Okay, brace yourself…. I’m going to rant about something that’s been bugging me for quite a while now.
Obviously, as I’m a presentation skills trainer I make a point of keeping track of a number of other blogs and fora like this one - many of them more sucessful in terms of the number of people [...]
I spend a lot of my time on other people’s forums, offering help and advice where I can. (So give a saint-hood!). One of the most common please I find is the “I’ve got to do a presentation on X: how do I make it interesting?”. As soon as anyone asks [...]
With nary a fanfare (as far as noticed, at least) Google have added another string to their online office’s bow. Presenter. Some of you will have - no doubt - heard of, or even been using Google Docs for creating share-able documents and spreadsheets. If not, have a play - think [...]
That’s the political party’s annual conferences, of course.
Inevitably, the media has been looking closely at the speeches made by the various party leaders. Accoring to The Telegraph, Cameron’s much touted “without notes” speech for the Conservatives was only a last minute descision. It’s been referred to as “unscripted” in various places too - [...]
I found myself getting quite heated under the colour on a forum where I was giving some freebie advice (what other kind is there I hear you ask!) about PowerPoint templates. I know they’re a quick way of making your presentation look better than you started out (maybe) but they also have a few [...]
So what’s the difference? Well, according to at least one online dictionary claptrap is ” Pretentious, insincere, or empty language” where as a Clap Trap is a trick used to generate applause: it’s an old theatrical gimmick… apparently now obsolete.
Except, of course, that we know it isn’t - because Clap Traps are still used [...]
….as at half-past three on a rainy Monday at least… Actually this post is based upon an on-the-spot interview I did for my local newspaper. I’ve edited here for sense but Andrew Mernon’s original is here if you’re intersted.
Tune your speeches into what the audience needs to know. The biggest [...]
Someone asked me recently for a simple formula for structuring their presentation.
Now, I’m always hesitant about giving out simple formulae - because they’re generally over-simple and don’t take into account the circumstances of the presentation etc.. This brings with it the risk of a presentation be totally in-appropriate and backfiring…… on the other [...]
Regular readers will know I’m not a fan of PowerPoint for two reasons.
It’s often badly used; and
It’s designed in a way to make it too easy to use it badly.
I know I’m not alone in this, and recently another voice has joined in - namely Prof John Sweller, from Australia. You can see a [...]