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Category listings for PowerPoint Abuse – Avoid It

The New SlideShare Ribbon

Posted by Bert Decker   |   December 15th, 2008   |   3 Comments   |  Tweet This

Slideshare_ribbon2
SlideShare is a great application most of you know about and use – it allows everyone to share PowerPoint presentations and decks easily and effectively. And among other things they have The World's Best Presentation Contest every year.

Now the SlideShare folks have come up with another new function. They worked with Microsoft on the "SlideShare Ribbon" which lets you use the full functionality of SlideShare from within PowerPoint. I think this is the first time a Web 2.0 property has been embedded so deeply into desktop productivity software.

You can download to SlideShare, upload, search, comment, and bookmark, all from within PowerPoint. And it gives the aspiring social media marketer a nice console for seeing how much reach (views, downloads, favoritings, etc).

Here is an introduction to the SlideShare Ribbon. It's a great tool, but for now it's Windows only – I understand the Mac version will be on the way before long.

So if you use PP and a PC and Windows, here is where you can get and install the SlideShare Ribbon.

PS: Here's a view of our new logo Decker_logo_2color_RGB


Categories: Communication Skills, PowerPoint Abuse - Avoid It, Public Speaking, Web/Tech
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Presentation Zen – a best blog

Posted by Bert Decker   |   December 3rd, 2008   |   5 Comments   |  Tweet This

Garr Simple
If you follow blogs on communicating, you certainly know of Presentation Zen and Garr Reynolds. If not, sign on now, because…

Everytime I try to find a great post of the week in Alltop's speaking category, there rarely is any that beats the depth, interest and visual power of Garr's work.

Here is his new post and recent review of Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers – a great new book reviewed countless places. But no review is as interesting as the Presentation Zen offering.

Presentation Zen blog stands head and shoulders above most of the rest because it is:

  1. Thorough. He does his research. Presentation Zen is deep, whether exploring
    type fonts     or kinetic typography, or a book review, or great speaking, or the subtlety (or
    power) of a TED presentation.
  2. Design oriented. Because of this Garr is visual. Almost always he has video demonstrations of his points – a great tool. And he explains in graphic terms.
  3. Personal. You know his perspective and personality. He writes with a direct and personal style. It is interesting. He gives his opinion but doesn't espouse causes that get in the way of his message. He keeps his focus on his one cause – good design.

Pres Zen
So Presentation Zen is this week's Alltop top hit. Although I think I'm going to exclude him from weekly picks from now on since he would too often be the pick. Just subscribe to his blog and get him regularly.


Categories: Communication Skills, PowerPoint Abuse - Avoid It, Public Speaking, Video - Use It, Web/Tech

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Connection Trumps Everything

Posted by Bert Decker   |   November 20th, 2008   |   8 Comments   |  Tweet This

Dave Paradi photo 35 Dave Paradi had an interesting post this week titled, "Does Great Content Trump Poor Visuals." (Another in my weekly Best of Alltop on Speaking.)

As he told the story of an academic presentation with powerful content but terrible slides, he noted that flashy visuals can't make the case with little content, but wondered if the reverse was true. I'd say neither.

You need connection. With dull visuals, with reading a speech, with no substance – you will have no connection. And no impact. Boredom, disinterest and tuneout. Twitter time for the audience.

Only if the audience is interested solely in the content and not the person and the experience (like college kids listening to a lecture for a test) does content reign supreme. At conferences and in business settings I've seen that happen only once in over 20 years – at a Pharmacist Convention during a research presentation (that would have been best presented in writing anyway.)

To make an impact you need connection, and that's people connection, emotional connection and action connection. It comes from high energy, use of stories (SHARPS), knowing your audience and relating, looking, moving and having a beginning, middle and end, etc. You can have a connection with no visuals, (if you have to), but you can't have a connection with boring and flat content and slides and behavior. If you have brilliant content but don't feel it needs connection, submit a paper. The written medium is faster anyway (just not as powerful.)

Dave said it well when he said to NOT go to the PowerPoints first:

"Next time you start to develop a presentation, don't sit down at your
computer. Go to a quiet place with a pen and paper and allow yourself
the time to concentrate on your desired outcome and the best way to
achieve it. Only after you've got great content should you look to
create persuasive visuals."

And if you're smart, then you will add some great visual ideas from Presentation Zen or Slide:ology.


Categories: Communication Skills, PowerPoint Abuse - Avoid It, Public Speaking, Short Bits
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Nancy Duarte, and the power of Twitter

Posted by Bert Decker   |   November 16th, 2008   |   2 Comments   |  Tweet This

Nancy Duarte at Apple
Yesterday was a lazy Saturday morning, and I was checking my iPhone in bed. There was a Twitter from Nancy Duarte Tweeting that she was speaking at the Apple Store in San Francisco, so I turned to my wife, Dru Scott Decker, and said, "Want to go?" This would be a chance for me to see Nancy, show the power of Twitter (which I'm still experimenting with), and also use my new Flip Video that was still in it's box! And Dru, also a best selling author who loves Nancy's book Slide:ology said "Yes – love to."

Nancy Duarte at Apple Store

So the Flip Video came out – and it works great for a very small (iPod size) video camera of adequate quality that you can immediately edit and put up on YouTube. Here's an example – my first shot.

And Nancy was great – overcoming a lot of background noise and distractions at a busy downtown Apple Store. Here is Nancy with her first key point, on the importance of Telling Great Stories.

She had terrific slides of course, but even moreso was her great content (Dru took some notes as I was busy with Flip Video):

  1. Tell Great Stories – she illustrated with visuals that ALSO told the great stories by themselves.
  2. Reach Beyond Projection – a presentation can be slides – projected, but she told also of the many other varieties, from decks (the written) to on the web, to PDA plus devices – where you can interact, collaborate, and view. In other words, the world of presentation is a new world.
  3. Show Don't Tell – and here she gave a great example of a Garr Reynolds' presentation on SlideShare.
  4. Create a Profound Experience – unusual was a chart of visual storytelling that looked for the conflict and resolution. Nancy said to identify those points in a preso where you want people to be conflicted, for conflict generates emotion generates action.

Nancy and Dru
Dru Scott also bought a few more copies of Slide:ology. That deserved an iPhone picture.

The Flip Video was OK, but the quality isn't great when you have poor sound and a screen as background. For a longer and higher quality view of Nancy, you might try this interview.

Other tidbits:

  • Nancy said to use high quality images – they evoke credibility, and Duarte Design spends over $150,000 a year on images!
  • Nancy Duarte and Garr Reynolds have changed the process of creating and presenting in less than a year with their influence, blogs, and particularly their wonderful and complimentary books Slide:ology and Presentation Zen. Both books are in the top 100 at Amazon already. Amazing.
  • Twitter, Tribes (also in the top 100 at Amazon) and Technology are changing the face of communicating. (At least task and relationship communicating – nothing will ever replace 'face to face'…)
  • The video revolution continues. Flip Video costs $179 and enables anyone to immediately shoot and edit and be able to use videos in their PowerPoints, blog posts, YouTube or devices. And video is the BEST way to capture emotion to influence to action in a very short time.


Categories: Great Books, PowerPoint Abuse - Avoid It, Video - Use It
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You’ve Got To Be Believed To Be Heard

Posted by Bert Decker   |   October 28th, 2008   |   1 Comment   |  Tweet This

You've Got To Be Believed To Be Heard
With today’s headlines, now more than ever “You’ve Got To Be Believed To Be Heard.” So I'm delighted to announce the release of my newly revised book, just published in hard cover from St. Martins Press!

Some great blog reviews already received are from Nancy Duarte of Slide:ology fame, Garr Reynolds of Presentation Zen, and John Pearson of Managing Buckets, among others. (Much appreciated.)

In "Believed…" you'll find out:

  • Why was George Bush a great communicator – once?
  • See the differences between the New Communicators and the Old…
    Steve Jobs vs. Lee Raymond
    Oprah vs. Jeannine Pirro
    Howard Schultz vs. Michael Chertoff
    Bono vs. Mark McGuire
  • Avoid the Three Myths of communicating
  • Discover the power of the First Brain, and how you can use it
  • Why people buy on emotion and justify with fact?
  • Use the Six Behavioral Skills to your advantage
  • Move your communications from information to influence
  • Make the unconscious, conscious
  • Reverse the ‘fear of speaking’ to your advantage
  • Learn SHARPs to create your own unique communication experience
  • Obliterate PowerPoint Abuse
  • And much more…

For the first time these two concepts are combined in one book to make the 'complete book of speaking' –

  1. The Behavioral Skills of the Decker Method with
  2. The Decker Grid – a unique and proven process to create and organize ideas in half the time

Naturally I'd love you to get it right here at Amazon – at 33% off the list price! And I'd thank you for helping it get on the best seller list…


Categories: Books, Communication Skills, Leadership and Communications, PowerPoint Abuse - Avoid It, Public Speaking, Speakers
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Slide:ology – 20 Years Beyond PowerPoint

Posted by Bert Decker   |   September 24th, 2008   |   1 Comment   |  Tweet This

Slideology
In Nancy Duarte’s first and great book "slide:ology" she shows a vivid timeline of the history of Visual Aids – with PowerPoint dominating since 1987. If she had written this book 20 years ago, perhaps we wouldn’t have the PowerPoint Abuse we have today. Nancy leads us now – and shows us how to create engaging and compelling visual support for our messages. Get her interview here.

I repeat what I said in the forward to her book, "It’s more than slides and design – it’s about communications and inspiration. And this book will help anyone – beginner or top professional – to get to the top of their game."

Read these good reviews – I couldn’t detail it as well – and then click on Amazon and get the book:

If you scan all these reviews, and don’t get the book, you’re not on the right blog!

And Nancy has a great new blog too.
    


Categories: Great Books, PowerPoint Abuse - Avoid It, Public Speaking
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SlideShare – World’s Best Slideshows

Posted by Bert Decker   |   September 2nd, 2008   |   Leave a Comment   |  Tweet This

SlideShare has announced the winners of the World’s Best Presentation Contest.

#1 was

THIRST
View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: design crisis)
And very well deserved. Creative, with powerful advocacy. You will never know how little you knew about water…

Judges were Guy Kawasaki, Garr Reynolds, Nancy Duarte and myself. Very interesting contest with many great designs – more on that later.

See them all here.






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