I am traveling home after a grueling week of UK pinball, meaning I have spent three days this week in London and therefore made 6 trips up and down the country. Today’s trip to the big smoke was to rehearse a bid team for an m62 STAT. Their presentation is on Monday and today was the final dress rehearsal stage of the process. As sometimes happens the team had decided to remove the clicks in the presentation, feeling that it would be too distracting for the audience for them to constantly be clicking during the presentation. This happens a lot. Making the shift from old style bullet point presentations (Presentations With Visuals) to modern visual communications (Visual Presentations) is difficult; but on the whole, worth the effort.

The Audience Visual Assimilation Control Device (or clicker) is the tool we use to control the pace of visual information flowing into the audiences’ visual cortexes. Our voice is the primary source for phonetic information and one would hope we are already in control of that! By putting the presenter in control of both visual information and phonetic information, we encourage Dual Encoding, which is where the Working Memory (Central Executive) processes the same information on two channels simultaneously. This is what drives the increase in both attention and retention that marks our presentations as different from the old style of death by PowerPoint. I guess that makes the presenter the Audience Phonetic Assimilation Control Device!

While it’s clearly more effective (we have measured recall to be 3-4 times that of old style Death by PPT) it is a new skill for many of our presenters. It often takes a leap of faith to trust us and abandon their anxieties and their prejudices. It does at first feel uncomfortable having to make all those clicks – but only the presenter is really aware of them; to the audience it just becomes a seamless flow of information. If we get it right the audience shouldn’t be able to recall whether the information was visual, phonetic or both.

Happily, after 18 years of coaching people through this we are pretty good at convincing them that it’s the right thing to do. I am not sure that makes it any less terrifying for them, but it does mean we have to re-animate the slides overnight tonight… Thank God for designers who are prepared to work long hours…

In anticipation of a new blog.. here is one I wrote in 2009.. watch this space.. comments please!

• Don’t use speaker notes.
• Don’t write scripts.
• Don’t wear white socks.
• Why? Because you will come across as an amature!

Occasionally when presenters use a script they end up concentrating on it more than on the audience, which is a recipe for disaster. Presentations need to be dynamic and audience-centered. A script, almost by definition, prevents dynamism by compelling you to follow it. Therein lies the real problem..

When you use a script you ignore your slides, when you ignore your slides you drive a wedge between phonetic information (you) and visual information (the screen). That prevents Dual Encoding (understanding by the audience of what they hear and what they see at the same time).

Unless you are very, very, very good at presenting using a script won’t work well. (A professional actor can sometimes pull it off, and some TV presenters can read an auto-cue and make it look natural, but one only needs to see the show Have I Got News for You in the UK to see the difference between a professional and an amateur.)

So why do people do it? Well, like a number of things that people do to help when they are stressed, it’s easy. You have been reading since you were 3 or 4, and you can do it in your sleep (well, OK not really but it is easy). Reading is easy, and so using a script to help overcome stress is a popular approach – especially when your brain chemistry is being altered by that wonderful survival drug adrenalin.

Those that can do; those that can’t… read a script.

The art of competence

What are you good at? Chess, cooking, squash, sailing, wine appreciation, business, presenting or perhaps selling? One thing is for sure – you are probably not the best at all of them.

How good do you need to be to deliver an effective presentation about any of these subjects? Certainly not world class. Competent is the word that springs to my mind. You don’t need to be the best – just better than the average of the group. I have given presentations on all of the subjects above, but I am clearly not the best at any of them. The secret is to know that you don’t need to be.

• Don’t pretend you know something you don’t – the expert may be in the audience
• Don’t start by saying you don’t know something (they don’t know you are not an expert)
• Explain why you have credibility in the subject

Most of the time when we are asked to coach presenters, particularly presenters for large pitch presentations, they are far from experienced expert presenters. In fact, more often than not, they are not even the content experts. They do however know more about their company and its products and services than the prospect.

“I believe we can help you” isn’t a good sales line.

My belief that I can help you isn’t persuasive; you would expect me to believe that whatever I’m selling works (I hope). If the most common sales mistake is not articulating the reasons to buy, next is assuming that because you have identified ways to drive value for your client, so have they.

Prove it!

Step 1

The search for Proof is more likely to be successful if you know what you are looking for. Often marketing teams search in vain for relevant case studies because they don’t know what they are trying to prove. The client likes us isn’t a good qualification criteria. Lewis Caroll wrote, “if you don’t know where you are going, any road will take you there.” So, start with a specific proof point. For my business, I have to prove that clients improve their sales win rates when they work with my team. If I ask my marketing department to provide me with statistics on that proof, it’s a much easier directive than “please create some compelling case studies.”

Step 2

Look in these four areas:

1. Testimonials: 1st person (using your own data and personal experience), 2nd Person (profile the success of a client with similar issues as the prospect), 3rd Person (a credible, independent verification of value, not capability) 3rd person testimonials from a trusted source are the most persuasive, but quoting Private Eye in the UK or National Enquirer in the US don’t qualify, and 2nd person is probably better than 1st. On the whole, testimonials are only as powerful as the source and only if they are relevant!
2. Processes: list the steps involved in driving value and compare your process to the competitors (or their lack of process.)
3. Technology: whether it’s online systems, hardware, a methodology or Intellectual Property – just try and avoid making it about people. Any sales person with a modicum of passion about their company can wax poetic about how much smarter, faster and more talented their people are than the competition.
4. Logical arguments: if in doubt, create a deductive chain starting from a known fact and ending with value for the client.

Step 3

Look for stories that tie in multiple types of proofs. This may include a case study profiling a 3rd party that recognizes the value driven from a process derived from a unique bit of your intellectual property. Now that is compelling.

Step 4

Draw the slides, and then get somebody who has the time and the skills to put them into PowerPoint.

Step 5

Practice.

Step 6

Win!

Simple really – good luck!

Lewis Carole had it wrong: “begin at the beginning” said the King to Alice.

Writing 3000 sales presentations and critiquing the same number has taught me a lot, but if there is one thing that I know for certain it’s that most people start off wrong.

Don’t write the first slide of your presentation first.

Regardless of what the presentation is about, it’s best to start with the end.  In a sales pitch, that needs some careful thinking. Most sales people think the desired outcome is simple, (TO WIN!) – but in my experience that’s usually unrealistic. While it might be a good outcome from the whole sales process, it may not be a SMART goal from the presentation  (SMART being Specific, Measurable, Action orientated, Realistic and Timed.)

Some of the questions it prompts me to ask are:

• Who is the decision maker?
• Are they in the room?
• Can they make a decision in the meeting?
• Do they need to see anything else before they can make their decision?

So, tip #1 is to make sure you have a question to ask at the end of the presentation – your “close” – is SMART. Then you can start building a pitch.

In searching for a value proposition, do not ask “What?” but “Why?” Why would the prospect give you the order for business? Most people believe that this is easy to articulate; right up to the moment their mouths open to do so and then they realise that what seemed obvious isn’t so. Rigour, challenge and persistence is my advice, keep asking “So What?” until you hear something that sounds like a good argument for action.

Then collect tangible proof that you can deliver this value to the client.

Proof Points

I like proof to be:

• A testimonial
• A process
• A technology
• An argument
• Preferably visual, short and ideally poignant

Once you have this, you pretty much have your presentation. You can write the introduction last, introducing the information the audience will need to understand. The arguments that follow should rapidly (less than 3 mins) establish empathy with the prospect and credibility for the presenter, organisation and solution.

Clearly I could write a book about this (oh.. I have!) but that’s the 300 word summary.

Friendly Assassins

Last year at the ISSM, I gave a presentation called “Friendly Assassins and Enemy Plants.” This refers to fact that many presenters often face their biggest hurdle when they are rehearsing in front of a critical leader/boss/coach. There to help and encourage, the presenter’s team often winds up breaking their spirit by nit-picking too much and failing to mention what was done well. Most people couch the feedback with, “Great (insert positive qualifier), but…” and then a list of mistakes.

What the Presenter Hears

Now from the presenter’s view of the world, next time he takes to his feet he will forget the positive qualifier and focus on correcting the list of mistakes. Unfortunately, this usually winds up backfiring – rather than focusing on the story or the sale at hand, the presenter preoccupied with avoiding errors.

Of course some presenters are naturally good and confident. They take negative feedback and turn it into a constructive critique that fuels a better performance. However, most people are not professional presenters and it’s very hard to be positive in the face of a list of gaffs. Especially if the critique came from your Boss, or your Boss’s boss.

Making Criticism Constructive

The next time you have the opportunity to provide feedback on a presentation, here’s some ways to ensure your feedback has a good impact:

• Listen for the good stuff and make notes about what worked well
• Commend the presenter on cool sound bites, interactions, rhetorical questions, pauses – all the components of a great presentation
• Carefully select the areas you believe the presenter should focus on improving
• Sandwich the critique between to positive reinforcements
• Always use constructive comments – say, “it might be better if you said it like this…” rather than “Don’t say that.”

Providing good, positive feedback is a skill that takes practice and thought, especially for busy executives who are coaching their teams. This is the secret sauce for successful presentations though – presenters need to have confidence in their message and delivery, and who better to help them get it than the boss?

Enemy Plants can be the subject of another blog, another day.

Moving from Monologue to Dialogue to encourage audience interaction and involvement.

A couple of weeks ago I was preparing a sales team for a two-day presentation session. The prospect is outsourcing a $1 billion IT project and scheduled 14 different sessions, 30-90 minutes each with 25 presenters and contributors in total.

In a sales situation like this, the more the prospect talks the better. So as the presenter, how do you encourage participation, control the debate and build on the relationship?

Step 1: Dialogue Themes

• Create five (or less) key critical themes (e.g. competitive differentiators, superior technology)
• Designate a presenter to deliver on each theme in their monologue
• Respond to questions in the dialogue with an answer that relates to one of the themes

Step 2: Distill Presentation Content

• Prepare enough material for each presenter to fill 75% of the allotted time
• Spend one week preparing and rehearsing the delivery
• Spend the day before the presentation cutting out material that does not address the issues associated with the key themes
• Add cut slides to the end of the presentation
• Deliver the content in half the time, with back up slides to cover the rest IF they are useful to the dialogue

If in the unlikely event the prospect has no questions, you can always go through these slides at the end but in my experience it never happens. If they don’t have any questions, they aren’t really considering you.

Step 3: Prompt Audience Interaction

• Coach the presenters to encourage dialogue by asking questions of the audience
• Rhetorical open questions have both a positive effect on audience synthesis but also encourage dialogue: What do you think?

So, How’d it Go?

Historically when I’ve worked with groups of technical or operations focused individuals, it is difficult to get the conversations flowing. So many are inherently quiet, perhaps so they are better able to process the insane amount of complex information that fills their day-to-day lives.

On the whole the session went really well, all presenters got through their core content, focused on the key themes and created good healthy productive dialogue. I consider this a great accomplishment – even the most introverted person can enliven a conversation when it’s something they are passionate and confident about!

How did I do? I’ll let you be the judge. Below is a link to the whole presentation; it’s about 45 mins long and the team are working on cutting it up a bit to produce two short segments.

[See post to watch Flash video]

How was it for me?

Frankly, it was much better than I thought at the start. The technology for sharing the diagrams I was drawing didn’t work as well as hoped. The projector wasn’t bright enough and the video camera that was supposed to be showing the hand drawn visuals arrived with no power cable and so we had to improvise.

Once I got going, it seemed to work well. The point I was trying to make is that “the pen isn’t mightier than the slide, but that the slide is nothing with out the pen.”

My 3 key messages:

1. What most people do with PowerPoint hasn’t changed from what we used to do 20 years ago with acetate and overhead projectors… which is bizarre, if not ridiculous.
2. The CRAVE methodology can be used to make points memorable (Chunking, Relevance, Association, Visualisation and Echo)
3. Before reaching for PowerPoint, we should reach for pen and paper.

On the whole I think I got these across. It could have been sharper, it could have been slicker, it certainly could have been more visible, but it worked. The purpose of a presentation is to convey a message, the audience don’t have to like it, agree with it or enjoy the experience for it to be a good presentation.

If they do like, agree and/or enjoy the presentation, GREAT! But really, it’s about making them think afterwards. What do you think? How did I do? Does it work well on the web?

Is the pen mightier than the slide?

Ok, I’m nervous.

I am frequently asked if I get nervous before a presentation and my stock response is, “If somebody says they’re not anxious before a presentation, they’re either lying or dead.”

But not today.

I had an idea to do something different during a guest lecture at a conference. Instead of my usual Killer Presentations Seminar – essentially a PowerPoint presentation about how to use PowerPoint effectively – I would ditch the slides for a whiteboard and pen. I want to demonstrate how a presentation can be engaging and memorable without using modern technology. Lets step back 20 years to the good old days of handwritten visual aids and see what we can learn from the experience.

Now clearly I’m not suggesting we all stop using PowerPoint, but if I can make it more engaging and more memorable than the other 26 slide-driven presentations at the conference then maybe, just maybe we can make people rethink what they do with PowerPoint.

Slides give us a crutch and a barrier to hide behind. If they’re cool, you don’t need to be. Without them I feel undressed – no graphics, no design, no frills – just me, them and a pen.

For two weeks, I have been planning my presentation and the adrenaline is pumping. It’s actually a positive force for me. I think I may be a bit of an adrenaline junky. The thought that this might not go as well as planned is really motivating me to plan it well.

At least I don’t need to worry about the power going out. I’ll let you know how it goes.

“I wish I knew then what I know now.”

Partly because last weekend I spent a heart-aching evening watching my scout troop – 14-18 years old – as they struggled to cope with the dress and demeanour of their female counter-parts at a barn dance. But mostly because I have been recording the presentation for the University of Central Lancashire (UCLAN) for first year undergraduates to try and encourage active learning rather than passive participation.

Although it is a cliché, I do wish I had had this knowledge back when I was a student – life would have been so much easier had I really understood how to learn.

This is a reversal of another kind for me since I generally teach or sell ideas, rather than teach audiences how to learn. But my experience in making content engaging and memorable also applies to those trying to remember what they have been taught.

Here is a mnemonic device called CRAVE I use in presentations:

• Chunking: Break the information down to manageable chunks
• Relevance: People learn what they need to, if they see no need, they don’t learn it
• Association: Storytelling, case studies, fables or parables, essentially linking ideas together.
• Visualisation: Enabling the audience to spread cognitive load across multiple information processing systems
• Elaboration: Repetition or rehearsal both rote and elaborate.

My wife and I use these techniques to help our kids study and I am now beginning to apply them to teaching scouting skills, however, thinking through how you would apply these processes during a university course has been an interesting experience.

A common understanding of the learning process bridges the gap between teacher and student.

Nobody taught me how to learn, did they teach you? Why not? Why don’t we take time to teach people how to encode and apply information? When I work with presenters, I naturally practice the techniques I am teaching. Now that I am spending more time teaching in the non-commercial world of scouts, I’m finding the need to teach learning skills simply as a way of explaining my actions.

So here is how I explain learning as a three stage process:

• Attention – kind of obvious, you can’t learn something you didn’t pay attention to, so we create intentional gaps in information (visual cognitive dissonance) to keep the audience engaged. I encourage students to not only question what they are being taught, but also why they are being taught it – an essential step in the learning process.
• Synthesis – is the process of moving the information you are paying attention to into your long term memory. It’s not a linear process. You must break down the whole subject into chunks and associate the pieces to existing, relevant information already stored in your long term memory. Processing the information on more than one cognitive level – visualization – and finally the echo – repeating these activities to firm up the new information’s place in our LTM.
• Retrieval – the final stage of learning is creating the capacity to share and use information. The ability to recite facts doesn’t really demonstrate learning – you must be able to use or those facts to truly benefit from the learning. Retrieval also prevents memory loss! Clearly, the more you use information the less you forget it.

Understanding the learning process is an essential part of designing effective presentations. As I work more with the scouts, and now with university students – tough audiences both – I realize how just how much this holds true. Please give me your thoughts on the matter – and your suggestions for making sure people remember the message you are trying to deliver.

Crave Learning Video