How do explain complex things quickly in my presentation?
Explaining very complicated things quickly in a presentation is hard. Here’s a handy tool!
Welcome to the better presentations blog!
I do my best to make this blog a resource for presenters - not pro-speakers, but real people who need to make presentations as part of their 'day job'. If there's something you really want to know about, just email me and I'll see what I can do (no promises except that I'll read your email - use simon@ and you can guess the rest of my address. :) )
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This month's most popular (and useful?) blog posts are:
- How to make a cheap studio for better online presentations from your home or home-office... https://presentationgenius.info/online-presentations-with-a-cheap-studio/
- How to use stories in your presentations (not just telling them! ;) )... https://presentationgenius.info/a-story-matrix-and-using-them-one-your-presentation
Or scroll down if you're just browsing!
Story-telling myth-busting: the big hero story
You know the ones. The rags-to-riches story. The against-all-the-odds story. The bad-to-worse-to-victory story. We’re told to use them because they’re inspirational. Whoops, that turns out to be a mistake. Why? Because… Because pretty much be definition such a story deals with exceptional people over coming staggering odds. And, again by definition that means these people …
Story-telling myth-busting: the big start
We’re often told by experts (for which read “well-meaning friends who’ve read it somewhere online”) that we should start our presentations with a big bang to grab the audience’s attention. A powerful story is often cited as one of the best ways of doing this. Alternatives are a challenging, shocking fact or a provocative question. …
Using stories in your presentations – picking a story size
How “big” should the stories be in our presentations? How “epic” and inspirational? The answer isn’t quite as spectacular as it might sound…
Questions and interactivity in presentations
I’m constantly asked how to “make my presentations interactive” because people “need to be more engaging”. Let’s set aside the fact that you don’t need to be interactive to be engaging for a moment, and look at how to be interactive – specifically being interactive by using questions – either digitally or physically. Something to think about …
How to practice a presentation
I hate practicing my presentations. So does everyone else. Here I am arguing withe Sid The StoryParrot about putting it off until my wife’s gone out. Why? Because it’s embarrassing to get things wrong in front of people. In my defence, part of that is because the last time I did that for a Big …
Recording yourself in a PowerPoint slide
I recently spoke at the course creators engergize conference, hosted by Zenler giving tips on how to make your videos and presentations better for online courses. Why? Let’s face it, most of them are rubbish! 😉 In my presentation I made the observation that to make your videos really pop you should embed yourself as …
Stories (and authenticity) in Presentations
Storytelling is a big part of presenting… and frankly of our whole culture. When we go to the pub we don’t sit around in silence, and a lot of that time is filled with sharing stories. Gossip is a story after all. Back-in-the-old days is nothing but stories. When-I-was young… you get the idea. From …
The first slide of your presentation
What should you put on your first slide? You know the one, the one that’s up there before your presentation. It might be there while your audience come in or just for a few minutes at the start of your turn, if there’s a speaker before you. Your mileage will vary of course because of …