You Need slide:ology

If you present at all in your job, you should get slide:ology. Even if you don’t it’s s great book that is beautifully presented (as you’d expect) and enormously practical. It’s backed up by a great website too with additional resources.

O’Reilly kindly sent me a copy of this book for review and though I’ve had it for a while I’m only just getting around to writing up my thoughts.

The book comes with a many luminaries commenting on how great it is though what really stands out for me is the accessible way it’s written by someone who is clearly passionate about what they do. It doesn’t go down the route of telling you stuff like how great a presenter Steve Jobs is (he is) or blames PowerPoint for bad presentations (many are). Instead, it leads you through simple, valuable lessons such as starting with an idea, not slides and how important design has been and is becoming. That last part is worthy of exploration itself – as Fast Company observed in Oct last year. Design counts.

What did I learn from this book? Not a lot of big things as I already spend quite a bit of time thinking about how I present and as Seth advises, watching things like TED to learn from the best.

However, I did learn a LOT of little things. The little things that really make a difference that perhaps only one person in the audience will notice but many will experience. Things like this

 

• Highlight what’s important
• Ideate. Then choose your tools. Not the other way around
• Make your images work the way people’s eye do. Don’t force them to do something unnatural unless you really mean to
• Think background, colour, text, images. I need to think about my text more. Specifically my font.
• Think about the 3 second rule. People process quicker than you can reset what they just read from your slide.
• If you’re under 24pts in a slide, it’s officially a document :)
• ….and many more you’ll find in the book. 

 

Some other stuff I try to do that I was often reminded of by the book

 

• Really think about your audience. Put yourselves in their shoes/seats
• Sit in several places within the venue before you present. Give yourself the perspective of your audience. It’ll help you on stage and you’ll be naturally drawn to those places where you sat.
• Keep a copy of my slides in an Internet accessible location. Should disaster strike.
• Use iStockPhoto. Obvious maybe but not to most.
• Think about one thing I want my audience to leave with. At the end of the day, we all have too much to remember so one thing is a good hit ratio.
• Started taking photos on my travels I think will work well in presentations.
• Wherever possible, always leave time for questions
• Tell a good story. This is the best lesson I ever learnt about presenting. Slides or not slides. People remember stories.

 

Anyway…back to the book. It’s brilliant. Oh and I love the audience needs map. I’m sending it to everyone I know. Congrats on a great book Nancy!

Comments

• Anonymous
  October 09, 2008
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  October 12, 2008
  The comment has been removed