Using Big Data to Create Better Presentations

Matt Abrahams has written a good article for Stanford Business School's Insights website. He describes the research conducted by Noah Zandan, founder and CEO of Quantified Communications. Zandan's company has used analytics to identify the key attributes of the most effective presentations by speakers and leaders of various kinds. Zandan's conclusions are based on the study of more than 100,000 presentations. Abraham's article is filled with great suggestions for improving your public speaking. Here are a few of the key points (excerpts below):

Avoid hedging language. Qualifying phrases such as “kind of” and hesitant language like “I think” can be beneficial in interpersonal communication, where they invite contribution and adjust your status relative to the person with whom you are conversing. But in contexts like presenting in public, they can reduce your credibility.

Vocal elements include volume, rate, and cadence. The keys to vocal elements are variation and fluency. Think of your voice like a wind instrument. You can make it louder, softer, faster, or slower. We are wired to pay attention to these kinds of vocal change, which is why it is so hard to listen to a monotonous speaker. In fact, even just a 10% increase in vocal variety can have a highly significant impact on your audience’s attention to and retention of your message.

Vital elements capture a speaker’s true nature — it is what some refer to as authenticity. For authenticity, Zandan’s team has found that the top 10% of authentic speakers were considered to be 1.3 times more trustworthy and 1.3 times more persuasive than the average communicator. Authenticity is made up of the passion and warmth that people have when presenting.  Passion comes from exuding energy and enthusiasm.

How to Deal With Skeptics

Matt Forrest Abrahams and Burt Alper have posted a Stanford Business piece titled "How to Handle Audience Skepticism."   They argue that reframing can be a powerful technique for addressing criticisms, objections, and tough questions.  Here's an excerpt focused on how paraphrasing can help when responding to a skeptic:

Paraphrase to address emotional skepticism. Paraphrasing is a listening tool where you reflect back what others say in your own words. Effective paraphrasing affords you several benefits (e.g., ensures that you heard someone correctly, values the other person’s contribution, allows you time to think, etc.). As a framing technique, paraphrasing allows you to acknowledge the emotion of someone’s question/objection, then pivot your response to the world of logic.

In my work, I've written about how reframing and redescribing can be powerful tools for handling contentious situations.  They can be methods for helping keep conflict constructive.  Here are two excerpts from my book, Why Great Leaders Don't Take Yes for an Answer:

On reframing: 

 When individuals seem to be locked into their positions, leaders need to find a way to alter the way that people perceive the situation. Too often, when debates get heated, individuals begin viewing the situation as a contest to be won or a test of wills. They believe that they are playing a zero-sum game, when, in fact, win-win solutions still may be achievable. Individuals stop thinking about new sources of information that might be examined or the possibility of new alternatives that might prove superior to any of the options currently being debated. They begin to worry more about losing face if the decision does not go their way rather being concerned about the impact on the organization. In these circumstances, leaders need to shift the focus back to the problem that needs to be solved. 

On redescribing:

Sometimes conflict becomes dysfunctional because one set of individuals tries hard to convey an important idea, but they cannot present the supporting evidence in a persuasive manner. They become increasingly frustrated, because they do not understand why others do not find the data compelling. It seems so obvious to them! Soon they begin to attribute the others' inability to comprehend their argument to a personal deficiency on the part of those they have failed to persuade. They think, "How could an intelligent person not understand this point?" Cognitive psychologist Howard Gardner, a pioneer in the study of the multiple dimensions of human intelligence, has argued that people can avoid these frustrating situations through a strategy that he calls redescription. As Gardner writes, "Essentially the same semantic meaning or content, then, can be conveyed by different forms: words, numbers, dramatic renditions, bulleted lists, Cartesian coordinates, or a bar graph. Multiple versions of the same point constitute an extremely powerful way in which to change minds."

PowerPoint Abuse

Megan Hustad has a good article at Fortune.com about PowerPoint abuse.   In the article, Warren Berger, design expert and author of Glimmer, argues that speakers use Powerpoint as a crutch.  It deflects the audience's attention away from the speaker, which is something many presenters actually prefer.  Berger argues that PowerPoint isn't the problem; the way people use it is the issue.  Speakers talk to the slides, rather than engaging interactively with the audience.  That lack of audience engagement harms a speaker's ability to persuade, influence, and impact.

Terri Sjodin,  author of Small Message, Big Impact, makes the argument that bullet points don't help the audience understand cause and effect.  A persuasive argument draws connections; it explains how and why one factor influences another.  Hustad ends the article with a story from the creators of South Park.  The story reinforces the notion that we have to draw connections when making a presentation.   The creators explain how they put "story beats" together: "We can take these beats, which are basically the beats of your outline, and if the words 'and then' belong between those beats, you're fucked, basically. You've got something pretty boring. What should happen between every beat that you've written down is either the word 'therefore' or 'but.' So it's not this happens and then this happens. Instead, it's this happens therefore this happens. Or this happens but this happens also, therefore something else happens."

Speakers, Have a Conversation With Your Audience

Nick Morgan at Forbes points us to a terrific TEDx Houston talk by Professor Brené Brown.  As Morgan writes, "Audiences long for presenters to be real with them, and just have a conversation.  Sure, they want a focused, smart conversation, not a rambling, pointless one like so many real conversations.  But they want an authentic connection with their speakers, and the way to achieve that is with a conversation."

Morgan goes on to explain that many presenters fear a conversation with their audience.  They want to control the situation.  Professors suffer from this same desire for control.  As a result, they sometimes shy away from interactive learning processes, because they are not sure how they will handle unexpected conversations and questions. 

I encourage you to read Morgan's article and watch Professor Brown's terrific talk:

Common Public Speaking Mistakes

Kathy Caprino has written a good column for Forbes regarding public speaking.  In this article, she highlights five common errors that people make when speaking to an audience.  I found one of her points particularly compelling.  Here is the excerpt:

Show Respect for the Listener

Again, I’ve seen scores of speakers alienate an audience by expressing disdain or criticism for some common behavior or thinking. For example, if you’re speaking to social media novices about what they need to do to get up to speed in the social media arena, you must understand that many folks are afraid and insecure about taking the plunge, and you need to be gentle with them, not judgmental, critical or flip. In the end, If you hate or disrespect your listeners for their lack of savvy in your area of expertise, they’ll hate you back. And if you leave your audience feeling that they are losers, failures or unworthy of your respect, then you’ll achieve the opposite of your desired effect – you’ll bruise their sense of self-worth and create a huge rift between you and your audience.You’ll lose them forever.

I agree wholeheartedly with Caprino's point. Too many speakers forget what it feels like to be a novice in a particular domain. They fail to put themselves in the shoes of someone who knows little about a particular subject, or might even be a bit stressed about trying something new or different.  Putting yourself in their shoes proves critical if you wish to be a successful public speaker.

Public Speaking in the Social Media Age

Fast Company's Drew Neisser has a good column on public speaking in the social media age.  I thought two of his points are worth emphasizing here, though I recommend reading the whole column.  

First, he argues: "Don’t Panic if They Aren’t Looking at You."   They might be on a portable device, such as an iPad or iPhone.  However, it doesn't mean they are reading email necessarily.  They might be taking notes, or tweeting about your presentation in real-time.  Both of those behaviors could be very productive and useful for you.  If they tweet your message, you could be reaching a much broader audience.  Telling them to put away their devices is NOT the answer, according to Neisser.

Second, he explains: "If You Don’t Speak Twitterese, It’s Time to Learn It."  In other words, you need to share your Twitter handle up-front. In that way, people can share their thoughts about your presentation, and you will be able to see those statements. Moreover, you need to provide some concise phrases and sound bites that will be amenable to tweeting. Think of capturing your message in a few phrases of 140 characters or less.