Workshop Planning

* Find out as much information as possible about the workshop specifics (length, audience member make-up, room set-up, content expectations, AV at your disposal, etc.)

* Create a Statement of Purpose. This is a specific, concrete, and short statement that sums up what you want the audience member's to learn during your session.

* Research quotes, activities (please peruse www.thesource4ym.com), facts, handout possibles, stories, personal stories, etc. that could possibly make it into the final flow for your workshop.

* Start a three-ring binder

* Make sure everything you put in your binder is closely related to your workshops' statement of purpose.

* If you find something on a web page, bookmark it, print it out and put it in your binder.

* If you come across something that you find very interesting or you think might work for a different workshop, print it out and put it in your binder behind a "to use later" tab.

* Get as much stuff as you can find. At this point, the more the merrier. If you have a tight Statement of Purpose, everything you put in the binder has a good chance of being valuable.

* If you are giving a leadership or life skills related workshop, chances are good you might find some content you can use at my leadership blog (www.PersonalLeadershipInsight.com). Type in a related word in the search field on the home page of the PLI blog.

The PLI Blog is indexed by Essential (Vision, Integrity, etc.). Scroll down on the right-hand side of the home page and you will see a section called Links. You can look at just the posts (there are over 250 total) for each Essential. If one of the Essentials looks like it might contain some content relevant to your workshop's Statement of Purpose, browse the posts and see if you can find some gems. For example, if you are doing a networking session, you will find some great posts on that in the Fostering Relationships posts. If you are doing a team communication workshop, obviously you will find some great posts in the Masterful Communication posts. Etc.

(WARNING - the links for these posts are NOT the Del.icio.us links that are on the rightIhand column. The links where you can look at all the posts filtered by essential are under the section titled Links. Although, if you want to peruse the Del.icio.us links, they are indexed by Essential and there are over 600 posts there! Great stuff.)

Concentrate Your Training Room

Your audience has a ton of noise going on during your training session. The learning and retention of your content hinges on a number of factors, some big - some small. One big factor is your willingness and ability to get everyone physically plugged into the session.

Concentrating the Room is about controlling the learning environment to produce the greatest chance for success and it is so simple to do. Just follow the techniques below. Does it take more time? Yes. Is it worth it? Absolutely.

Five quick benefits of Concentrating the Room:

1. Removes energy gaps.

2. Removes distractions, especially when you have a round table set-up.

3. Gets the audience physically engaged in the session and thus creates a boost of attention via heightened awareness, blood flow and brain activity.

4. Creates the perfect environment for Passionate Paul and helps Hostage Harriet to get plugged in.

5. Encourages growth in the trainer's confidence because the audience will be more attentive. Guaranteed.


Five ways to concentrate your round table training room:


Table Work: You roaming the room. Audience seated at round tables facing each other.

Unfortunately, most trainers who have a round table set-up just keep the audience members seated like this throughout the entire session. Everyone is facing different directions and many have their back to the trainer. If they are not looking at the trainer, they are facing a table full of distractions. You should keep the audience in Table Work position only when they are doing group work.


High Receive: You in one spot. Chairs and audience members at tables, but facing directly toward you.

We use high receive all the time to make key points, video presentations, slide presentations, and big group discussions. High receive can easily be overused since the audience members remain at their tables. Don't overuse it. The point of any concentration technique is to make a significant directional change in their body language to create a more focused learning environment. If you overuse any one of these techniques, the technique becomes the norm and attention fatigue will set in.


Movie Time: You in one spot. Audience members seated in amphitheater style around you.

If you are planning a longer group discussion, illustrating a point with a story, or teaching from an easel, bring the audience forward and have them sit close to each other and close to you.


Corner Cram: You in the corner. Audience members seated in corner with you.

Same as movie time, only in a corner.


Play Time: You and the audience standing in an open area.

If you are using an activity or exercise to illustrate a point, get the room set up like you need it by concentrating where the audience is standing as you give the directions. Push the tables and chairs out of the way, get all the audience members standing together in one place, get attention and go for it!

10 Tips for Next Level Facilitators

If you are a presenter, chances are good you spend part of your time "speaking" and part of your time "facilitating." There is a big difference.

Speaking is the act of verbally communicating information.

Facilitating is the act of moving an audience via speaking, interaction, discussion, experiential exercises, multimedia, etc.

The difference in the definitions highlights the key difference between speaking and facilitating - the latter is a much more complicated art form. The following are a few strategies of how to improve your facilitation-based presentations...

This particular list of 10 was co-developed by myself and the 08-09 Georgia FFA State Officers at Camp John Hope in June 2008. Thanks team!



1. Get the group physically active
2. Give clear directions
3. Allow the participants opportunities to share ideas and give opinions
4. Let the group direct their own learning at certain times
5. Get the group writing
6. Allow the participants to work in teams
7. Take the sharing from personal reflection to small group discussion to large group sharing
8. Have mood-appropriate music and always make it CPP - Clean, Powerful and Positive
9. Build in group encouragement
10. Set the context early in the agenda (let the group know what you are going to do and why)

On Tour

I will be blogging only from the PLI blog (www.PersonalLeadershipInsight.com) between May 16 and May 30. I will be on tour from Oklahoma City to Washington to Oregon to New Jersey to Tulsa to Chicago and back to Oklahoma City. The blog posts over there will include tips and strategies and content from my keynotes and workshops during this period.

Postings will resume here in June. Thanks!

The Personal Leadership Insight blog - www.PersonalLeadershipInsight.com

Tips from Steve Jobs

Bnet.com has a new video on the biggest reasons why Steve Jobs' presentations always rule!

http://www.bnet.com/2422-13722_23-192173.html

Five Offspring of Authenticity

The following list contains five results from a presenter being authentic:

1. Credibility - I don't care if your area of expertise is wide or narrow, I just care that you know what you say you know.

2. Authority - Speakers are questioned all the time. Authentic speakers are questioned less often.

3. Sincerity - In the era of botox, liposuction and "cheat your way to the top," sincerity is worth more because of simple supply and demand. The demand is high and the supply is short.

4. Consistency - Humans begin appreciating consistency from birth. A child loves peek-a-boo because of the consistency of you appearing each time. Make it a habit to be yourself.

5. Energy - It is physically and mentally draining to be fake - for you and your audience. Being authentic reverses this and encourages an energetic experience.

50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can't Be Wrong

There was only one Elvis. He was paid a large sum of money to be Elvis and he will always be remembered. There are a million Elvis impersonators. They are paid small sums of money to be someone else and they will never be remembered.

Being an authentic presenter begins with you deciding who you are, understanding your uniqueness and working hard every day to bring the best of your genuine self to each presentation.

You have a unique path. No one in the world has ever walked through life just like you. Your audience deserves all of you, not some of someone else. Your stories. Your beliefs. Your shortcomings. Your expertise. You.

To tap into your inner-Elvis, answer the following questions as quickly and honestly as you can…

What is your greatest strength?

What do you most believe in?

Who are you in three words or less?

What do you know the most about?

What are three interesting personal stories?

Describe your favorite type of presentation.

Describe your favorite audience make-up.

If you only had only one thing to say to the world, what would it be?

The Power of a "Best" Friend

1. Be yourself.

2. If you can't be yourself, be someone better.

3. If you can't be someone better, hang out with someone who brings out your best - a "best" friend.

4. You will then be yourself and someone better.

5. Your "best" friend brings out the best in you because they expect to find it and they look until they find it. You should do the same - for yourself and others.

PLI Presentation Tip Post

Click over to the Personal Leadership Insight blog for a quick post on how to improve your next presentation...

http://pliblog.yournextspeaker.com/2008/04/masterful-communication-dance-with-one.html

Developing Your Presentation's Flow

Authenticity Rule #5 is Know Your Flow.

How do you decide how your presentation is going to flow? What is your presentation going to be about, what goes into the outline, and what comes first, second, third, etc.? Here is a simple strategy I have used roughly 2,250 times (I have given over 150 presentations every year for 15 years.)

1. Begin by asking, "What is at the core of my presentation?" Your answer should be the most important concept, idea, or learning lesson you want the audience to walk away with. It should be simple, clear and meaningful. Everything in your presentation should make your core stronger, clearer to understand, and/or easier to remember/implement.

2. Detail out the presentation logistics: number of people, presentation length, room set-up, audience ages/backgrounds/reasons for being there/expectations/etc., AV tools at your disposal, and organization makeup/history/challenges/etc.

3. Brainstorm a long list of options to support your core and that will fit with the logistics. Your list will include stories, more points, quotes, visuals, pictures, props, activities, exercises, videos, handout pieces, facts, data, etc. This list should be intentionally long. Everything won't make it into the presentation, but you need to get all your options in front of you.

4. Now you are ready to start putting together your flow (i.e. - your outline). This is simply an exercise in pulling elements out of your options list and moving them into your outline based on these characteristics: powerful, fresh, creative, deep in meaning, easy to understand, authentic to you and your story/experience/expertise, and connects back to your core (point #1.) Take into consideration the time elements and remember to plan on using only 80% of your allotted time. The cardinal sin for any presenter is going over time. This normal happens by trying to fit in too much information. Remember, less is more.

This strategy will work for short presentations (1-10 minutes), keynotes, workshops, breakout sessions, informational presentations, etc. Remember to save not only your final flow, but also your options list. We use Microsoft Outlook Exchange for our contacts/calendar/etc. and Blackberry devices. I save the final flows and the option lists in both the calendar notes for the events and the memo/notes feature. This allows me to be able to access both via my laptop and my Crackleberry and everything is backed up on both devices, as well as the Exchange server.

A future post will officially introduce to Authenticity Rule #5...

The 7-Iron Rule - Know Your Flow

You can only improve after you learn how a correct presentation flow feels.