Seth Godin on Presenting to Persuade

We spend way too much time creating, giving, and most of all, consuming presentations.

The seduction of the power of the presentation--combined with the fear of being seen. Decks are either a great way to be seen or a great way to hide.

Exercise:

What’s the best presentation you’ve ever attended? Or the best you’ve given?

What do the great presentations have in common?

Here's a talk I gave around my book Linchpin. I hope you'll be able to see how I use my slides, instead of having my slides use me:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJ6eZIYZsyg

Design thinking: What’s it for?

What change are you trying to make? Who needs to be onboard for that change to happen?

Do you have enrollment? 

The tin man wanted to go with Dorothy. Is this audience eager to go on a journey with you?

More than a sales pitch.

If your deck was a memo instead, how would it read? Can you condense it to one page? Does it make sense as a narrative? Write it up and see.

The Amazon method: Run your next meeting this way. Get buy-in in advance, and actually do it.

Make a list of all the things you have control over. Figure out what other tools would increase the chance that your ideas would be heard.

In order to use design thinking, we need to ask: who is it for

Enrollment

The presentation

The aftermath/call to action

It's so tempting to gloss over these steps and get right to the deck. But that's a huge mistake, because it'll leave you right where you started.

Instead, take the time to find a partner, a co-worker or friend who can dissect your analysis. Is the audience judging you the way you want to be judged? Is your point of view clear? If so, is your argument sensible? Urgent?

Here then are the two key elements that have to be included in a successful deck.

1. What assertions are you making? 

2. And where are the exhibits that back you up?

Not just proof in the legal sense, but emotional proof. How do you earn the enthusiastic support of your audience, an audience that isn't nearly as well-versed or as motivated as you are?

What you'll notice about these slides is something that you might see in the slides you've used:

A. Many say "yadda yadda yadda" and there's no way to decode them

B. Many are sloppy, and they remind us of things that are boring, poorly thought out or just unattractive

With this in mind, take a scalpel to your existing deck. Remove the slides that you can live without. Add a point of view to the rest. And then redesign them to look the way you sound... you wouldn't wear a ripped, dirty t-shirt to a board meeting, and your slides should be at least as good as your dress or your suit.

This is the most important part of the course. Watch it twice.

Then, with a colleague, come up with your if/then/else or your Story of Now (or both).

This is the work that truly pays off.

You've made it this far. Here are some examples to tie it all together.

And finally, ten principles for slide design:

• No more than ten words per slide
• Never read your slides
• If you need note cards, bring note cards. Or add presenter notes
• Find a font that reminds people that you care about how you come across and stick with it
• Don't use stock photos that look like stock photos
• Slides are free. If a single slide can become two or three or ten slides, do that
• The moments between slides create interest... create pace and tension
• Bring other voices into the room with video or photos of real people
• Rely on exhibits that you'll hand out later. Mention the exhibits in your slides
• End with a clear call to action

Now that you see it, what will you do? This summary goes over some of the key tactics and mostly pushes you to adopt an active voice and make something happen.