3 ms·

The road to being a kick-ass public speaker

33 points by dajobe 15y ago

nickpinkston 15y ago
After doing a few bigger talks and being pretty nervous before, I really wish I read these tips - great down-to-earth advice. The Ignite talk on how to give an Ignite talk was also worth the while.
davesmylie 15y ago
This is pretty awesome stuff. I've got a presentation I'm supposed to give in a few months on Ruby on Rails on Oracle that I've been stressing about. Not sure how it's going to go, but I'm gonna be going over these tips prior to trying put something together =)
- Luyt 15y ago
  From the article: "Quick tip about “Clever Trevors” – you will always find someone in the audience who tries to show off their knowledge instead of asking a question." Now, imagine this will happen: You: "And in conclusion, we have found Oracle to be an excellent database for our website. Any questions?" Trevor: "Yes, I have a question. Why didn't you use MongoDB? MongoDB is a web scale database, and doesn't use SQL or JOINs, so it's high-performance." (The rest of the conversation can be read on http://mongodb-is-web-scale.com/ http://mongodb-is-web-scale.com/)
follower 15y ago
I found the embedded slides didn't work for me, so here's a non-embedded link to the same slides: http://www.slideshare.net/cheilmann/the-road-to-being-a-kickass-publis-speaker http://www.slideshare.net/cheilmann/the-road-to-being-a-kick... I'm a big fan of: (1) encouraging techies to take and make opportunities to present publicly; and, (2) improving the quality of the presentation in terms of supporting material and presentation styles. In the past I've found sites like Presentation Zen (http://www.presentationzen.com/ http://www.presentationzen.com/) to be really helpful for improving the quality of my presentations. I'm no Lawrence Lessig but here's part of a presentation I did last year at DEFCON: http://youtube.com/watch?v=XotF9FyiAZc http://youtube.com/watch?v=XotF9FyiAZc (Self-critique: still need to work on reducing the "ahhs". :) ) Also, like most things, improvement takes time: for many of my earlier presentations I just used a vertically scrolled single HTML page for my "slides"--it did the job and allowed me to concentrate more on the content. Nowadays when I actually manage to finish the content earlier than the night before I can put more time into increasing the production values. (Incidentally, I think the DEFCON videos from last year are possibly the best layout for post-event videos I've seen with legible slides and decent sized speaker view.)
ares2012 15y ago
Good advice. If you really want to be kick-ass, however, you need to practice, practice, practice. Toastmasters is a great place to get some free speaking practice in front of strangers. Yes it's a little cheesy but it does the job.
fakelvis 15y ago
Step 0: Practice public speaking The single best way to become a "kick-ass" public speaker is to speak in public more often. Deliberate practice. All the tips in the world won't help if you don't get up in front of an audience and practice just that: being in front of an audience and speaking to them. How can you do this? Toastmasters (http://www.toastmasters.org/ http://www.toastmasters.org/) is a fantastic group to join and is available all over the world. I swear by it and so do my friends who have also joined (I went from a nervous public speaker who dreaded the thought of public speaking to a nervous public speaker who _loves_ getting in front of an audience).

33 points by dajobe 15y ago

After doing a few bigger talks and being pretty nervous before, I really wish I read these tips - great down-to-earth advice. The Ignite talk on how to give an Ignite talk was also worth the while.

davesmylie 15y ago

This is pretty awesome stuff. I've got a presentation I'm supposed to give in a few months on Ruby on Rails on Oracle that I've been stressing about. Not sure how it's going to go, but I'm gonna be going over these tips prior to trying put something together =)

Luyt 15y ago
From the article: "Quick tip about “Clever Trevors” – you will always find someone in the audience who tries to show off their knowledge instead of asking a question." Now, imagine this will happen: You: "And in conclusion, we have found Oracle to be an excellent database for our website. Any questions?" Trevor: "Yes, I have a question. Why didn't you use MongoDB? MongoDB is a web scale database, and doesn't use SQL or JOINs, so it's high-performance." (The rest of the conversation can be read on http://mongodb-is-web-scale.com/ http://mongodb-is-web-scale.com/)

follower 15y ago

I found the embedded slides didn't work for me, so here's a non-embedded link to the same slides: http://www.slideshare.net/cheilmann/the-road-to-being-a-kickass-publis-speaker http://www.slideshare.net/cheilmann/the-road-to-being-a-kick... I'm a big fan of: (1) encouraging techies to take and make opportunities to present publicly; and, (2) improving the quality of the presentation in terms of supporting material and presentation styles. In the past I've found sites like Presentation Zen (http://www.presentationzen.com/ http://www.presentationzen.com/) to be really helpful for improving the quality of my presentations. I'm no Lawrence Lessig but here's part of a presentation I did last year at DEFCON: http://youtube.com/watch?v=XotF9FyiAZc http://youtube.com/watch?v=XotF9FyiAZc (Self-critique: still need to work on reducing the "ahhs". :) ) Also, like most things, improvement takes time: for many of my earlier presentations I just used a vertically scrolled single HTML page for my "slides"--it did the job and allowed me to concentrate more on the content. Nowadays when I actually manage to finish the content earlier than the night before I can put more time into increasing the production values. (Incidentally, I think the DEFCON videos from last year are possibly the best layout for post-event videos I've seen with legible slides and decent sized speaker view.)

ares2012 15y ago

Good advice. If you really want to be kick-ass, however, you need to practice, practice, practice. Toastmasters is a great place to get some free speaking practice in front of strangers. Yes it's a little cheesy but it does the job.

fakelvis 15y ago

Step 0: Practice public speaking The single best way to become a "kick-ass" public speaker is to speak in public more often. Deliberate practice. All the tips in the world won't help if you don't get up in front of an audience and practice just that: being in front of an audience and speaking to them. How can you do this? Toastmasters (http://www.toastmasters.org/ http://www.toastmasters.org/) is a fantastic group to join and is available all over the world. I swear by it and so do my friends who have also joined (I went from a nervous public speaker who dreaded the thought of public speaking to a nervous public speaker who _loves_ getting in front of an audience).