PowerPoint vs. No PowerPoint, that is the question...
I have a number of "Andrea-isms" that I share with my team, colleagues, and on this blog from time to time. One is "Blank Whiteboards Beget Blank Stares." I encourage the folks around me to come prepared to challenging discussions with a "straw man" idea for what is needed, giving the folks engaged in the discussion something to which they can react, critique, and evolve. It works...just this week I shared with a colleague the current wireframes for a new technology I am building. He was able to confirm many of the things I am planning for this technology, but in the process also expanded my thinking with ideas he had that would make the solution more valuable to him. Would I have been able to get such a reaction if I didn't show him anything and illustrate what I was planning. Maybe, but given that I have a hypothesis and proposed solution, of course I will show it to him and ask him to poke holes in it.
I didn't, however, come up with a 25-slide deck to run through with him, asking him to review and read each slide while I spoke to him about what each meant, and then asking him to think creatively as part of a dialog to evolve my thinking. If I had, he would have been sucked into the slides, trying to read each word and understand what I was trying to get across while also trying to the words I was throwing at him. I would have been more focused on presenting and "getting through all my slides" than I would have been in having an open discussion with him about how to make my solution better and more valuable to him.
Unfortunately, I think many of us rely too much on tools like PowerPoint when we feel we have important points we want to get across, limited time to do so, and a large and/or challenging audience that we may or may not know. The end result is a presentation during which you impart all of your wisdom and learn little or nothing from the audience or meeting participants.
I had the pleasure of attending a workshop with David A. Fields, a consultant to the consulting community and an expert in connecting the right consultant to his business customers, enabling a higher ROI on services rendered. David hosted a session with the Crimson Consulting Collaborative, of which I am part, and discussed ways consultants fail to properly sell their value and drive revenue. It was great. David reminded many of us of key best practices that are easily forgotten or not trusted when in the field, and he did so without a single PowerPoint.
As a participant, David's session felt very much like an ad hoc discussion with like-minded people, he as the facilitator. The reality is, though, that David had a well-planned and practiced presentation in which he planned to take us through a journey of "ah ha" moments. He's done this session before, and he will do it again - almost the same way each time. The questions may vary from session to session, but they all tie back to the journey he wants to take us on, and he knows how to respond to each and make sure we get the lessons learned he set out to impart on us. Each one of us left the one-and-a-half hour sessions with a key lesson learned and a desire to purchase his book, talk to our colleagues, or hire David for more one-on-one assistance...not a single PowerPoint.
I realized in this session that PowerPoint is a great tool, but I often hide behind it. While I know I can use PowerPoint to build my story boards for the discussion I want or have been asked to facilitated, but I don't have to show them. Although, I almost always to. (David had notes or slides on his iPad, which never far from site.) By choosing to keep the slides to himself, David quickly connected with his audience and invite Q&A a long the way. If you have a deck, you expect and are expected to present the deck. This puts you in the role of "speaker." As a consultant or a consultant who sells, though, the more you are talking, the less you are listening and learning, and less likely you are to assist this customer in asking and answering their own questions (from Peter Block).
David could have shared his slides with us, talked through them, and before moving on to the next slide, asked "are there any questions." Having taken that approach time and time again in my career, I suspect it would have been a much less dynamic conversation and the "ah ha" moments may not have happened so quickly.
Be prepared for the meetings you facilitate, for sure, but try stepping out of your comfort zone, closing your laptop, and have a conversation. If you need to jump up to white board a concept or an example...go for it. (I keep a set of dry erase markers in my work bag for just those occasions.) If you know there are certain topics that warrant a visual, practice your "impromptu" white board often so you can get it right and appear as though you are thinking on your feet (which you are, since you will only jump to the white board when the conversation lends itself to you doing so).
I have a number of "Andrea-isms" that I share with my team, colleagues, and on this blog from time to time. One is "Blank Whiteboards Beget Blank Stares." I encourage the folks around me to come prepared to challenging discussions with a "straw man" idea for what is needed, giving the folks engaged in the discussion something to which they can react, critique, and evolve. It works...just this week I shared with a colleague the current wireframes for a new technology I am building. He was able to confirm many of the things I am planning for this technology, but in the process also expanded my thinking with ideas he had that would make the solution more valuable to him. Would I have been able to get such a reaction if I didn't show him anything and illustrate what I was planning. Maybe, but given that I have a hypothesis and proposed solution, of course I will show it to him and ask him to poke holes in it.
I didn't, however, come up with a 25-slide deck to run through with him, asking him to review and read each slide while I spoke to him about what each meant, and then asking him to think creatively as part of a dialog to evolve my thinking. If I had, he would have been sucked into the slides, trying to read each word and understand what I was trying to get across while also trying to the words I was throwing at him. I would have been more focused on presenting and "getting through all my slides" than I would have been in having an open discussion with him about how to make my solution better and more valuable to him.
Unfortunately, I think many of us rely too much on tools like PowerPoint when we feel we have important points we want to get across, limited time to do so, and a large and/or challenging audience that we may or may not know. The end result is a presentation during which you impart all of your wisdom and learn little or nothing from the audience or meeting participants.
I had the pleasure of attending a workshop with David A. Fields, a consultant to the consulting community and an expert in connecting the right consultant to his business customers, enabling a higher ROI on services rendered. David hosted a session with the Crimson Consulting Collaborative, of which I am part, and discussed ways consultants fail to properly sell their value and drive revenue. It was great. David reminded many of us of key best practices that are easily forgotten or not trusted when in the field, and he did so without a single PowerPoint.
As a participant, David's session felt very much like an ad hoc discussion with like-minded people, he as the facilitator. The reality is, though, that David had a well-planned and practiced presentation in which he planned to take us through a journey of "ah ha" moments. He's done this session before, and he will do it again - almost the same way each time. The questions may vary from session to session, but they all tie back to the journey he wants to take us on, and he knows how to respond to each and make sure we get the lessons learned he set out to impart on us. Each one of us left the one-and-a-half hour sessions with a key lesson learned and a desire to purchase his book, talk to our colleagues, or hire David for more one-on-one assistance...not a single PowerPoint.
I realized in this session that PowerPoint is a great tool, but I often hide behind it. While I know I can use PowerPoint to build my story boards for the discussion I want or have been asked to facilitated, but I don't have to show them. Although, I almost always to. (David had notes or slides on his iPad, which never far from site.) By choosing to keep the slides to himself, David quickly connected with his audience and invite Q&A a long the way. If you have a deck, you expect and are expected to present the deck. This puts you in the role of "speaker." As a consultant or a consultant who sells, though, the more you are talking, the less you are listening and learning, and less likely you are to assist this customer in asking and answering their own questions (from Peter Block).
David could have shared his slides with us, talked through them, and before moving on to the next slide, asked "are there any questions." Having taken that approach time and time again in my career, I suspect it would have been a much less dynamic conversation and the "ah ha" moments may not have happened so quickly.
Be prepared for the meetings you facilitate, for sure, but try stepping out of your comfort zone, closing your laptop, and have a conversation. If you need to jump up to white board a concept or an example...go for it. (I keep a set of dry erase markers in my work bag for just those occasions.) If you know there are certain topics that warrant a visual, practice your "impromptu" white board often so you can get it right and appear as though you are thinking on your feet (which you are, since you will only jump to the white board when the conversation lends itself to you doing so).
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