by Beth Levine | Mar 5, 2012 | Just Mouthing Off
So, I just read an article about how harder-to-read fonts promote better recall. Uh oh, I wondered, slides too? Yup, slides too.
Interestingly enough, most of the prevailing wisdom about creating effective PowerPoint presentations suggests that clean and lean fonts, anything sans serif – i.e. no curlycues on the letters – are best. But apparently, less legible fonts make readers concentrate harder and therefore retain better. It seems counterintuitive until you really think about it and realize that readers have to slow down and focus harder with a font that isn’t as easy to skim.
What fascinated me most, though, about the research presented in this article was that they discovered students learn better from a teacher’s or professor’s handwritten scribbles on a “chalkboard” (probably a whiteboard!) than they do from PowerPoint. Yes, this would make sense given the font proposition. And it also supports my long-held theory that drawing or writing on a whiteboard during your presentation allows your audience to be present for, and part of, the creation of your visuals … and therefore promotes stronger reinforcement and stickiness.
No matter what, though, less is always more in the retention department, so feel free to go ahead and use a busier font, or your own handwriting, but keep the number of words and lines as lean and mean as possible!
by Beth Levine | Feb 21, 2012 | Just Mouthing Off
If you ever needed a really good reason to improve your performance at the front of a room or at the podium, consider this …
In an article on “Social Intelligence and the Biology of Leadership” published in the Harvard Business Review in September 2008, Daniel Goleman (of EQ fame) and Richard Boyatzis wrote this:
“It turns out that there’s a subset of mirror neurons whose only job is to detect other people’s smiles and laughter, prompting smiles and laughter in return. A boss who is self-controlled and humorless will rarely engage those neurons in his team members, but a boss who laughs and sets an easy-going tone puts those neurons to work, triggering spontaneous laughter and knitting his team together in the process. A bonded group is one that performs well, as our colleague Fabio Sala has shown in his research. He found that top-performing leaders elicited laughter from their subordinates three times as often, on average, as did midperforming leaders. Being in a good mood, other research finds, helps people take in information effectively and respond nimbly and creatively. In other words, laughter is serious business.
Wow … if we all took this to heart, meetings could be a heck of a lot more fun, huh?!
by Beth Levine | Feb 7, 2012 | Just Mouthing Off
Okay, speakers and presenters, you have a dilemma!
On the one hand, it is widely expected and perfectly acceptable to open a talk by thanking your hosts and guests for being there and for their participation in whatever meeting or event everyone is gathered to attend. Sometimes this is even laced with welcomes and other platitudes.
On the other hand, it is also widely known that audiences judge a speaker or presenter’s worthiness within the first 10 seconds. Some say 8 seconds, some actually say 3 seconds. Hmmmm. Suffice it to say, audiences judge fairly quickly – in a matter of seconds – whether the person at the front of the room is worth paying attention to and whether they plan to listen attentively or not.
Collision, conundrum, dilemma. What to do? How do you reconcile these two forces? I’m a big advocate for shaking things up and trying something new and different. I’m also a big advocate for yielding to the audience (if there’s even a slight conflict between the speaker’s interests and the audience’s interests, the audience wins hands down!). It’ll be a little bit like moving over and sleeping on the other side of the bed (you know you have a side!), but try and grab your audience’s attention first and thank them later. See if you can save your niceties and pleasantries for the end of your opening section, or for the very end of your remarks, whichever feels more doable. Open instead with a story, a question, a proposition, or a call to action.
Yes, making this change is likely to feel unnatural at first, but it will make you and your talk much more memorable. If for no other reason, you will stand out as the speaker who had a strong, impressive opening!
by Beth Levine | Jan 16, 2012 | Just Mouthing Off
Today is the perfect day for a reminder about going to 30,000 ft and staying out of the weeds.
Dr. King was the master. He said, “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.” He did not say, “We need equal rights and equal access to schools, buses, water fountains, and voting booths for adults and children alike; we need laws to be enacted that protect and promote the future of our people in this nation.” Nothing wrong with the second one, but it’s not nearly as impactful or memorable as the first. It’s all in the why versus what, the message versus the info.
So, in a slightly different twist on honoring the legacy of Martin Luther King, let’s all resist delivering laundry lists of items and features when we speak. Instead, let’s look at our lists and ask what value or significance or meaning there is in all of our items and features collectively. And then that’s the message.
I have a dream indeed.
by Beth Levine | Dec 26, 2011 | Just Mouthing Off
Gifts come in all forms, and one of mine this year came in the form of an invitation to be a Visiting Executive and Lecturer at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. Very exciting!
I will be on the campus in Hanover, NH, January 3rd through the 5th, giving a lecture to MBA students on Executive Presence, coaching students in one-on-one sessions, and meeting with the Dean as well as various faculty members and administrators. An amazing opportunity, a wonderful gift.
So, the countdown begins, and the preparation, which actually began months ago, continues. Yes, SmartMouth followers, I have outlined my “focal points” and my “messages” for each and every one of my presentations and important conversations. Who wouldn’t, right?!
by Beth Levine | Dec 12, 2011 | Just Mouthing Off
Omigosh, I had to laugh. “Tks” was the full content of an email I got from a client the other day. That was it, just … Tks.
He meant thanks, or thank you, or thank you for your response … or, more specifically, thank you for responding to my email and for editing my important presentation that was attached.
Not to worry, I gave him a ton of grief for his Tks. And I reminded him that my work with him, our journey together, was to help him become a more robust and
relevant communicator. He’s an executive, with a lot of potential and a bright future, but I’m told that people cannot follow him when he speaks. He really had been making great strides, getting lots of compliments, feeling better about his presentations. Then Tks.
But Tks is not just his pitfall. It’s all of ours. Thumb fatigue from text messaging, the limits of the 140-character message, and the pressures of hectic and multiple communication modes these days have made for some pretty
sloppy messages that assume a familiarity and casualness with your
audience that might not always be appropriate or welcome. And let’s be honest here, we’ve all fallen into a complacency with messages like Tks. We just generally trust that it’s okay. Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t …
The moral of the story? U cud b gr8, but beware, these shortcuts could also shortcut your career if used too often or with the wrong audience at the wrong time. And so the few extra seconds it takes to type out a full word or two might be well worth it. Think about it next time you’re in a hurry to send a message, and Tks for reading!
