Avoiding Death by PowerPoint: Three Common Mistakes with Slides

How many times have you sat in a dim meeting room only to be bombarded by an endless slide deck? Or attended a conference where speakers made a point of reading every bullet?

Don’t use slides as a reminder of what comes next (as in, ‘Oh yeah — the slide w/ the stars. That’s my cue to talk about space’). Instead figure out what you want to say, then build your slide deck. [Photo credit: Kyle Wong]

Death by PowerPoint is, sadly, all too common. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

As a speechwriter and speech coach for nearly 15 years, I’ve sat through hundreds of talks. Here are the three most common mistakes when it comes to slides and, even better, how you can avoid making them.

Common Mistake # 1: No Go

The Scenario:  You watch a speaker walk onto the stage. He hits the clicker but it won’t advance the slides. Then the screen goes black. Someone (the IT guy?) walks onto the stage and fiddles with something on the podium. Meanwhile, the speaker becomes increasingly uncomfortable. He tries a joke or two, but it’s too late. People around you start to talk among themselves.

The Message It Sends: When AV fails, it tells the audience that the speaker doesn’t care about them. He didn’t take the 5 minutes required to test it out in advance.

The Solution: Show up early and make sure your slides will work. I’ve seen instances (especially going from a MAC to PC) where the font sizes become too small or images become blurry. If you can’t show up early (and if the slides aren’t confidential), email your deck to the event organizers. Like you, they desperately want to avoid the appearance that this is “amateur hour.”

Bonus Tip: Always carry a backup copy of your slides on a thumb drive or email them to yourself, so you’ll have them handy in a pinch.

Common Mistake #2:  Info Overload

The Scenario:  The speaker is an expert. You’re excited to hear what she has to say, but things immediately get technical – and the slides don’t help. In fact, they confuse the issue because they’re impossible to decipher. One slide shows the world’s most complicated wiring diagram. Another has an x- and y-axis with font so small it looks like Japanese rather than English. Either way, it doesn’t matter. The slides will be available later, so you pick up your phone to check email until this speaker is done.

The Message It Sends: The speaker doesn’t know how to translate this visual story for the audience. As a result, she has included way too much information on the slides. It’s not easy to translate data or stats — agreed — but the alternative of overwhelming your audience isn’t an option.

The Solution: Don’t try to tell the whole story in a single slide. Keep it simple. Breaking down your story into manageable chunks and walk the audience through a broader, more meaningful narrative. In other words, bridge the gap between what you’re saying and what (you hope!) the audience is hearing. You can check this by practicing in front of someone with roughly the same level of knowledge that your audience will likely have.

Bonus Tip: Check out this TED Talk by Hans Rosling, a Swedish physician and professor of International Health. He offers a great example of how to translate complex data on global health and economic trends in a way we all can understand.

Common Mistake #3:  Too Many Slides

The Scenario:  It’s only two minutes into the presentation but you’ve already seen 25 slides. Every point the speaker makes is captured in a list of bullet points, a heartwarming image, or a funny video. Rather than focusing on the material, your mind wanders. You ask yourself how many more slides will she race through in the next 20 minutes?    

The Message It Sends: The speaker doesn’t know her material well enough. She may also be using PowerPoint as a reminder of what she needs to cover next. (Oh, it’s the slide w/ the night sky. That’s my cue to talk about space.)

The Solution: Figure out what you want to say first, then build your slide deck. That will prevent you from upstaging yourself and relying too heavily on slides. Resist the urge to “throw in” that amazing pie chart because it’s just so good.

Bonus Tip: I don’t have a good rule of thumb for how many slides you should use in say, a 20-minute presentation. What can be helpful, however, is thinking about AV as a tool to underscore your key points. Don’t upstage yourself. Slides should be an exclamation mark to what you say, not a script to keep you on track.

Looking for more guidance on using slides effectively? Here are some more tips and examples from TED Talks.  Thanks & reach out anytime. – Rose at rose@rosespeechwriter.com.

Prop Up Your Speech: Five Tips to Use Props Effectively

Can you use your grandfather’s telescope to talk about his dreams for a better future? Concrete items (easily seen from the back of the room) often make the best props. [Photo Credit: Uriel Soberanes]

Scientist Jill Bolte Taylor is a brain scientist who experienced a massive stroke in 1996. In her TED talk, “My Stroke of Insight,” she explains how she woke up one day to find her brain shutting down. “And in the course of four hours,” she says, “I watched my brain completely deteriorate in its ability to process all information. On the morning of the hemorrhage I could not walk, talk, read, write or recall any of my life. I essentially became an infant in a woman’s body.”

Taylor’s TED talk, the seventh most popular one of all time, is extraordinary in and of itself. It’s also an excellent example of how to use a prop – in this case, a human brain – to complement your presentation.

Here are five tips we can learn from her speech.

Tip #1 – Make it Meaningful

Early in her presentation, Taylor mentions the human brain and the audience immediately leans in. As Taylor puts on medical gloves, nervous laughter and mumbling float through the room. When she turns to face the audience, everyone zeros in on the moist, gray tissue (complete with a dangling spinal cord) that she cradles in her hands.

Taylor’s prop is meaningful on several levels. First, she uses the brain in a pragmatic sense to explain the difference between the right and left hemispheres. Seeing the two clearly-divided chambers helps us understand what otherwise might have become a complicated medical explanation.

Second, the prop is meaningful because it’s unusual. How many of us have ever seen an actual human brain, even though it’s so vital for every function we perform? Just as Taylor analyzed her brain that terrible morning of the stroke, we too are focused on the brain in front of us, learning what happens when a clot forms (in her case, golf-ball sized), blood vessels explode, and our body suddenly shuts down.  

Tip #2 – Keep it Simple

No prop is fool proof, so keeping it simple is your best chance to avoid problems. That means don’t plan on attaching a cable to the ceiling or floor. Don’t use a huge tank of water or bring an animal on stage. And don’t have a robot doing complex maneuvers up and down the aisles. Unless you can test your prop in advance (and have a backup plan if it doesn’t work), you risk something big going wrong. Or worse, creating a distraction that undermines your credibility as a speaker.

Instead, select a concrete item to illustrate what you’re talking about. For example, can you use your grandfather’s telescope to talk about his dreams for a better future? The purple geode you found in 8th grade to address the pace of change? Or the silver watch, given to you by your dying Aunt, to underscore work-life balance? The best props are often concrete, physical items that provide insight into your topic.  

Tip #3 – Put it Aside

Don’t hold your prop during the entire speech. Consider Taylor’s presentation. When she was done with the brain, she placed it back on a tray and an assistant carried it off stage. In fact, she used it only for about a minute.

Bill Gates provides another good example. He used a jar of mosquitoes as a prop in his TED talk about malaria in 2009. He opened the jar, then put it on a side table while speaking. He didn’t upstage himself, but instead kept the jar handy so he could refer back to it when needed.

In addition, avoid the temptation to pass your prop around the room, which instantly diverts people’s attention, taking all eyes off of you. As an alternative, you can invite folks up to the stage to see it after your presentation. This is a great way to continue a dialogue, not to mention exchange business cards.

Tip #4 – Right-size It

I took a play-writing class a few months ago. Our teacher told us about a student play that he’d reviewed in which the entire plot rested on a tiny picture in a locket. In Act III, the “big reveal” with the locket was the cultivating moment of the entire play. The problem was, as our teacher pointed out, the picture inside the locket was about a centimeter in diameter.  In other words, too small for most folks to see it.

For your remarks, select props that are neither too big or too small. What size is that exactly? Before your talk, hold your prop up on stage and ask someone standing in the back if they can see it. (This is also a good way to check your font size on slides.)

At the 2017 MCON Conference, Diana Aviv, then head of Feeding America, used the right size prop in her speech. In a presentation about food waste, she used apples to show that 40% of all food harvested in the US ends up in landfills. Aviv’s prop? A clear glass bowl filled with ten apples. She moved four of them to another bowl, explaining why each would be rejected from the marketplace. One apple had a blemish. Another was misshapen. Others were too big or too small. The clear glass bowl and ten apples stood out on stage. Her example showed us clearly why 40% of healthy, edible food never makes it to our grocery stores.

Tip #5 – Practice with Them

What if Taylor had dropped the human brain? What if Gates struggled to open the jar of mosquitoes?

Perhaps my most important tip is to practice handling your prop beforehand. Be familiar with it. Know what you’re going to say and when you’ll say it. Most people get nervous when they’re giving a speech. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed, lose the thread of your argument, and forget why the heck you’re standing there holding a wooden African mask in front of a hundred people. Those three minutes of rehearsing with your prop will pay dividends.

Conclusion

Props are under-used tools that can turn an above-average talk into an extraordinary one. When used correctly, they can be a powerful tool that amplifies your message. Select a meaningful, creative, tangible prop. Make sure it’s the right size for the venue and, when you’re done with it, put it aside or send it back stage. And above all, practice with your prop to help make your next speech unforgettable.

Have another tip about using props? What’s worked (or not) for you in the past? I’d love to hear from you at rose@rosespeechwriter.com. Thanks.

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So, Do I, Like, Sound Bad? Practical Tips to Eliminate Verbal Pauses

We all use verbal pauses when we speak: um, ah, like, and you know. Filler words like these become more pronounced during interviews or presentations. Why does this happen, even to the best speakers? In some cases, we’re nervous speaking to an audience. In others, we may be so passionate about the topic that we’re concerned we won’t do it justice. Whatever the reason, our hearts race. We talk faster than normal. And we often use bridge words to hold our place, while we think of the next thing we’re trying to say.

You don’t have to fill every silence with noise. [Photo Credit: Nycholas Benaia]

 Unfortunately, verbal pauses make us sound less professional at the very time we want to be at our best. Making matters worse, they are also distracting. Instead of your future boss keying in on your skill set, she may be noticing how many filler words you use.

 How can you prune um and ah from your vocabulary? By far, the best solution is to stop talking all together. In other words, use a pause instead of a filler word. You can also try speaking more slowly. Fully finish a thought and then take a deep breath. My point is that you don’t have to fill every silence with noise. Let the power of your idea sink in without further distraction.

 Here are two other ways to break this habit.

 Find an Accountability Partner – Maybe you’ve heard of Toastmasters infamous “Ah-Counter.” That’s someone who tabulates how many times you use verbal pauses. While this method is no doubt embarrassing, it gets right to the core of the problem: self- awareness. We have to recognize how many times we are using um or ah before we can fix the problem. If you don’t want to join Toastmasters, find a supportive accountability partner who can give you candid feedback next time you speak at the office staff meeting. 

 Record Yourself – Most smart phones today have a free mic app. (I often use QuickVoice or VoiceMemos.) Next time you’re giving a short presentation, ask the people in the room if it’s okay to record yourself. Then play back your remarks to see how you did. The next step is to work on trimming these from your vocabulary and, when you’re ready, record yourself again to see whether you’ve improved.

 Awareness and practice are the dual keys to getting rid of ums and ahs. For better or worse, we have dozens of opportunities every day to monitor ourselves: on the phone, talking at dinner, in meetings. Eliminating filler words will, in the end, make you a more confident, powerful speaker.

 Want to read more on this topic? Check out this article in the New York Times, then email me at rose@rosespeechwriter.com.

One Hundred Beats Per Minute

Three weeks ago, some friends mentioned they’d attended a workshop by Drs. John and Julie Gottman, the famous couples counselors.  I’d heard about the Gottman Institute over the years but was surprised by something they said that night. Basically, that when your heart races, you can’t communicate clearly – or sometimes at all.

What’s the threshold for effective communication? Turns out it’s 100 beats per min. [Photo credit: Daniel Canibano]

I saw a connection to public speaking and did what we all do when we hear something interesting. I googled it. I learned that, according the Gottman’s research, “if your heart rate exceeds 100 beats per minute, you won’t be able to hear what your spouse is trying to tell you no matter how hard you try.”  The Gotmmans call this “flooding,” being overwhelmed by a barrage of emotions, which makes communication with other human beings all but impossible.

As my friends spoke, I realized I’d heard about flooding before: by clients who felt paralyzed by nerves right before a speech. Looking back, I’m guessing their heart rate was likely over 100 beats per minute.

Now, in the world of couple’s counseling, Gottman recommends taking a time out. Nothing good can be achieved when you or your spouse has been flooded by emotions. That’s not an option, however, when you’re about to step onto the stage, take the microphone, and deliver a 20-minute presentation.

My recommendation for speakers is first and above all, to be proactive. In other words, be hyper-aware of how your body is dealing with stress. Are your cheeks flushed? Hands sweaty? Heart racing? If they are, do a quick self-assessment. You can check your Fitbit, Apple Watch, or other tracker. But you don’t need fancy technology – just find a quiet spot to take your pulse. Count your heart beats for ten seconds and multiple the number by 6. This will give you objective data that can serve as a kind of early warning system. If your heart rate is, in fact, creeping up toward 100 beats per minute, it’s time to act.

The next step is figuring out what works for you. Some people benefit by taking a brisk walk around the venue before they speak or working out the morning of the event. This helps them shake off excess nervous energy (cutting down on pacing and verbal pauses like “um,” “like,” or “you know”) Other people use affect labeling to quell their anxieties. This involves naming the emotion that they’re experiencing, which can help take the sting out of it.

But by far, the most effective means I’ve found to calm nerves has been mindful breathing. I wrote about this in one of my first blogs, which you can read here. In short, regulate each breath by inhaling through your nose to a count of 4 and exhaling to a count of 4. Keep it up until you feel more composed. What I love about this process is that it interrupts the sympathetic nervous system which is responsible for high alert “fight or flight” responses. When done correctly, it will help you tap into the parasympathetic nervous system that’s responsible for the body’s “rest and digest” functions. (For a quick overview of both, check out this article.)

In the end, public speaking is about communicating but that’s tough to do when your heart rate surges over 100 beats per minute. So check in with yourself before the next speech. Then use the right techniques to keep your nerves in check and ensure you’re at your best as you walk up to the podium.

How have you managed your fear of public speaking? Let’s talk!  – Rose (rose@rosespeechwriter.com)

You're More than a Speaker

A few months ago, I was hired by two CEOs who were new to their job. Each had a big speech on the books to external clients – folks other than their employees. Both of them contacted me because they wanted to kick off their tenure as a clear and compelling speaker.  

During our first few meetings, my conversation with each of them circled around to a common denominator. That’s what I want to talk about today. Specifically, answering the question of ‘Who you are on the stage (or who do you want to be).’

You’re more than just a speaker. Take time to identify your relationship to the audience. [Photo credit: Miguel Henriques}

In both cases, the speakers were unsure of the image they wanted to project. They were too new to the job and unfamiliar with their organization. They had dozens of other tasks on their to-do list and hadn’t yet considered their relationship to the audience.

If a speaker is presenting herself as a peer, for example, she might call the audience “colleagues” or “friends.” She might also decide not to stand on a stage but at eye level (if everyone can see). Other options, depending on the audience and event, might be cheerleader (urging them on) or coach (kicking them in the butt).

In this case, one of my clients decided to position herself as a kind of maverick in the field. Then I asked how she wanted to be perceived. We brainstormed answers (confident? humble? accessible?) and landed on enthusiastic and hopeful.

As you work through this process, it’s important to note that I’m not talking about acting.  The best speakers are natural in all aspects of their delivery: how they use their hands or move around the stage. They aren’t trying to be someone they aren’t.

Next time you accept a speaking invitation, consider your relationship to the audience. Once you figure out who you want to “be” on the big day, you’re sure to be a more successful speaker.

Need help figuring that out? Please reach out.  – Rose (rose@rosespeechwriter.com)

Speaker as Leader -- Or Not

Every speech, whether 5 minutes or 15, shows people what kind of leader you are. And that cuts both ways.

Some speakers ramble on, stumbling through the material. They haven’t thought about their headline message or what they hope to accomplish. Compare that to speakers who have done their homework. They know their purpose from the get-go: inspire the team to meet sales targets, get buy in on the new strategic plan, or explain changes to the company’s Paid Time Off policy. These speakers have data on hand and a compelling story to share. They’ve built a cogent argument to convince even the greatest skeptics in the audience.

And they’ve practiced what they plan to say. 

Winging it is, frankly, a bad idea. [Photo credit: Designecologist]

If you want people to follow you or put your plan into motion, you need to read your remarks aloud before the event. That’s where you’ll learn if your sentences are way too long for a single breath. Or if you’ve strung together so many s-s-s-sibilating sounds you can’t get out. Or if the tone sounds too formal for the company picnic.

As a speechwriter and speech coach, I hear a lot of executives say they want to ‘wing it.’ Practicing in advance, they explain, will make them sound stilted or rehearsed. After 10-plus years in this business, I can tell you that’s not the case. Practicing makes them better. Much better. They come off as more relaxed, natural, and sometimes even playful because they are familiar with the material.

They practice in advance because they know they’re being evaluated as a leader. They don’t want to let their people down or risk seeming ill-prepared. And real leaders know that they don’t have the luxury of wasting other people’s time.

Click here to learn four tips for rehearsing that’ll make you a better speaker and leader.

Four Tips to Rehearse More Effectively

In the end, the stakes are just too high not to practice. [Photo credit: Charles Deluvio]

Your last talk to employees didn’t go well. You were nervous standing in front of them. You paced as thoughts of self-doubt crept into your voice. You kept looking down at your notes but couldn’t find your place. After a few minutes, you lost track of what you were hoping to accomplish. More than anything, you just wanted to sit down and be done.

Now that’s a bad day at the office. The only good outcome from this kind of dreadful experience is the determination I hear in a client’s voice afterwards. They resolve never to ‘wing it’ again. Never to stand in front of their people without preparing. Never to show up as a boss who can’t motivate, can’t communicate, can’t lead.

How exactly should you practice before your next talk? There are any number of approaches, but I’ve found these four steps to be particularly effective.

Rehearsing Effectively

 1. In private, practice what you’ll say from beginning to end. Re-start wherever you need to. If you stumble on a section repeatedly, change the wording.

2. Once you can deliver the entire speech without stumbling, time it. Trim it, if too long.

3. Ask two or three trusted colleagues to listen to you as you practice. Get their feedback on what was unclear and on any distracting tics you may have such as pacing or jittery hands. (An alternative is to videotape yourself on your cell phone. This is a simple way to check your posture, eye contact, and hand gestures.)

4. If possible, practice in the venue where you’ll deliver the speech. (This is essential for big speeches.) Find out if you’ll have a podium and mic. If so, what kind? (For example, a hand-held mic, podium mic, or lavalier mic?)  Ask who’s presenting before and after you, if you’ll have a bottle of water on stage, and whether they will be filming you. In short, now’s the time to get the scoop so you can be your best as a speaker and as a leader.

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Want to learn a few more practical tips for rehearsing your next presentation?  Let’s talk.  – Rose (rose@rosespeechwriter.com)

Own It To Get Over It

Over the years, I’ve shared several techniques on how to manage your nerves before a speech. (See this blog and this blog.) Today I’d like to share another one. The scientific name is ‘affect labeling’ but I use another term: ‘naming it.’

Affect labeling basically means identifying an emotion as you’re experiencing it. When I was growing up, my Dad accidentally backed our Plymouth Valiant out of the garage with a backseat door open. The screech of crunching medal filled the garage. Dad stopped the car, hopped out, and stared at the crease in the door. He was fuming. Clearly, someone hadn’t shut the door behind them. His anger was, of course, understandable, and he was probably more upset with himself than any of us. But I remember him being pretty darn mad. Now, in retrospect, I know that affect labeling would have quieted the storm.

Identifying our emotions (Dad saying, “I’m royally pissed off right now”) has the power to calm them. That was the finding of psychologist Matthew Lieberman who coined the term ‘affect labeling’ in 2007. You can read the whole study here. The short version is that naming your emotions disrupts the amygdala, the part of our brain responsible for fear, anger, and other emotions.

Affect labeling can help quiet the fear of public speaking. [Photo Credits: Wynand Uys]

There’s now a large body of work on affect labeling. One more study worth mentioning involved spiders and people who feared them. Michelle Craske and her research team divided participants into four groups and asked them to walk toward spiders. As they did so, one group was told to label their feelings (ex: “I’m scared, anxious”). Another was asked to think of the spider as less threatening (ex: “You can’t hurt me.”). Still another group was directed to distract themselves (ex: “This is an experiment. I’ll be fine.”) and the last group was a control group (given no instructions.)

The study found that the first group – people who acknowledged their fears – had the lowest emotional reaction to the spiders than any other group. Psychology Today summed up the study, “These findings suggest that having greater emotional clarity about one's fear can help reduce the physiological manifestation of this emotion.” One more key finding of the study is that verbalizing emotions (not just thinking them) is what made the difference.

Affect labeling is a useful technique to manage those overwhelming feelings you have before speaking in public. I often ask speakers, while they are rehearsing or before they step onto the stage, to stop and reflect. What are they feeling right now? Their answer – just naming it – puts the emotion under a microscope and turns it into an object they can observe. As a result, fear and anxiety no longer grip them, no longer control them. The result? They’re able to relax and deliver a much more natural, compelling talk.

Has affect labeling worked for you? Let’s talk about managing your fear of public speaking. – Rose (rose@rosespeechwriter.com)

Speaking to a Disparate Audience

I’m often asked how best to handle an audience that includes many different types of people. In other words, how can you be effective as a speaker if you’re talking to group that’s a third government employees, a third nonprofit leaders, and a third business executives?  Should you try to address them all equally in the time you have?

Good question.

How do I reach an audience that includes many different kinds of people? Read on. [Photo credit: Denise Johnson]

My answer is no. Don’t deliver three little mini-speeches. Instead, consider a typical commencement speech. Three groups of people attend graduation ceremonies:

1.     faculty and staff;

2.     parents and family members; and

3.     graduates.

Speakers at these events must mention all three of these groups of course. But in general, they spend the bulk of their time talking to their primary audience, the students.

I recommend a similar approach. First, direct some portion of your remarks to all of the major constituents in the room. (Going back to our analogy: at a commencement, it’d be a grave oversight not to acknowledge faculty/staff as well as parents/families, right?)  Second, focus your attention on your primary audience, the main group of people you want to influence. That’s who you really care about reaching. That’s who can move your agenda forward. That’s who can move the needle and make a real difference.

Now, there’s one catch. The primary audience doesn’t always equate to the greatest number of people. Yes, a graduating student body is almost always the largest of the three sub-groups listed above. But in some cases, your primary audience may be one of the smaller sub-groups present. 

Take the classic board of directors meeting. You may be speaking to 15 people in the room, but there’s really two key individuals you need to reach. Perhaps it’s the Board Chair or the Treasurer? If you can convince both of them, the other attendees will fall behind you and your project will sail forward.

Let’s go back to my opening scenario. If I were speaking to an audience that’s equal parts government, nonprofit, and business, I’d focus on the decision makers in each group. They would be my primary audience. Maybe I’d urge them to work together more effectively? Maybe I’d include examples from different cities? Maybe I’d highlight success stories and failures? Whichever route I take, it wouldn’t involve cobbling together 3 mini-speeches. The organizational structure would be cumbersome and the key message too diluted to be effective.

In the big picture, you should always put your audience first. Figure out what they are interested in hearing from you. When you speak to a disparate group of people, address all of them briefly but focus in on your primary listeners. Whether you want to inspire or challenge, inform or provoke, make sure they walk away with the message you intend to deliver.

Looking for a speech coach or speechwriter? I'd love to hear from you. Please email me at rose@rosespeechwriter.com.