SpeakHQ Blog
Many conferences include what’s called a panel session. This is where 3 to 5 experts get up on stage and each one, in turn, bores the audience to death. Why do panels still happen? One reason: they’re sooooo tempting. In theory a panel is great. It gets more people on stage, which should magically creates something…
Read MoreNew post is up at SpeakerConfessions.com about How to fix boring lectures. I’ll be doing more “How to fix…” style posts so if you dig this, keep watching. Got a question you want me to answer on public speaking? Let me know. I take requests.
Read MoreWe all know most lectures are boring. They go on too long, most speakers are dull on stage, and sitting in big dark rooms for an hour or more is not going to help anyone stay awake. But if they’re so boring why do we go? We go because we have little choice. If we…
Read MoreTo keep track of all the interviews, research and stories I’m putting together for the next book, I’ve set up a new blog called speakerconfessions.com. Why the new blog? One reason. Public speaking is a polarizing topic – some people find it fascinating, others are bored to tears. Rather than annoy half of you here,…
Read MoreLast call for presentation camp – a brand new unconference event for people interested in pitching, presenting and public speaking. Presentation Camp At UW communications building (map) Saturday April 4th 2009, 9am-4:30pm (Full schedule here) It’s $15 if you register by noon today, $20 later today or at the door. I’ll be doing a keynote…
Read MoreSaturday April 4th Kathy Gill and I are running the first ever Seattle presentation camp, an unconference for people interested in all forms of public speaking, presenting, and pitching ideas. We’ve posted the core schedule with some of the sessions that we know will take place, as well as plenty of slots for unconference style…
Read MoreAs research for my bestselling book on Public Speaking, I listened to dozens of famous speeches. I found a list of the top 100 speeches of all time and worked my way through it, making the following observations: We have technology bias. Since we don’t have recordings of, for example, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, Jesus’ sermon on…
Read MoreDuncan Davidson has a nice post listing several annoying habits some conference presenters have. Duncan of course notices these things since he’s often paid to photograph speakers, and these things make that more difficult than it should be. He includes several good ones including my favorite: Please take off your name tag. This is self…
Read MoreOne of my favorite things at Adaptive Path’s MX event this week was how they had designers assigned to make large drawings based on the current talk, as the talk was happening. It was real time art/design/creation – super cool. Here’s Teresa Brazen’s drawing of my talk, Why designers fail: The cool thing is that…
Read MoreI find YouTube fascinating from a “how much things change yet stay the same” perspective. We love to talk about how different the world is than the pre-internet days of say 1989, but when I look at YouTube I see lots of video of people speaking in public. Lectures, talks, monologues, etc. Yes, it’s true,…
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