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October 21 2011
How to Give a Compelling Presentation to a Smart, Jerky or Otherwise Picky Audience [Presentations]
Googler Steve Yegge wrote an insightful, revealing, and honest look at the internal state of Google last week, touching on topics like their internal culture and their shortcomings in developing a platform like Google+. It was meant to be sent to employees only. After a week of dealing with the blowback (minimal, actually), he's written a followup talking about his time at Amazon; specifically, how to give an enthralling presentation to a tough audience (Jeff Bezos).
Jeff Bezos, Amazon's founder and CEO, is a notorious critic of presentations. Yegge, on the other hand, through preparation and insight into how Bezos operates, managed to craft a presentation that was among the best his coworkers had ever seen. If you're in a similar situation, where a picky, smart and impatient person is in the audience, here's what you do.
To prepare a presentation for Jeff, first make damn sure you know everything there is to know about the subject. Then write a prose narrative explaining the problem and solution(s). Write it exactly the way you would write it for a leading professor or industry expert on the subject.
That is: assume he already knows everything about it. Assume he knows more than you do about it. Even if you have groundbreakingly original ideas in your material, just pretend it's old hat for him. Write your prose in the succinct, direct, no-explanations way that you would write for a world-leading expert on the material.
You're almost done. The last step before you're ready to present to him is this: Delete every third paragraph.
Bezos is so goddamned smart that you have to turn it into a game for him or he'll be bored and annoyed with you. That was my first realization about him. Who knows how smart he was before he became a billionaire — let's just assume it was "really frigging smart", since he did build Amazon from scratch. But for years he's had armies of people taking care of everything for him. He doesn't have to do anything at all except dress himself in the morning and read presentations all day long. So he's really, REALLY good at reading presentations. He's like the Franz Liszt of sight-reading presentations.
So you have to start tearing out whole paragraphs, or even pages, to make it interesting for him. He will fill in the gaps himself without missing a beat. And his brain will have less time to get annoyed with the slow pace of your brain.
But how do you prepare a presentation for a giant-brained alien? Well, here's my second realization: He will outsmart you. Knowing everything about your subject is only a first-line defense for you. It's like armor that he'll eat through in the first few minutes. He is going to have at least one deep insight about the subject, right there on the spot, and it's going to make you look like a complete buffoon.
So I knew he was going to think of something that I hadn't. I didn't know what it might be, because I'd spent weeks trying to think of everything. I had reviewed the material with dozens of people. But it didn't matter. I knew he was going to blindside me, because that's what happens when you present to Jeff.
If you assume it's coming, then it's not going to catch you quite as off-guard.
And of course it happened. I forgot Data Mining. Wasn't in the list. He asked me point-blank, very nicely: "Why aren't Data Mining and Machine Learning in this list?" And I laughed right in his face, which sent a shock wave through the stone-faced jury of VPs who had been listening in silence, waiting for a cue from Jeff as to whether he was going to be happy or I was headed for the salt mines.
I laughed because I was delighted. He'd caught me with my pants down around my ankles, right in front of everyone, despite all my excruciating weeks of preparation. I had even deleted about a third of the exposition just to keep his giant brain busy, but it didn't matter. He'd done it again, and I looked like a total ass-clown in front of everyone. It was frigging awesome.
So yeah, of course I couldn't help laughing. And I said: "Yup, you got me. I don't know why it's not in there. It should be. I'm a dork. I'll add it." And he laughed, and we moved on, and everything was great. Even the VPs started smiling. It annoyed the hell out of me that they'd had to wait for a cue, but whatever. Life was good.
And if you're interested in reading more about presentations, or about Amazon in general, Yegge's full G+ post is below.
Photo by jurvetson
November 12 2010
Create Compelling Presentations with the Three Q Method [Presentations]
Save your audience from another dull presentation and increase their focus by building a presentation that answers their questions instead of smothering them with slides. Author Joey Asher explains how to create effective presentations built around real questions.
Most presentations are complicated messes. Listeners wonder "What are the key points?", "Why should I care?", "Why is this so complicated?" and "Do we have to look at that many slides?"
Presentations don't have to be complicated to be good. There is a simple approach to creating simple presentations that connect with the needs of any audience—and you won't need to create a single PowerPoint slide.
We call it "The Three Q Method." It works because it is built around your audience members' key questions about the topic. The only prop you'll need is a flip chart.
Start with What Your Audience Cares About
Ask yourself "What are the three questions my audience would ask me?" Most presentations stink because they fail to provide what most listeners want—answers to their key questions. The Three Q Method addresses this issue by focusing the presentation on three audience questions. Photo by Office Now.
Next time you have to create a presentation, don't go to your computer and open up PowerPoint. Instead, take out a blank sheet of paper and ask yourself "What are the three questions my audience would most likely ask me about this subject?"
Those three questions will become the basis of your presentation.
Delivering Your Three Q Presentation
Start your presentation by briefly describing your topic. Keep it to just a few sentences. Let's say that you're a PTA president introducing a plan to raise money for school renovations. Photo by Marco Bellucci.
I think we all agree that the school is in bad need of renovations. Today, we're going to talk about our plans to raise money to make sure that the school looks great for our children.
After introducing the topic, introduce the questions, writing them on a flip chart. Once you've given an overview of the topic, preview your presentation for your listeners by telling them the three questions you plan to address.
If I were you, I'd probably ask three questions.
- What are the capital improvement needs?
- How much money do we need to raise?
- How are we going to raise the money?
As you introduce the questions, write them on a flip chart. This gives the audience an easy way to follow your presentation.
Go back and answer the three questions. In the body of your presentation, answer the questions in as much or as little detail as you feel is necessary. Be sure to start each section by repeating the question. It's OK if this sounds redundant. The goal is clarity. Your listeners will appreciate how easy it is to follow you. Photo by Velkr0.
The best way to answer each question is to give a simple answer in the first sentence or two. Then elaborate as much as you'd like.
So let's talk about the first question: What are the capital improvement needs?
The biggest need is the athletic fields. I think we all agree that they're an embarrassment and don't provide the kind of sports experience that our kids deserve . We need new grandstands. We need a new scoreboard. We need a new locker room . . .
End by opening up the floor for questions. Everyone's favorite part of the presentation is the Q&A. It's where listeners can get their specific needs addressed. When you've finished answering the three key questions, take more from your audience.
You don't need lots of slides for a great presentation. All you need to do is answer your audience's key questions simply and clearly.
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