World-renowned presentation coach Jerry Weissman has spent 20 years helping top executives succeed in the most important business presentations of their lives, and he's learned the best way to get his message across is to show his techniques in action. Weissman does just that in "Presentations in Action: 80 Memorable Presentation Lessons from the Masters." He teaches how to make spectacularly successful presentations by showing exactly how great presenters have done it. Weissman dives into his library of outstanding presentations, sharing examples from current events, politics, science, art, music, literature, cinema, media, sports, and even the military. His compelling examples don't just demonstrate what's universal about effective human communication: they also reveal powerful ways to solve the specific challenges presenters encounter most often. This book's five sections focus on each element of the outstanding contemporary presentation: Content: Mastering the art of telling your story; Graphics: Designing PowerPoint slides that work brilliantly; Delivery skills: How to make actions speak louder than words; Q&A: How to handle tough questions; Integration: How to put it all together. From clarifying "What's in it for you?" to crafting better elevator pitches, improving flow to using anecdotes, "Presentation in Action" is packed with solutions-and packed with inspiration, too!
World-renowned presentation coach Jerry Weissman has spent 20 years helping top executives succeed in the most important business presentations of their lives, and he's learned the best way to get his message across is to show his techniques in action. Weissman does just that in "Presentations in Action: 80 Memorable Presentation Lessons from the Masters." He teaches how to make spectacularly successful presentations by showing exactly how great presenters have done it. Weissman dives into his library of outstanding presentations, sharing examples from current events, politics, science, art, music, literature, cinema, media, sports, and even the military. His compelling examples don't just demonstrate what's universal about effective human communication: they also reveal powerful ways to solve the specific challenges presenters encounter most often. This book's five sections focus on each element of the outstanding contemporary presentation: Content: Mastering the art of telling your story; Graphics: Designing PowerPoint slides that work brilliantly; Delivery skills: How to make actions speak louder than words; Q&A: How to handle tough questions; Integration: How to put it all together. From clarifying "What's in it for you?" to crafting better elevator pitches, improving flow to using anecdotes, "Presentation in Action" is packed with solutions-and packed with inspiration, too!
Introduction 1
SECTION I Content: The Art of Telling Your Story
1 A Lesson from Professor Marvel aka The Wizard of Oz 5
How to Customize Your Presentation
2 Obama and You 8
The Most Persuasive Word
3 The “So What?” Syndrome 10
…and How to Avoid It
4 Beware of Jokes 12
Dispelling a Common False Belief
5 Presentation Advice from Abraham Lincoln 14
Clarity, Ownership, and Add Value
6 It Ain't What You Say, It’s How You Say It 16
Lessons in Structure from Jeffrey Toobin and Andrew Weil, M.D.
7 Presentation Advice from Mark Twain 18
Brevity Takes Time
8 Presentation Advice from Mike Nichols 20
How to Find Value in Your Story
9 Show versus Tell in Hollywood 22
The Wrong and Right Way to Tell a Story in Three Films
10 Slogan Power 24
Why the US Army's "Be All That You Can Be" Succeeded
11 How Long Is Too Long? 26
When in Doubt, Leave It out
12 The Elevator Pitch in One Sentence 28
How to Describe Your Business Succinctly
13 Do You Know the Way to Spanish Bay? 30
The Correct Way to Practice
14 Getting to “Aha!” 32
The Magic Moment
15 This Is Your Pilot Speaking 34
A Lesson in Flow from the Airlines
16 Presentation Advice from the iPhone 36
Substance and Style in Your Story
17 Presentation Advice from Steve Jobs 38
The Power of Positive Words
18 Presentation Advice from Novelists I 40
Begin with the End in Mind, Then Write, Rewrite, and Rewrite
19 Presentation Advice from Novelists II 42
Storyboard and Verbalize
20 Microsoft Slogans Score a Trifecta 44
Three Persuasive Techniques
21 Presentation Advice from a Physician 46
Audience Advocacy
22 Presentation Advice from a Politician 48
Audience Advocacy
23 Ronald Reagan Meets Lenny Skutnik 50
The Catalyst of Human Interest Stories
24 Human Interest Stories: A Double Advantage 51
Two Ways to Use Anecdotes
SECTION II Graphics: The Correct Way to Design PowerPoint Slides
25 The Presentation-as-Document Syndrome 55
Never the Twain Shall Meet
26 Blame the Penmanship, Not the Pen 57
Operator versus User Error
27 You Can't Use a Sentence As a Prompt 59
Less Verbiage Is More Useful
28 Baiting the Salesperson 60
Selling Is about In-Person Communication
29 PowerPoint and Human Perception 62
Scientific Support for Graphics Design
30 PowerPoint Template: Combined Picture and Text 64
The Best Positions for Pictures and Text
31 Shady Characters 67
The Wrong Way and the Right Way to Build Text
32 “I Can Read It Myself!” 69
Three Simple Steps to Avoid Reading Slides Verbatim
33 A Case for Case I: Initial Caps or All Caps 71
Text Design in Presentations
34 A Case for Case II: Serif or Sans 73
Font Design in Presentations
35 What Color Is Your PowerPoint? 75
Contrast Counts
36 Presentation Advice from Corona Beer 78
Peripheral Vision Counts
37 The Cable Crawlers 80
How Television Animates Text
38 Computer Animation 82
Three Simple Rules
39 PowerPoint and the Military 84
Sometimes More Is More
SECTION III Delivery Skills: Actions Speak Louder Than Words
40 The Art of Conversation 89
Eye Contact and Interaction Start at Infancy
41 Presentation Advice from Edward R Murrow 91
The "Person-to-Person" Role Model
42 Nonverbal Communication 93
Look Them in the Eye
43 Presentation Advice from Pianist Murray Perahia 95
Concentration Creates Control
44 Presentation Advice from Actress Tova Feldshuh 97
Concentration Creates Communication
45 Presentation Advice from Michael Phelps and Dara Torres 99
How to Control Stress under Pressure
46 Presentation Advice from Frank Sinatra 101
The Art of Phrasing
47 Presentation Advice from Soprano Kiri Te Kanawa 103
The Importance of Breathing
48 The One-Eyed Man 105
Necessity Is the Mother of Invention
49 Bill Clinton's Talking to Me! 106
The Power of Group Dynamics
50 Liddy Dole and Person-to-Person 108
From Law School to the Republican National Convention
51 Fast Talking 109
Fun or Maddening
52 Presentation Advice from Titian 111
Position, Position, Position
53 Presentation Advice from Musicians and Athletes 113
The Value of Effortlessness
54 Presentation Advice from Vin Scully 115
From Reagan to Barber to Scully
55 “Ya’ Either Got It, or Ya’ Ain’t!” 116
The Fear of Public Speaking Is Universal
56 How to Eliminate the Fig Leaf 118
A Presentation Lesson from the Military
57 Unwords 120
Even Barack Obama Says Them
58 To Slip or Not to Slip 122
Been There, Done That
59 The Free Throw 124
A Presentation Lesson from Basketball
60 10 Tips for 30 Seconds 126
Help for Job Seekers
61 You Are What You Eat 127
10 Tips about Food and Drink in Presentations
SECTION IV Q&A: Handling Tough Questions
62 Speed Kills in Q&A 131
The Vanishing Art of Listening
63 A Lesson in Listening from Barack Obama 133
How to Handle Multiple Questions
64 If I Could Tell Jon Stewart... 135
Talk Shows Include Listening
65 What Keeps You Up at Night? 136
How to Handle the Most Frequently Asked Questions
66 Spin versus Topspin 138
The Political World versus the Business World
67 When Did You Stop Beating Your Wife? 140
How to Handle False Assumption Questions
68 Madoff and Cramer Plead Guilty 142
How to Respond When Guilty as Charged
69 Tell Me the Time, Not How to Build a Clock 144
Keep Your Answers Short
70 Presentation Advice from Jerry Rice 146
Grasp the Question before You Answer
71 Politicians and Spin 147
Putting Lipstick on a Pig
72 Murder Boards 149
How Elena Kagan Prepared for Tough Questions
73 Ms. Kagan Regrets 151
Non-Answers to Tough Questions
SECTION V Integration: Putting it All Together
74 The Elephant 155
The Whole Is Greater Than the Sum of the Parts
75 Presentation Graphics Meet Linguistics 156
Symmetry in Graphics Design
76 One Presentation, Multiple Audiences 158
12 Presenters, 12 Stories, 1 Set of Slides
77 The Art and Science of Oprah Winfrey 160
The Secrets of Oprah Winfrey’s Appeal
78 Right or Left 164
The Deep Roots of Human Preferences
79 Graphics Synchronization 168
The Missing Link
80 The House that Jack Built 170
Make All the Parts Fit
Footnotes 173
Acknowledgments 177
About the Author 178
Index 179
Jerry Weissman is the world’s number one corporate presentations coach. His private client list reads like a who’s who of the world’s best companies, including the top brass at Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Intel, Intuit, Netflix, Dolby Labs and many others. Mr. Weissman founded Power Presentations, Ltd. in 1988. One of his earliest efforts was the Cisco Systems IPO road show. Following its successful launch, Don Valentine, of Sequoia Capital, and then chairman of Cisco’s Board of Directors, attributed “at least two to three dollars” of the offering price to Mr. Weissman’s coaching. That endorsement led to more than 500 other IPO road show presentations that have raised hundreds of billions of dollars in the stock market.
Mr. Weissman’s focus widened from coaching IPOs to include public and privately held companies. His techniques have helped another 500 plus firms develop and deliver their mission-critical business presentations.
Mr. Weissman is also the author of three books, the bestselling Presenting to Win: The Art of Telling Your Story, named by Fortune magazine as one of eight must-reads; The Power Presenter: Technique, Style, and Strategy from America’s Top Speaking Coach; and In the Line of Fire: How to Handle Tough Questions...When it Counts.
|
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
