vouch that PaniPuri ROCK. And while the piece based on Fisch cries out “debunk me” (and Fisch sort of has), I have to admit it’s compelling in its own way too.

We almost need a new word here. These are brilliant (that word)’s because they do stand alone as compelling narratives. They are more than visual aids. Candidly, I am not sure how well they would do with a speaker. Should we call them Storyboards? Visual narratives? Standalone slideshows? ___________s?

Good training should focus on achieving results, often by personalizing the instruction. The training should ideally not end until business objectives are met. Since I teach presenting, for me this includes the objectives students need to go on to achieve with subsequent presentations. I don’t teach set programs by rote and I don’t teach to “rules of thumb.” I encourage clients to see training as a project, with “student” preparation before and mentoring after the actual training.

You can make it through the curricula, have each aspect understood and even mastered, and still not make substantive change in on-the-job performance. I believe trainers should consult to identify client needs and then apply their expertise, experience and talents to substantially re-shape client performance.

Many trainings lean heavily on hackneyed, tactical rules of thumb (again, in my world, things like slides per minute, words per line, font size, “platform skills” such as gestures, and “one size fits all” rules like never say “um”). While each tactic has its use, training is not a “one size fits all” sport.

It’s also a big mistake to treat what you are training (presentation skills, management theory, your discipline here) as the end product. Repeat after me, “what I am training is always just a tool to achieve a specific business result.” Here’s how this plays out in my work:

I teach clients to see their business presentations strategically. I develop two core abilities: how to work from the audience and the business objective/s to craft the message, and how to find individualized ways to prepare and present. I actually teach how to stop “presenting” and start engaging with their audiences. Most of all I exhort clients to know what they want the audience to do as a result of the presentation. If the presenter doesn’t know, the audience certainly won’t.

I challenge you to make your own training work more effective. Can you set aside your training “tactics” long enough to consult with your clients and keep a tight focus on what they (strategically) need to achieve?

Check out the new TED.com for some amazing presentations. If you haven’t heard of the TED conference before, here is your chance to play with the ideas presented by a select group of presenters to the exclusive invitee list. They range from silly-brilliant (don’t miss Ze Frank) so earth-moving (numerous world leaders have presented at the conference. You can view “TEDTalks” at their website and on YouTube.
TED Blog: The New TED.com launches today Monday April 16th

TED Blog: New TED.com and TED’s June Cohen featured in today’s New York Times

And many of the talks are already on YouTube: