I’ve witnessed a lot of seminars/presentations/classes/shows lately. Suffice it to say I have plenty of material for coming weeks.Watched an instructor roll out a course. He was capable, competent, credible, and well spoken. But the materials were marginal at best.I love flip charts. I think they’re easy and great and adaptable. And evidently this instructor shared my passion for them. And had used flip charts before. In fact, these same flip charts. Their edges were worn and torn, the color had yellowed, there was masking tape on top of masking tape where they had been hung many times, and the company name of this particular training session was taped over a previous heading. These were clearly not first-run flip charts. Reminded me of wearing my older brother’s clothes growing up, which is not a pleasant memory.You can hardly blame the instructor. There were a lot of charts and they would have taken a lot of time to re-produce. But that’s what instructors are paid to do. And paid well, in this case. But the audience had to feel they weren’t worthy of such effort.Anyone who gives recurrent content faces this challenge. How can one give material over and over such that it is fresh every time for the new audience? It’s hard, to be sure, but it’s also exactly what good communicators should do. It may take hours or just a lot of energy, but it’s worth the effort.
Make the content (seem) new for every audience.
Why do you keep telling us you’ve seen a lot of bad presentations? It almost reminds me of Shakespeare, “methinks he doth protest too much.” You’ve got credibility, and even if you were making things up, you’re still dead on. Just tell us how we can improve.
I struggle with this. I struggle with this even for myself. I almost always cringe when I watch myself present (via video). There is always just so much to improve on. That’s why I always leave a take-away at the end — a principle to live by.