Posts – Page 8 – Craig Strachan

PowerPoint Karaoke slides

On Monday evening, I ran a PowerPoint Karaoke contest at the Cape Communicators Toastmaster Club. This is the first one that I ran, and it was a fantastic evening!

We had about 10 people who were each given a random deck of PowerPoint slides, and they were given about three minutes to present a presentation using their slides. It was all in good fun, and we had some very interesting takes on the topics.

It is a great way to both practise your impromptu speaking skills, and to have some practise with PowerPoint.

Here is how I did it:

Draw for random speaking order
Draw for random topic order – I didn’t want to be too nasty and give somebody a topic that they knew absolutely nothing about, so they could select topics beforehand. I also gave them 3 minutes to prepare – basically while the previous speaker was speaking. If you are feeling nasty, give them a topic just before they speak, and let them go – much as for a Toastmasters table topic session
Each speaker got 3 minutes to speak. Timing lights at 2, 2.5 and 3 minutes
I used the Toastmasters Table topics contest form as a “judging form”
You are basically pretty free to make up the rules, so the above is what I did; feel free to adapt and let me know what works for you.

Here are all the decks that I used:

Each deck was approximately 5 slides long. Note that they are not “real” slide decks, but made up to give the speaker something to play with. Some of the topics are a little off the wall.

Many people have asked me for a copy of the slides so that they can present the Karaoke contests at their own clubs, so here they are. Please feel free to steal and disseminate. My only request is to let me know how it goes.

Please note that I have created these slide decks from a variety of publicly available material and slides that I have built up over the years. If I have inadvertently used copyright material, please let me know and I will remove it.

Finally, thanks so much to Imation for sponsoring the event. They gave us memory sticks and tee shirts as prized. The sticks are 1 gig, and about 1cm square – really cute. They also gave me an amazing remote wireless projector adapter. This little device plugs into your USB port on one end, and the projector on the other, and voila, you have a wireless projector!

Leave a comment and let me know how your session goes!

10 ways to grow your business

Advertise on company and community notice boards
Free announcements in local/community newspapers
Barter your services in exchange for free advertising
Word of mouth – tell all your friends
Business cards – never leave home without them
Be outrageous – do something so out of the ordinary that you get free publicity
Offer to write articles for local newspapers or magazines. Note that these are articles and not advertorials
Make contacts with complementary businesses to provide a stronger offering that helps you both
Be contactable make it easy for your customers to find you. Have a website, and respond to emails and phone calls
Follow through on your leads and customer queries

PowerPoint Karaoke?

Here is an interesting technique that will both improve your thinking skills, and provide an unusual form of entertainment: PowerPoint Karoake. Basically, you have to present an impromptu PowerPoint presentation. From how I understand it, you are given a deck of slides, and you need to present an unprepared presentation using the slides (also known as Battle Decks).

You have to deliver a PowerPoint presentation about an unfamiliar topic, with slides you’ve never seen, to an audience eager to heckle and laugh at you. If you’re in your underwear, you’re having a nightmare. If you’re clothed, it’s called PowerPoint Karaoke

This is serious business, there are loads of prizes, including a grand prize of $5000. Unfortunately, the contest is only available to USA and Canada residents, but I still think that it could be quite a fun event to host anyway.

If you look on YouTube, there are over 125 different PowerPoint karaoke video’s, here are a couple that I enjoyed.

See you on the stage.

How much effort are you prepared to put into your passion?

I was listening to an interview with Malcolm Gladwell recently on the Radiolab podcast in which he was speaking about the performance of Jamaican athletes when he was growing up. He made a comment that part of the reason for their performance is that they trained harder than anybody else.

When Darren la Croix won the 2001 World Championship of Public Speaking, he said that he did not want any of the other competitors to be more prepared than him – he wanted to out-prepare all of them, and he won.

When I was in school, I studied music as one of my matric subjects. In my final year, I would probably practice about 2-3 hours a day, and I was a far better pianist then than I am now. It was because I was putting in the time to prepare.

Tiger Woods is such a great golfer partly because he puts in approx 6 ½ hours training every single day, as well as about 2 ½ hours in the gym . I have no doubt that if I put effort into golf every day for a few years, I would be a mighty fine golfer as well. Maybe not as good as Tiger Woods, but a lot better than I currently am.

According to Fortune Magazine,

“The evidence we have surveyed … does not support the [notion that] excelling is a consequence of possessing innate gifts…. that nobody is great without work…There’s no evidence of high-level performance without experience or practice.”

Ok, so the bottom line is that you can be excellent at just about anything that you choose, but you will need to put in the effort to get there.

How much effort are you prepared to put into your passion?

Conversations with the Champs

Here is a six-part conversation by some of the World Champs of Public Speaking. These are the guys that you get to hang out with if you attend the Toastmasters International Convention.

Here is a six-part video – Conversation with the Champs. For many more free educational videos from Darren, check out his YouTube site.

Anyway, here are the videos – enjoy!

Confusing your audience in stories

Last night I watched a speaker say something like this: “Do you remember the scene where they tore the page from the textbook in Dead Poet’s Society? ”. He then proceeded to relate the scene in the movie to his speech.

While using a quote, idea or story from a movie to help make a point is a useful and powerful technique, you need to be a little careful not to make one of these two assumption:

We had all seen the movie
We all remembered the scene/quote.

Those of us who had seen the movie will try to remember exactly what happened, and the rest of us have no idea what the speaker is talking about. This confused the audience and they loose the connection with the speaker.

Here are three suggestions.

Pick an example that most of your audience can relate to.
Give a brief summary of the scene; just enough to help the audience understand why it emphasises your point
Provide context for people that may not be familiar with the example, so that they can relate to the story.

This doesn’t just apply to scene’s from a movie, it could be a quote from a famous speech, or even an important event. For example if I was giving a speech on national unity, I could say something like this

“Do you remember when Nelson Mandela walked onto the rugby field in 1995 after South Africa won the world cup final?”

The South African’s in the audience will remember the moment, but not many others will. Here is an alternative:

“It was 1995, and South Africa having just come out of years of racial segregation, was hosting the Rugby World Cup competition. Due to anti-apartheid sporting boycotts, this was the first year that South Africa was allowed to enter, and they beat New Zealand in the finals to take the trophy. Nelson Mandela walked onto the field wearing a springbok rugby jersey, and presented the trophy to the captain Francois Pineaar, and a nation cheered.”

Which example do you prefer?

Mandela, Rugby World Cup Final, 1995

Even if I gave that story to an audience that does not follow rugby, they can probably relate it to a similar story that is relevant to sporting matches that they follow.

Keep your examples powerful, relevant and simple to capture your audiences, build powerful connections and leave memorable messages.

DG in the news

Hi All

The recent Toastmasters Induction Dinner has made it into the Cape Town local papers. Cape Community Newspapers ran an article which was syndicated to most of the local community newspapers.

Correction: I am the second youngest District Governor. Howard Steinberg beat me in 1980.

You can read the article below.

I hope that it brings some new members in.

Toastmasters Induction Speech

On Saturday 4 July, we celebrated our incoming Toastmasters district leaders by holding a gala Induction Dinner.

I was installed as District Governor in a ceremony chaired by Past District Governor, Frances Boshoff, after which I presented my incoming address, where I spoke a little about what Toastmasters means to me, and I presented the district theme – Toastmasters, Growing People.

District Governor

The outgoing officers were also released from their duties, allowing them to handover the leadership duties to a new set of officers, and Lois Strachan was installed as the IPDG (Immediate Past District Governor), which means that she will be chairing the PDG advisary committee for the next year.

Anyway, if you missed the dinner, it was a fantastic function, and judging by the noise level, was enjoyed by all. If you didn’t manage to get there, I have a video of my speech, you can watch it below. Anyway, keep talking, and remember that Toastmasters Grow people!

https://youtu.be/z4P1BO8BsZI

Do you leave memorable messages – Darren LaCroix on originality

Do you give your own memorable messages, or do you sound just like everybody else? Here is an interesting lesson from Darren LaCroix, the 2001 world champ of speaking. He tells an interesting story:

Never use someone else’s story. This is a small industry… it won’t take long for the ‘owner’ to find out. After doing my “Ouch!” speech at NSA a few years ago, it was copied by somebody overseas just a couple of months later. One of my mentors happened to be in the audience, and called the speaker on it. At first, he denied it. But later, he admitted it. As speakers, we can be inspired by others — but it’s important that we be original in our own messages, techniques, and stories.

As Darren would say “Ouch!”

You can read the entire article on Darren’s website.

Leave them wanting more…

Whammey Bar Gig

Before I started getting stage time giving presentations, I spent many years on the stage as a musician. In fact, you will still see me occasionally playing a few tunes in a restaurant or pub. One of the things that I learnt from playing and from listening to live music is to leave them wanting more.

I have heard great bands that just don’t know when to stop planning, or that insists of playing every song they know. What happens? Everybody gets board, and leaves before the band has finished. So when they do finish, they end to a lukewarm applause from the few people still there.

I have also heard bands finish their set with the entire audience is on the dance floor, while everybody is having a party. They end the gig with a bang, to huge applause. When this happens, everybody remembers a great party, and is back next week.

Why does this happen? Simple – the last impression is what people remember. The same applies to speaking.

If you speak for too long, people will get board and loose interest. If you finish on time, and with a strong finish, they will remember how great you were, and will want more. Next time they hear you speak, they will wait with anticipation for your presentation, and not with dread as to how long you are going to speak for.

Leave them shouting “encore”, and not “thank goodness its over”.

By the way, if you want to listen to some of my music, go here.