Archive for year: 2011

SlideRocket recently sent me this e-book on The Secrets of Compelling Presentation Design.  It was worth the read and a good reminder of some of my favorite tips.

1. Keep it Simple – your background, fonts, content should all be straightforward so your audience can easily assimilate information
2. Use Images – a picture is really worth 1,000 words and can convey a concept much more succinctly than bullet points
3. Keep it Relevant – only use design elements (color, transitions) and multimedia (video, sound) that add meaning to your presentation
4. Be Repetitive – you know your material well, but the audience doesn’t and they will only remember your message if you repeat it frequently
5. Close Strong – your presentation doesn’t end after your last point, but rather after you’ve summarized all your points and given the audience clear instruction on what to do with the information they just learned

The underlying factor in every presentation tip is the audience.  Keep your audience in the forefront of your mind through the entire process and you will be more likely to satisfy them and, therefore, reach your presentation goal.

I watched the Vator Splash SF presentations through two lenses.  The first was that of a technology enthusiast, always wanting to learn what bright people are inventing.  The second was that of a communication expert, curious about how entrepreneurs are presenting.

Through the first lens, I saw some interesting technology. The People’s Choice Winner was Building Layer, which maps the inside of buildings.  The Vator Splash Winner was Front Door Software, which protects portable computers using the smarts of traditional security systems.

As the communication expert, I gathered data on the multimedia learning principles of using visuals, signaling, and full sentence headlines.  What I found is that pictures are pervasive, but signaling and full sentences are rare.

Pictures – photos, graphs, and screenshots – were used heavily in 9 of 10 presentations.  That is the good news.  Showing visuals while telling a story is the best way for people to learn the information being presented.  My catch phrase is “Show the glory, tell the story.”  The presenters at Vator Splash did a good job showing the glory.

This same multimedia learning principle indicates that bullet points flood the verbal channel of the brain with too much information, since the same channel processes words heard and read.  More good news on this front.  Seventy percent of presentations contained NO BULLET POINTS.   Only one presentation was heavy on bullet points and one on text in paragraphs.

The bad news is that not a single presenter gave an overview or summary.  There was essentially no signaling.  Signaling helps the human brain assimilate information by setting a map of where you are going, where you are, and where you have been.  My catch phrase is “Use a cue, they’ll follow you.” Now these presentations were short and many presenters may think that eliminates the need for a visual agenda and summary, but not so.

Even if you are giving an ‘elevator pitch’ you still want to give a cue or preview.  Stating your three key points in the beginning and the end will help your audience remember what you had to say, which, after all, is the whole point of your presentation.

The other pointer to remember is to put your headlines in full sentences.  Research has shown that a full sentence headline and a relevant picture is the best slide combination for learning. Building Layer was the only presentation that used any full sentence headlines – hey maybe that is why they got the People’s Choice Award.

In addition to enjoying the slew of new innovations, Vator Splash was a good opportunity for me to take a pulse of the state of start-up presentations.  Net, net – the trend is going in the right direction.  More pictures, less bullets.  Now all we need are previews, summaries, and full sentence headlines.

As a university teacher, a lover of technological advances, and a communication scholar, the notion of 58,000 students participating in a free online course enthrals me.  Today’s NY Times article, “Virtual and Artificial, but 58,000 Want Course” describes how Peter Norvig and SebastianThrun are offering a course on artificial intelligence this fall through Stanford. Anybody, not just enrolled Stanford students, can sign up for the course.  Non-Stanford students won’t get credit, but they will get access to the same course.

According to the article, “The two scientists said they had been inspired by the recent work of Salman Khan, an M.I.T.-educated electrical engineer who in 2006 established a nonprofit organization to provide video tutorials to students around the world on a variety of subjects via YouTube.“The vision is: change the world by bringing education to places that can’t be reached today,” said Dr. Thrun.”

From a communication scholar’s perspective, opening up a course to 58,000 students is most certainly changing the world through education.  So how can technology make it happen?

Apparently is starts with the basics of streaming Internet and interactive technology for quizzes and grading.  But, to avoid systems crashing, Stanford will use Amazon Cloud. Google Moderator services will help manage the barrage of student questions by polling and ranking questions that are most prominent.  Top-ranked questions will be answered in online discussion with the professors. In order to foster student-to-student interaction, a study group on reddit has been formed.

An interesting experiment in using technology to communicate and educate world wide, I look forward to watching it unfold. More information on the course can be found at http://www.ai-class.com/.

We all know intuitively that communication is an important aspect of medical care.  Each of us can recall experiences where a doctor did a good or bad job communicating with us.  For me, the bad job was in the ER just before my mom was diagnosised with colon cancer when I was literally arguing with a doctor who wanted to send her home with antacids without doing any tests.  My ‘perseverence’ with that doctor resulted in a CT scan that showed the cancer. Boy was that an example of a doctor being unwilling to listen.  The good experience for me was the level of details received from my orthopaedic (Dr. Diefendorf) before, during, and after my rotator cuff repair surgery.  He told me what he was going to do every step of the way and then afterward showed me in pictures exactly what he had done.

Seems the medical community has gone from acknowledging the importance of communication in the abstract to practical implementation.   New applicants to medical schools are being asked to go through the Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) process, according to a recent New York Times article, “New for Aspiring Doctors, the People Skills Test.”  The applicants have two minutes to review a scenario of an ethical conundrum and then eight minutes to share how they would handle it. They then repeat the same process with more interviewers.   According to the article, “”We are trying to weed out the students who look great on paper but haven’t developed the people or communication skills we think are important”, said Dr. Stephen Workman, associate dean for admissions and administration at Virginia Tech Carillion.”

In an Atlantic Magazine article, “The Triumph of New Age Medicine” the medical community’s research and attitudes about alternative medicine is explored.  It is a long article with many interesting angles, but I narrowed in on the effects of communication in the equation.  The article outlines the commonality of many alternative medicine treatments; “These include a long initial meeting covering many details of the patient’s history; a calming atmosphere; an extensive discussion of how to improve diet and exercise; a strong focus on reducing everyday stress; an explanation of how the treatment will unleash the body’s ability to heal itself; assurance that over time the treatment will help both the problem that prompted the visit and also general health; gentle physical contact; and the establishment of frequent follow-up visits.”  Two aspects of this typical treatment scenario seem to make a difference 1) good provider/doctor-patient relationships  and 2) improvement of an overall healthy lifestyle.

Looking at the first aspect in more depth, communication is the core to the development of a good relationship.  According to the article, “A 2008 study on physician-patient relationships found that physicians deemed “exemplars” based on their reputation and awards received were likely to create an emotional bond with patients; to convey to patients that their commitment to caring for them will endure over time; and to imbue patients with “trust, hope, and a sense of being known.”

Good to know that what we all intuit is now being taken seriously by the medical community.  Yet, we still have a ways to go.  As the Atlantic article concluded,  “Every single physician I spoke with agreed: the current system makes it nearly impossible for most doctors to have the sort of relationship with patients that would best promote health. The biggest culprit, they say, is the way doctors are reimbursed. “Doctors are paid for providing treatments, not for spending time talking to patients,” says Victor Montori, an endocrinologist at the Mayo Clinic. A medical system that successfully guided patients toward healthier lifestyles would almost certainly see its cash flow diminish dramatically. “Last year, 75 percent of the $2.6 trillion the U.S. spent on health care was for treating chronic diseases that, to a large degree, can be prevented or reversed through lifestyle change,” says Dean Ornish of UCSF. Who (besides patients) has an incentive to make changes that would remove that money from the system?”

Of course, as patients we can influence change by demanding better communication from all our medical providers, and, when we have the option, voting with our pocket books for better provider relationships.

When you want to get somebody to change an attitude, belief, value, or behavior — happens just about every day — you need to employ the art of persuasion.  A quote from a student of mine:

“Thus, to change a person’s view, their belief or their actions is to slide through their ears and into their skull and embed yourself into their brain.”

How does one do so?  Rhetoric, of course.  Since it has probably been some time since you studied the 5 canons of rhetoric, here is a short reminder.

1. Invention (inventio) is finding the means to argue your point.

2. Arrangement (dispositio) is the organization of your argument, such as the most common organization of problem/solution or lesser-used refutation.

3. Style (elocutio) is your choice of words and phrasing or how you put together your specific arguments.

4. Memory (memoria) is what you employ to help your audience remember what you tell them, such as repetition, catch phrases, and visuals.

5. Delivery (pronuntiato) is the non-verbal aspect of communication including voice volume and articulation along with facial expressions and gestures.

What I commonly see is that people will put significant effort into the first canon of invention, but very little effort in the remaining four.  It is easy to just come up with the reasons of why somebody should do as you suggest, but that is not enough.  If you employ all five principles, you will be much more effective at persuading others.  Why?  Because people on not just influenced by logic (logos), but also by pathos (emotion or passion) and ethos (credibility).

So the next time you want to persuade, remember there are 5 canons of rhetoric, and use them all.

At the recent Western States Communication Association (WSCA) Conference two panels “Social Networking and Beyond: Computer Mediated Communication and Community” and “Relational Communication and Social Networks” contained interesting research on how people are using social networking.  The overarching theme is that people are using social networking as a means of simultaneously forming and communicating their personal identity and relationships.   I have briefly summarized some of the research and provided links for you to dig further if you are interested.

Valerie Barker from San Diego State University discussed research comparing Mixi Diary vs. Facebook.  She looked at Japanese vs. American young women’s uses of these social sites.  Mixi is popular in Japan like Facebook is in America.  She notes that there are differences:  Mixi is used primarily through mobile devices.  On Mixi the network of friends is smaller with more of a sense of privacy and a closer experience than Facebook use among American young women. Motives for using the social sites include social identity gratification (bolstering a sense of belonging) and social compensation (making up for offline unhappiness).

Ahlam Muhtaseb from CSU San Bernardino shared research entitled “Mobilizing Online: The Internet, Political Involvement and Community Participation of Arab Americans”  Ahlam found that from a convenience sample of 185 Arab Americans, 75% were users online users and 25% were non-users.  Users showed a greater propensity for community participation, in particular political involvement with a statistically valid correlation between users and voting.

Makenzie Phillips from Boise State University researched social networking sites for surveillance in romantic relationships and found that 83% of respondents are engaging is some type of surveillance behavior.  Jealousy and entitlement were predictors of surveillance behavior.

Karen Lollar from Metropolitan State College of Denver has been tracking Denver neighborhood’s use of social sites, such as Neighborhood Link for the past 10 years and shared how neighbors are interacting differently online. She has discovered that most online topics match what neighbors discuss face-to-face, such as pets and local civic issues.

Erin Koppel from University of Arizona looked at 2008 Pew Internet data on social networking use to determine if relationship initiation and relationship maintenance was related to age and found only a negative correlation between age and relationship management online. She noted that this counter-intuitive result could be because of the nature of relationships that exist on the site.

Lynne Webb (and others) from University of Arkansas researched how ethnicity was enacted on Facebook and found that of the 488 open profiles they studied, 29% showed some ethnicity, primarily through quotations or applications.  Webb noted that Facebook does not give space in the profile set up for people to share anything about their ethnicity.

There is such a wealth of information to be studied as social network sites become a pervasive form of communication around the world.  Delving into how communication remains the same and changes as the medium changes will be of great research interest in the coming years.