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Speaking in Your Underpants
If you’ve ever asked for advice on how to overcome pre-speech nerves, no doubt you’ve heard the sage advice: “Just imagine your audience is wearing nothing but underwear.” Helpful advice? Maybe for some. What’s interesting to me though, is how this advice masks what’s really going on when you step on the stage. When you…
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Be Prolific: What I’ve Learned From 10 Toastmaster Speeches
Last week I achieved Toastmaster’s “Competent Communicator” (CC) award (I know, I’m officially competent, hooray!). I’ve been working towards this since I started the Toastmasters program early this year, so it felt like a big accomplishment. To achieve a “CC”, Toastmasters need to complete 10 speeches, most being between 5-7 minutes long. Each of the…
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The Fear and the Power of Connection
A discerning speech mentor recently pointed out that when I give a speech, I look towards the audience, but I don’t really look at them. My gaze scans the audience, but never really make eye contact with anyone. Why do I avoid eye contact? Speaking to a crowd, launching words into the air, is safe…
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Be Enchanting
Enchantment – turning cynics into believers, causing voluntary change of hearts and minds, winning over true fans – isn’t just for slick salespeople and charismatic leaders. If you want to make an impact, change the world, or give a great presentation, you need to learn how to enchant your co-workers, clients and audience. Guy Kawasaki…
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Hip Hop and the Feedback Loop
My favourite way to joke about hip hop (years ago, when I was just a white boy who didn’t understand), was how often rappers would rap about rap. “Listen to words that I create. Watch my lips arti-cu-late.” (My you can tell that my favourite rapper is the hiphopopotamus). But now I get it. I…
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Slides Are Harmony
Funny thing about this thing we call a “presentation”. Usually our first thought when we’re getting ready to give one, besides the possible dread or stress, is the visuals, the slides that will be on the screen. The PowerPoint guys have convinced us that visuals are what makes the presentation, that no presentation is complete…
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Prezi is cool, but it’s still just a tool
I heard about Prezi a couple months ago, but have only recently had the chance to try it out in a couple projects myself. Prezi is… Prezi is an online (and offline, for a price) presentation tool which lets you create presentations in a non-linear format on a white canvas. Instead of clicking through slide…
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You Can Change the World: TED Talk by Nancy Duarte
A couple months ago I got my hands on Nancy Duarte’s new book, Resonate. Duarte recently spoke at TEDxEast, and released the video of her 18-minute talk. Nancy Duarte’s talk at TEDx East from Duarte Design on Vimeo. “You are not the hero who will save the audience; the audience is your hero.” – Nancy…
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Nancy Duarte’s “Resonate”
A friend linked my to Nancy Duarte’s free webinar where she talks about some of the thoughts from her new book, Resonate. Nancy’s the CEO of Duarte, a presentation design firm, and has a ton of great tools and wisdom to share from her years of developing presentations. I’ve just started cracking into Resonate (Santa…