WHEN YOU STAND UP to make a presentation, your audience has many other things on their minds that compete with their attention to you and your information. You have to break through the clutter quickly, or you lose your chance to focus their working memory on the new information you’ll present. In addition to the limited capacity of working memory, you also have only a limited amount of time to make a first impression. In the first moments of a presentation, an audience forms an opinion about you and determines your credibility to talk about the topic in the first place. This puts you in a critical situation where you really need to get it right the first time.
A presentation—like a story—is a sequence of ideas over a finite period of time. People naturally follow this linear structure when they tell one another stories, whether in person or in novels and films. The beginning of a story defines your specific opportunity to lay down the sequence of ideas that will make the most efficient use of your audiences’ limited capacity for new information and your limited time to make a first impression. If this sequence is put together well, it can quickly and efficiently engage your audience.
What Will You show, say, and Do in the first five slides?
There are many theories about what it takes to focus your audience and make an impact in the first few minutes of a presentation. But whatever you believe, now you have to make specific decisions that will turn your abstract ideas into practical form. Next week, or whenever you present, you’ll be the specific person standing at the front of a specific room, with a specific presentation on your computer. With Beyond Bullet Points (BBP), you have a place to begin—the document that holds your story template is the specific place where you start the practical work you need to do to get ready for that day.
With your story template document open, locate the Zoom toolbar on the lower right of the screen, and click and drag the Zoom toolbar so that Act I fills the screen, as shown in Figure 4-1.
FIGURE 4-1 The five cells where you’ll write the five headlines in Act I of the story template.
Although you’ll be working in a Microsoft Office Word document for now, it’s helpful to keep in mind that the specific words you write here will become the headlines of the first five slides of your PowerPoint presentation, as shown in Figure 4-2. These five slides will determine everything you say, show, and do in the critical first few minutes of your presentation, and they also represent your opportunity to start strong and clear and to guide working memory through the entire presentation.
Inspired by the basics of classical story structure, Act I of the story template includes the specific elements that make up the beginning of a well-crafted story, ensuring that you always have the essential pieces to begin your presentation properly. Once you have a solid foundation established in Act I, you’ll have limitless creative options for what you actually do visually and verbally in the presentation. Later you’ll look at a range of ideas for creating the words and images for these first five slides. But first you’ll write a specific example to see exactly how all the pieces of Act I fit together in a tight and smooth sequence.
FIGURE 4-2 The five headlines you write in Act I of the story template will become the headlines of the first five slides of your presentation that determine what you’ll show, say, and do during the critical first few minutes.
Starting with the Title and Byline
The scenario for this example presentation is that you’re in charge of a team that currently manages a line of products and services. Although things have gone well in the past, you see the environment quickly changing and you know you’ll run into trouble soon. Your team is savvy and experienced and don’t have time to waste, so they expect you to get right to the point. So with that, you start at the top of the story template.
In the top cell above Act I, replace the text Title and byline with the title of your presentation—in this example, A new way of thinking. Type a byline for the script following the title—in this example, by Pat Coleman, as shown in Figure 4-3.
FIGURE 4-3 Type the title and byline in the top cell of the story template.
Now that you’ve added a title and byline, the story template is ready for you to start writing Act I.
Why a byline is important
The byline of the story template is important because it names the person who is responsible for the story’s successful delivery: the presenter. In many organizations, PowerPoint files will pass through many hands as they’re being developed, and ownership can easily become lost or unclear. The impact of these presentations diminishes because they are disconnected from the real names and faces of the people who will stand at the podium. Many people can contribute to a presentation, but only one person will ultimately make the presentation. The byline at the top of the story template makes it clear at all times who is behind the slides and whose reputation and credibility are on the line.
Choosing a Story Thread
Act I of the story template lays down the pattern for the headlines of the first five slides in a sequence that will orient the audience, interest them, engage them, motivate them, and then focus them on a path forward. These five headlines will answer the clarifying questions that every audience silently asks every presenter: where and when, who, why, what, and how.
In Act I, you shape the answers to these questions in a creative way that awakens the imagination of your audience, connects with their emotions, and persuades them that they want to participate in your story.
Orienting the Audience with the Setting Headline
The headline of your first slide establishes the context for your entire presentation. In a film or television show, if a scene takes place in the living room of a house in the daytime, you might first see a shot of the exterior of the house in daylight that then fades into a shot of the living room where the action will take place. This film technique is called an establishing shot and quickly shows the audience the where and when of a story.
To begin writing the first headline of Act I, type a headline in the row in the template labeled Setting that describes the establishing shot and answers the questions your audience members are silently asking: "Where am I, and when is it?" Where is not necessarily a literal geographic location but could be an abstract setting, such as a profession or a general topic of discussion that establishes the context for the presentation. When could be an implied time, such as today, if that’s obvious to the audience. For the
Setting headline of Act I of this story, enter Our team has done well here until now, but the environment is fundamentally changing, as shown in Figure 4-4.
FIGURE 4-4 Write your first headline of Act I to describe the setting.
The use of "here" in this headline establishes the location for this presentation within this organization, and "until now" indicates the time frame of the past leading up to today. Now that the where and when have been established, the rest of the headline can say something about the setting that everyone in the room agrees is true—in this example, that "the environment is fundamentally changing." At this early stage in the presentation, the headline should not say something controversial or unclear, or else you’ll quickly derail your presentation before you even get started.
The reference to "the environment is fundamentally changing" is an example of establishing the setting at a macro level—presenting the big picture of the situation, to which you’ll zoom in with laser-like focus shortly. This makes sense for this audience of executives because they all would know about trends in the industry environment, and this headline affirms what they know to be true—perhaps more succinctly than normally would be said in a presentation.
This first slide is important because when your presentation begins, audiences might have different expectations than you do. The Setting headline invites them to join you at the same location, establishes a common ground, and leaves no doubt about the context for what you are about to say.
The Setting Headline
The Setting headline answers the question the audience members are silently wondering: "Where am I, and when is it?"
When you’ve written the Setting headline, you’ve made sure you will orient the audience by establishing the where and when of the story in the first slide of your presentation, as shown in Figure 4-5.
FIGURE 4-5 The headline of the Setting slide orients the audience to where they are and when it is.
After you write a headline for the Setting slide, it’s time to add some character to the presentation.
Interesting the Audience with the Role Headline
The headline of your second slide names the role of the main character of the story.
Every story is about somebody, and that includes your PowerPoint story. The main character of your story is the person who will make a decision to do something or come to believe something by the end of the experience. According to this definition, the main character of every nonfiction presentation is your audience.
Establishing your audience as the main character in your second slide makes your presentation personal to them. Because the audience members have a direct involvement and stake in the outcome, they will pay attention. Making your audience the main character also helps you to stay focused on your audience and makes sure that you tailor your presentation to their needs. Many PowerPoint presentations tend to be "all about me," with little if any consideration of the audience. With this single slide, you remind your audience that this is "all about you."
■ REMEMBER The main character of every presentation is your audience, and you are a supporting character. This is the crucial spin on crafting stories for live presentations.
The main character of a presentation could be a single person, such as a customer or client, or it could be a group, such as a committee, a team, a jury, a board, or an organization. In this presentation, the executives are the main character because they are the ones who have to figure out what to do in the changing environment.
Now that you have a star for the leading role in your presentation, write a headline that acknowledges your audience’s role in the setting you described. In the row labeled Role, type a headline that answers the question your audience is wondering: "Who am I here in this setting?" In this example, enter You’re here to help us figure out what we’re going to do, as shown in Figure 4-6.
FIGURE 4-6 Write your second headline of Act I to describe the audience role.
In any particular context, a person could have a number of different roles—for example, the same individual could be the supervisor of one person, the peer of another person, and the subordinate of yet another person. Here you choose the specific role your audience members play in the context of the setting you just established. The subject of this headline, "you," establishes the audience, the executives, as the main character of this story. Now that the who of the story is clear, the rest of the headline can simply affirm something about the audience’s situation that everyone in the room can agree on. In this case, the executives would concur that they are "here to figure out what we’re doing to do."
The Role Headline
The Role headline answers the question the audience is silently wondering: "Who am I here in this setting?"
When you have written the Role headline, you’ve made sure that you’ll interest the audience by acknowledging their role in the second slide of your presentation, as shown in Figure 4-7.
FIGURE 4-7 The headline of the Role slide interests the audience by making them the main character of the story.
In the next slide headline, it’s time to stir things up for the main character.
Engaging the Audience with the "Point A" Headline
The headline of your third slide begins the action and presents your most important opportunity to quickly engage your audience. Because you should make an emotional connection within the first few minutes of a presentation, this is the specific slide where you make that abstract concept a reality.
Stories are about how people respond to something that has changed in their environment. People like stories of how other people handle changes in circumstances and what their choices reveal about their characters. When a main character experiences a change, an imbalance is created because things are no longer as they used to be. This creates a challenge that sets the story in motion. In your story template, you’ll define this challenge with the Point A headline. This headline is called Point A because it defines the specific point where your audience begins the action of this story. Later you’ll define the specific point where your audience wants to be in light of this challenge—Point B.
The Point A challenge that has brought everyone to the presentation today could be a crisis brought on by an external force that has changed your organization’s environment, such as a sudden economic shift or the action of a competitor. It could be the result of an internal change, such as a revised opinion or mindset, a new piece of information, a new research report, or an anecdote from the field.
■ REMEMBER The Point A headline sets your story in motion by defining a specific challenge your audience faces.
