Last night, in very possibly the longest six minutes and forty seconds of my life, I watched a slide show called Lovely and Amazing, featuring 20 dead birds mounted on what appeared to be Popsicle sticks clipping along one at a time over 20 slides with their calls playing in the background and the artist (her term not mine) standing idly next to the slide show, mic swinging by the cord from her hand, while she looked on (apparently mesmerized by her own work) and offering no other explanation.
It got me thinking. Most things do, as I'm sure you know by now. :)
Where does the audience fit into a presentation?
If stand up comics are any indication, the audience is at least 50%, maybe more than that. The experience of trying to get the attention of people sitting at round tables eating and talking is painful. On the flip side, an audience already prepared to support you and/or your message, interested and ready to engage is priceless.
The questions I would ask any presenter to consider are: "How likely is my audience to already have knowledge on this subject?" "What is the purpose of this information? Entertainment, Call to action, Informational only?" "If they're ready to engage, did I give them an action step?"
Having sat through countless engagements in my life, I can confidently say the most memorable ones are some combination of all three. The speaker didn't have to be a stand up comic to make light of a few serious topics intermittently. The common thread seems to be the story behind the story. In all circumstances, people want to feel like by attending this session, they're receiving something they wouldn't have gotten elsewhere and didn't already know.
The last and most crucial piece of a successful talk:
Make it short enough! There will be times when you need to give people 40 hours of information. There are an awful lot of times when an hour long talk should have been 20 minutes. Does your audience need visual aids or handouts? Do they need to know every nuance of your topic? Why do they need to X or Y?
By considering these things in advance, you're likely to get a vastly improved response than you would have any other way.
