A recent house guest of mine was asked to do a Pecha Kucha while here in New York City. She’s a surface-textile designer and doesn’t really use Microsoft Office products and doesn’t feel it’s worth the investment for the singular presentation. She asked me what her options are, which had me thinking that others may [...]
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Dealing with Public Speaking Anxiety: Guest Post
Who better to give tips about anxiety than a licensed therapist? The Presentation School is proud to present you with a guest blog by Autumn Hahn, Licensed Mental Health Counselor and Hypnotherapist. ~~~ Fear of speaking in public is ranked higher than fears of falling, spiders, the dark, and even death on opinion polls. However, as our [...]
1-on-1 meetings
An old college friend of mine recently asked me for some advice for a 1-on-1 meeting he was about to have with his boss about a possible promotion. (Let’s all cross our fingers that he gets it!) My advice to him was that the process for preparing for a 1-on-1 meeting is the same: Do [...]
Anatomy of a chart
When designing a presentation chart, you should focus on clarity and credibility above all else. In order to best explain what I mean by clarity and credibility, I’ve put this visual anatomy of a chart together. Clarity: Hierarchy of titles is clear. The overall message of the page (the top line that says [...]
Metaphors series revisited: Opportunity
Last June, we had a series of posts brainstorming possible visuals for metaphors, including: growth, balance, and leadership. In the beginning of this second series, we covered innovation. In this post, I’ve put together a list of possible images for another theme that I’ve seen in tons of presentations: opportunity. According to Merriam Webster, an opportunity is: A [...]
Prezi storyboarding template
Recently, I had an inquiry from a Non-Profit around creating Prezis that would act as standalone training videos. I explained to them that the typical process is as follows: 1. Select a central metaphor (the best Prezis have a central image you zoom in and out of) 2. Write the voice-over script 3. Decide on [...]
Storytelling structures from some greats
When I teach presentation classes, the story telling structures I teach are Barbara Minto’s “Pyramid Principle” and the classic story structure as I learned in a storytelling class with Kevin Allison of The Story Studio. Great for structuring business documents for busy executives and for telling awesome personal stories! Between the 2 structures, most people [...]
Fonts & PowerPoint
If you’d like to have an edgier, moe sophisticated looking PowerPoint template, I’d suggest not using one of the following fonts: Arial, Calibri, Tahoma or Verdana. Everyone uses them. The benefit to using them, is that anyone can then edit your pages. If that’s not the concern, then consider using a different font. When selecting [...]
Killer pages
This is the name of a summary page using combined elements from data-driven and conceptual chart objects that you can base an entire conversation on. It could be one central concept, a filled-out framework, or a summary of your data (e.g., a dashboard). It’s a great idea to use a killer page, also known as [...]
Lessons from Occupy Atlanta
I just watched this clip of Occupy Atlanta, where the group decides that booked speaker, John Lewis, known for being instrumental in the Civil Rights Movement is not allowed to speak. The group couldn’t come to a consensus about whether they wanted to hear him speak, namely because someone spoke up and said that he [...]
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