New light through old windows – seven presentation creativity ideas

No, I’m not talking about the Chris Rea album, I’m talking about a new way to make your content ‘stick’.

Consider the picture – to give you a sense of scale, that’s my wife in the bottom right hand corner. What’s so special about a tree – even such a cool tree as this one? Well it’s kinda scary, because I’d never seen it before, despite walking past it maybe a dozen times.

It’s at the Alnwick Gardens. If you’ve not been, go.

So what tools are there to present your information differently?  Or tools find those ways?

1. Try a different medium. It’s not necessarily the way you’d do it in the end, but forcing yourself to try presenting using a different medium can really kick your creativity into overdrive and force you to think differently. It’s a bit like playing mime games – when you can’t speak, your ability to pass on information visually becomes more to the fore.
2. Pretend you’re talking to a different audience. Instead of your colleagues from work, what if you were presenting to the Mothers Union, or the Association of Radical Midwives? Or what about the International Clown Convention?
3. Give yourself some (unreasonable) rules.  For example, if you’re using Pecha Kucha rules, for example, you only have 20 seconds for each or your 20 slides before the slide automatically moves on.
4. Abandon the idea of you leading a presentation altogether. Instead, why not try something like a facilitated meeting – you provide the facts in advance and spend the meeting time soliciting ideas from the floor. (Note – don’t do this as a cop-out! Doing it well takes a lot of time, energy and effort!)
5. Give yourself some random props. Seriously, when I’ve been stuck in the past, I’ve even tried to work in a stuffed cow to the presentation.  Of course the cow hasn’t been there in the end, but the process of using the cow frees up ideas.
6. Ask yourself: What would Batman do? It doesn’t have to be Batman, of course (But if it’s not, what’s wrong with you?  Batman is the answer to almost any question!) The point is to pick someone who you know will have the right way of doing it – and be yourself, not them!  But be influenced by them.
7. Change your environment. Yes, that old chestnut. It’s a cliche, but it’s a cliche for a reason – it works.  Play different working music; work in a different cafe; use different software… whatever.

And one bonus thought ;)

Inspiration is often assumed to just strike. It doesn’t. The research is very, very clear. Inspiration comes as a result of being completely on top of your topic, and letting things go from there.  You can’t use any of these tools to by-pass the hard work of knowing what you’re talking about. Sorry about that :)