The Ten Commandments of Presentations

I’m reposting this from Michael Hyatt’s excellent blog. He got this from the TED (Technology Entertainment and Design) conference.

Here are the ten commandments of presentations:

Thou shalt not simply trot out thy usual shtick.
Thou shalt dream a great dream, or show forth a wondrous new thing, or share something thou hast never shared before.
Thou shalt reveal thy curiosity and thy passion.
Thou shalt tell a story.
Thou shalt freely comment on the utterances of other speakers for the sake of blessed connection and exquisite controversy.
Thou shalt not flaunt thine ego. Be thou vulnerable. Speak of thy failure as well as thy success.
Thou shalt not sell from the stage: neither thy company, thy goods, thy writings, nor thy desperate need for funding; lest thou be cast aside into outer darkness.
Thou shalt remember all the while: laughter is good.
Thou shalt not read thy speech.
Thou shalt not steal the time of them that follow thee.

Priceless.

http://www.georgerebane.com George Rebane

Number 7?? But isn’t that why God invented PowerPoint?

http://www.aaronklein.com Aaron Klein

Yeah, that one was the least applicable. I’m always selling something with PowerPoint: usually not a product, but most often an idea or concept.

But I decided to take the spirit of that point as “Thou shalt make sure that your audience gets as much value out of your presentation as you do.”

http://www.nationonthehill.com Tyler

I always follow 5×5 on presentations, never more than 5 bullets per slide and never more than 5 words per bullet.

I’ve listened to too many that give a #9…

http://www.aaronklein.com Aaron Klein

Yep, I agree. I saw a great presentation the other day with no bullets. Each slide was a picture and maybe five or six words. It inspired me to try that some time. Takes a lot longer to build that kind of presentation though.

http://www.georgerebane.com George Rebane

Although, we’ve all heard speakers whom we have wished to violate #9