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Top 10 Best Presentations – The Reader's Choice
Oct 1Our Top 10 Best Presentations Ever stirred a lot of interest and we were lucky enough to get tens of thousands of visitors thanks to Scott triggering a blogswarm. As you can imagine, we got lots of feedback, and readers offered addtional nominees for the Best Presentations. We looked at every one of them, and here are the the Top 10 Best Presentations – The Reader’s Choice (once again in no particular order…in fact, it’s how they came in):
Hans Roling talks about the “devolving world” at the 2006 TED Conference. This presentation was suggested by Blackfriars, who says, “I’d add Hans Rosling…who explains 50 years of trends in world health and development in 18 minutes of animations.” Roling is professor of international health at Sweden’s world-renowned Karolinska Institute, and founder of Gapminder. What a powerfully enthusiastic presentation he makes. He loves this stuff. And makes us love it too.
Sir Ken Robinson advocates for educational creativity at the 2006 TED Conference. Another presentation suggested by Blackfriars. The conference bio for this video says, “Sir Ken Robinson is author of Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative, and a leading expert on innovation and human resources. In this talk, he makes an entertaining (and profoundly moving) case for creating an education system that nurtures creativity, rather than undermining it.” Robinson argues that “creativity is as essential as literacy in education and we need to nurture that.” A captivating storyteller. And funny. Hey, where are his slides? Oh. He doesn’t need slides.
Al Gore talks to MoveOn about global warming in 2006. Suggested by Albert at Philly, who says, “How can you leave Al off the list?” Yes, it’s an inconvenient truth that I didn’t put Mr. Gore on my first list. But he’s on this list. Mr. Gore makes a powerful argument for taking action against global warming, and uses persuasive science combined with passion to make his points. Science and emotion together. What an idea.
Majora Carter talks about sustainable development and environmental justice at TED 2006. Okay, I have to go to TED 2007, because this sounds like the place to see all the presentation superstars in one place. Suggested by Guy Kawasaki, he says that Majora is “every bit as good as Steve Jobs” and offers 15 reasons why. Amazing talk in story style by the founder of Sustainable South Bronx. She got a sustained Standing O. And brought me to tears.
John F. Kennedy at the Berlin Wall in 1963. This speech, Kennedy’s Ich bin ein Berliner appeal to the free people around thw world, was suggested by by the German Anders|denken blog. This speech set the stage for people around the world to focus on being citizens of the world and fighting oppression.
My Name is Joe shouts I Am Canadian on a 2006 Molson ad. In the style of Dick Hardt’s Identity 2.0 presentation, this suggestion by Anders|denken blog is stirring in its own right. And dang funny. Who ever thought of using shadow puppets in their presentation? (I actually do know someone who did, so this is a second reference.) Humor is often sadly missing from presentations. Do humor if you can. And, go big or go home.
Ze Frank talks about what makes a website popular at TED 2004. Ian at Flashpoint said that he agreed generally with our first list of the Top 10, but said we missed Ze Frank’s talk. The world’s top vlogger shows how he got that title. He uses humor and creativity to make points about the intersection of technology and communication. Never underestimate the fact that people, first and foremost, want to be entertained. And that they don’t care about slide 18. Side note: Lots of people weighed in on this one (here’s one in German). It’s dang funny, I have to say that.
Douglas Englebart demos the first computer mouse and lots of other computer fucntionality…in 1968! “I’m suspicious of any best presentations list that doesn’t include at least a nod to Douglas Englebart’s Mother of All Demos” is what Christopher St. John commented on Guy Kawasaki’s post. Well, here’s the presentation in all it’s B/W glory. Vive la computer revolution! And it’s old school, baby.
Steve Jobs goes all Mighty Mouse at MacWorld 1997. What’s better than having people go nuts when the introductory speaker says, “This man needs no introduction”? Crazy. In 1997, Steve came back to save the day. Now Mighty Mouse is on its way. (This one was suggested by so many people that I’m thinking we might need a new category called “Top 10 Best Presentations by Steve Jobs.”)
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young sing “Ohio”. Ed Darell from Millard Filmore’s Bathtub offered up four suggestions, all of them historical. We’re going to do another list with the historical speeches, but CSNY’s Ohio is a powerful “speech” in its own right and, despite your politics, it undeniably changed behavior. Ed writes: “They intended it as a protest to the shootings of students by the National Guard at Kent State University in Ohio, in 1970. It played everywhere in that summer. By the fall, all protesters, claiming outwardly to be committed to protest, instead absorbed the hidden text message: ‘Four dead in Ohio.’ Students stopped protesting and instead got degrees and moved into government. Protest was deadly, was the message. By 1975, when the South Vietnamese government teetered on the brink, even U.S. Congressmen got the message, and the war ended when the U.S. refused to support a corrupt government. It happened again in the Philippines years later.”
Tom Peters: If You Don't Fall Over, Then You Weren't Going Hard Enough
Sep 30Here’s a 60-second interview of Tom Peters where he talks about leaving it all on the stage: “If you don’t fall over, then you weren’t going hard enough.”
(via The Tom Peters Weblog)
Beautiful Evidence: Presentation Design Matters
Aug 22
Edward Tufte, the graphic presentation guru, who was called “The Leonardo DaVinci of Data” by the New York Times, has recently published Beautiful Evidence. He describes the book about presenting information by saying, “Beautiful Evidence is about how seeing turns into showing, how empirical observations turn into explanations and evidence presentations.” If you don’t own Tufte’s other three books, you can buy the entire bundle for $150 (saving yourself $35 and learning a heckuva lot about presenting information in the process).
The author was interviewed on NPR about the book in a piece titled Edward Tufte, Offering Beautiful Evidence. The five-minute interview is well worth listening to, especially when he talks about “spark lines,” which are data-rich presentations that give a much more complete way to present information.
In HR, presenting data is often a key part of the job. HR professionals present data to senior management about turnover, pay, performance ratings, and many other aspects of the work experience. It’s wise to consider Tufte’s work in that context. As we all know, when it comes to people, nothing happens in a vacuum.
Top 10 Best Presentations Ever
Aug 21Hi. Welcome to KnowHR. Many of you come here every day to read this post about the best presentations. If you like it and would be interested in practical, straightforward advice about HR and communicating, would you consider subscribing? You can sign up to get KnowHR by email or in your RSS reader. Thanks a lot for stopping by!
Here are five stories you might want to look at:
10 Tenets of the New HR
1,001 Canned Responses for Self Evaluations
Get Out of the Obfuscatorium
65 Things I Believe about HR
Subterranean HR Blues
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Sarah and I were talking about great presentations we’d seen or heard about and she came up with an idea for a Top 10 list. Here’s our take on the Top 10 Best Presentations Ever (in no particular order…and if you have others to add, we’d love to hear about them):
Steve Jobs introduces the Macintosh in 1984. Back then, Steve dressed like Tucker Carlson circa 2006, but black tee shirts and jeans or double-breasted jacket and bow tie, this Macintosh unveiling rocked the house. Steve has perfected the sense of theater, and none is better than this one. Check out how he pulls the 3.5-inch floppy from his jacket pocket. Flair, baby.
Dick Hardt’s Identity 2.0 presentation at OSCON 2005. Hardt’s preparation and energy sets the standard for presentation quality. He uses hundreds of slides in this 20-minute, high buzz work. Heck, I didn’t even care about virtual identity and still watched this one five or six times. It has a chance of becoming my presentation Dirty Dancing (which I’ve seen 100 times), where “nobody puts baby in the corner.”
Guy Kawasaki’s Art of the Start speech at TiECon 2006. In the 40-minute presentation (PDF of slides here), Kawasaki talks about innovation and business evangelism. When he talks about “Make Mantra” it’s well worth listening to. The beauty of his speech is that he uses a Top 10 approach and is unafraid to speak plainly and with great humor (which is sadly lost in public speaking).
Dr. Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream speech in 1963. Who can argue that Dr. King’s speech in Washington on August 28, 1963 was anything but brilliant and changed the trajectory of America? But the rheotrical beauty of this speech is also unparalleled. At a time when our language has been reduced to the common, it’s essential to look upon the preparation and thought that Dr. King used for this monumetal speech.
Lawrence Lessig’s Free Culture talk at the 2002 Open Source Conference. The master of the simple slides shows us how it’s done. And since, as he says, this is his 100th time for this talk, he has this bad boy down solid. Even though this talk is from 2002, his slide presentation style is still as fresh today as Axe Body Spray.
Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink presentation at SXSW 2005. I’ve seen Gladwell talk a couple of times in person, and he’s brilliant. He talks fast and he makes points by telling stories. He doesn’t lecture, he paints a picture. All this from one of the foremost thinkers of our age. Gladwell makes the points, “We can do more with less. And there are real dangers in giving people too much information.” Hey, that reminds me, Where are his slides? Oh, he’s presenting without slides. How about that?
Tom Peters presents A Ham Sandwich in 1990. Okay, this isn’t a Peters presentation, but the guy has so much passion that he can make a ham sandwich sound compelling. I saw him a few times in the late 80s during the height of the Thriving on Chaos days, and that was some rallying cry. In the link here, Peters outlines what makes a great presentation. No one can leave a Tom Peters presentation saying they weren’t energized and entertained.
Seth Godin talks about Marketing at Google in 2006. “Technology doesn’t win, but it sure gives you a chance at marketing.” Godin knows the story, lived it, and tells it. He also uses slides to his advantage to persuade his audience that he’s right. Check out the slide he calls “No one cares about you.” Is there anything wrong with getting people to laugh and think at the same time?
Andy Kaufman sings along to Mighty Mouse on SNL in 1975. Mies van der Rohe would have been proud, because Kaufman showed the essence of “less is more” in this Saturday Night Live skit. I’m not suggesting that your presentations should be filled renditions of superhero songs, but negative space is important, and this presentation was both ahead of its time and pointed in its simplicity.
Rupert Everett sings I Say a Little Prayer for You in MBFW in 1997. Okay, this is just one of our favorites and isn’t exactly a “presentation.” In fact, it’s from a movie – My Best Friend’s Wedding. But isn’t a lot of what we do a “presentation” designed to persuade people to believe our story? The beauty of this one is the lead-in and then the music. Oh, the power of music. And if you haven’t seen this movie, the last scene is just fantastic.
UPDATE: The readers have spoken! And in addition to KnowHR’s Top 10 Best Presentations Ever, we now have Top 10 Best Presentations – The Reader’s Choice. Click on over and have a look at 10 more great presentations.
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