Transcriber: eric vautier
Reviewer: Hélène Vernet Most people who come to speak at TED
are here because they’ve succeeded. I’m here because I haven’t. (Laughter) For the last ten years, I’ve been helping conference speakers,
business leaders, entrepreneurs to prepare and deliver
powerful presentations. And in those same ten years,
TED has shown that presentations can and should
be both enjoyable and effective. But, ten years on, despite TED and despite my best efforts
at schools, conferences, and companies, most presentations
still do this to their audiences. (Laughter) So have I failed? No! I just haven't succeeded yet. And to succeed in making all presentations
resonate with their audience, I need your help. That’s why I’m here. So I’d like to share with you the three magic ingredients
of powerful presentations. OK, let’s just pause there for a moment. I’ve told you what I’m going to say. The question you should be asking is: "So what? What’s in it for me?
Why should I care?" And that is a really important question because the first magic ingredient
is in fact the audience. The audience is the magic ingredient
in every presentation. This is not my talk, it’s yours. Every presentation
should be made to measure for a specific audience
in a specific context. So why should you care about the magic
ingredients of great presentations? Well, it's very important, right? It’s really important to understand that
we all have to listen to presentations. Wouldn’t it be great
if they weren’t all so boring? But we don’t just listen to presentations, we also have to give présentations, right? How many of you
ever have to give presentations? I think if we’re honest, we all do. Sooner or later, at school or at work, and also in interviews, we all have to present,
with or without slides, and it’s how well we present that will make a huge difference
to how well we succeed. That’s why you should care. So that’s the first magic
ingredient: the audience. Always make it special for them. The second magic ingredient
is the speaker. Now, you’re probably
looking at me and thinking: “Well, Phil, not very magical.” (Laughter) Thanks, by the way! But, it’s really important that you put
something of yourself in there, something only you can say. This doesn’t mean you tell them
what you had for breakfast, but it does mean that if someone else could give the exact same
presentation in your place, then you didn’t put
anything personal into it. And that matters
because when you share, we care. So show why you care,
why it’s important to you. Tell us examples and stories
from your experience. And that will make it more personal
and more memorable. So those are the first
two magic ingredients: the audience and the speaker. I know it doesn’t sound very magical, but you’d be amazed how many
presentations have neither of them. So the third magic
ingredient is transformation. Now most presentations aim only
to inform their audience, and it doesn’t work very well. Let me take out my magic wand because
I’m going to do a disappearing trick, because like this guy, we forget most of what we hear
very quickly indeed. But good presentations
are not about information, they are about transformation. They are about changing something
in what your audience believes, in what they feel, in what they do. Imagine you are making a pitch for raising funds
for a project or a start-up. After your pitch, the audience knows
everything they need to know, but they don’t fund you. Did you succeed? No. Now imagine that after your pitch,
your audience does give you the funds because they feel confident and trusting, and they believe that your
project will be successful and that it is a good investment. All of that is not information,
it’s transformation. So it’s easy for me to say
“Don’t inform, transform!” but how? Well, every magician needs
a magic wand, and here is yours. It’s called the "Audience
Transformation Roadmap." This is a really simple
but amazingly powerful technique to understand what your
transformational objectives are, and then to brainstorm what you can say, show and do
to transform your audience. So here’s how it works. To understand how to take your audience
on a transformational journey, you first need to work out
where they are starting from. So we ask ourselves four simple questions: What does my audience know
before my presentation? What do they know about the subject? What do they believe? And what do they feel? Now the difference between the two is believing is something you think,
and feeling is an emotion. So for example, I believe
it’s time for dinner, I feel hungry. See the difference? Right. So what do they know, believe and feel,
and lastly, what do they do? Now this could be nothing,
maybe they do nothing relevant, or maybe they do something
that you need to change. So once you’ve worked out
where they are before, you can then take them to where
you want them to go afterwards. And we ask the same four questions
but in the reverse order. So now we know what they do before. What do we want them to do
after the presentation? What do they need to feel? What should they believe differently,
to feel and do those things? And lastly, what do they need to know? And when you follow this process, you realize very quickly
that the real transformations are not in what they know,
it’s in what they believe and feel and do. That’s what makes the difference. Once we’ve understood where they are
and where we need to take them, then, we can fill in
the Transformation Column with all of the ideas on what
we can say in our presentation to make those transformations
in our audience. And that gives us
the content of the presentation. Clear so far? Maybe we should take
an example, so let’s take one! Let’s assume that I am going
to make a presentation, and I'd like to explain the three
magic ingredients of a great presentation, and I’d like to make my audience want to
use the Audience Transformation Roadmap. So what does my audience know
before the presentation? Well, they know that most presentations
aren’t exactly successful, and they know TED is the exception
that proves that rule. What do they believe? Probably like most people, they believe
presentations are for sharing information. It might be wrong, but that
doesn’t stop them believing it. What do they feel about presentations? Probably bored, but also resigned
to a really ineffective way of presenting because that’s just what everyone does. And lastly, what do they do? Well, when it’s their turn to present, they generally will pack
things full of information, and they won’t personalize it
to their audiences. So, what do I want them to do
after my presentation? Well afterwards,
I’m going to want them to aim to transform their audience
every time they present, to change something in their audience. I’m going to need them to personalize
their presentations every time. And also, I’d like them to use
the Audience Transformation Roadmap because I know
it will help them to succeed. What do they need to feel
to do those things? Well If they still feel bored or resigned,
they’re not going to do very much. So they need to feel curious
about this new technique, they need to feel motivated to try it, and optimistic that it can work for them. What do they need to believe
to feel those things? They’ll need to believe
that the Roadmap can actually help them
to succeed in their presentations. Lastly, what do they need to know
to believe, feel and do those things? Well they’ll need to know the three
magic ingredients, that’s pretty basic. They'll need to know
presentations are bad at information but great at transformation. And they’ll need to know how to use
the Audience Transformation Roadmap. OK, now we’ve worked out where they were
and where I want to take them. What can I do now? I fill in
the Transformation Column. So what can I say or show or do
to make those transformations? Now usually, I’m using a flip-chart
and some sticky notes here. So I’m going to use virtual sticky notes. Let’s start at the top. We need to make sure
they know the three magic ingredients, so I’m going to need to talk
at some point about the audience, about the speaker, and the transformation. They need to know presentations
are bad at information, so maybe I should tell them that we forget
most of what we hear very quickly. And perhaps I can find
a visual way to show that as well. What next? They need to know how to use
the Roadmap so I’d better show it to them, and I guess I could make it even clearer
by going through an example. They need to believe that the Roadmap can help them
to succeed in their presentations. So I’ll need to show how easy it is to take all of these sticky notes
off of the Transformation Column and arrange them in a suitable order to create the storyline
for their presentation. It really is a short-cut. OK, now I need to make them curious. Now to make them curious,
I’m going to need to make them care, and to make them care,
I need to show that I care. So, I probably need to explain that most
presentations really don’t succeed, and that I care about fixing that. And then to make them care, I’m going to need to find out
how relevant it is to them. Perhaps I could ask them how many
of them actually need to present, and of course I know the answer
is pretty much everybody. I need to make them
motivated and optimistic. Well I can make them optimistic
by explaining how easy this is to use but also how powerful it is. And to motivate them to try it, I’m going to need to explain
that successful presentations can really make a difference
to how well they succeed in life. Lastly, to make them do these things,
I’ll need a call to action, which focuses on what I want
them to do afterwards. So there we have it! That’s a very accelerated version
of the brainstorming, but it doesn’t need to take long. What we have now
is just enough relevant ideas on how we can transform our audience. So what happens next? Well this is where I’m going to take
my magic wand out again because this is where
the presentation magic happens. This is where you can take all the sticky
notes off of the Transformation Column, prepare a suitably magical story line, and then arrange all of these ideas
back into that story line, and hey presto, there is my presentation! Now you might recognize
this one, because ... this is the presentation you have been
watching for the last ten minutes. And this is where we are now. Isn’t that magic? So, now you know what happens next! Next, I need to explain how simple
this can be and how powerful. And it’s so simple
that it doesn’t take an expert. Thousands of people
have already used this technique to prepare and deliver fantastic
presentations of all kinds, from TED talks to the boardroom. But more than presentations,
they’ve used it also for emails, for proposals, for preparing interviews,
for preparing conferences … Basically, it works in any situation where you need to change
what people believe, feel and do. You really don’t need a magic wand. This is all the magic you need. (Applause) Thank you. Thank you. So now I need to give you
a call to action, and here it is. Remember those three magic ingredients
of every great presentation: the audience, the speaker, and the transformation you want
to create in your audience. Try using the Audience Transformation
Roadmap for your next presentation, and you’ll be amazed at how well
your ideas resonate with your audience. And lastly, please remember
I need your help. I can't cure the world
of bad presentations on my own. (Laughter) But together, we really
can make a difference! So by all means, share this
with anyone you know who needs a dose of presentation magic. It could be your colleague,
your teacher, your boss, but you all know someone. And most of all,
every time you get to present, focus not on informing
but on transforming your audience. That’s where the magic happens, and if you can succeed in changing what your audience
believes, feels and does, there truly is no limit
to what you can achieve. Thank you. (Applause)
