Nick Fitzherbert

I wrote recently about my excitement at finally getting to meet advertising legend Dave Trott and soaking up some of the street-wise wisdom that he generously blogs, then compiles into his books Creative Mischief and Predatory Thinking.

It was on re-reading the latter that I was reminded how closely he hits the spot on two big, related issues in business presentation: 1) the difference between conversation and presentation and 2) the need to be ruthless in editing yourself.

When making a business presentation you almost certainly want to adopt a conversational style, but this does not mean you simply make it up as you go along. If you were to record a genuine conversation you would find it so full of superfluous words and general meanderings, let alone umms and errs, that you would certainly want to do a major edit on yourself before repeating that particular topic in a more formal manner. As Dave Trott says in Predatory Thinking: if we wrote the way we talk, the page would be covered with so many words it would be illegible.

Trott goes on to say:

Why don’t we talk the way we write?

In writing we work out what’s essential and just say that.

Why don’t we do that with talking?

Work out the most important, powerful thing to say.

Then say it.

Then shut up.

In writing, we know words are more powerful with lots of white space around them.

Words need room to breathe.

So we’re more sparing with them.

We only use what we need.

That – as long as you avoid defaulting to the ‘cloak of formality’ that some people still do when writing - is the essence of good construction for a business presentation. And the point about ‘…say it. Then shut up’ needs reiterating when you are thinking about how to close. A strange paradox that afflicts many business presenters is that they are often nervous about getting up to speak, but having done so they never know how to stop! Having made their big point they keep trundling on, gradually running out of anything to say and getting further and further from that big point.

So: Say it. Then shut up!

Last night I finally got to meet one of my communication heroes – the legendary ad man Dave Trott, who was speaking at the LSE on his favourite topic ‘Predatory Thinking’.

As a keen disciple of Trott’s books and blogs I was looking forward to hearing lots of familiar stories – straight from the horse’s mouth. What intrigued me as a Presentation Skills coach, however, was whether be could be as compelling in front of a live audience as he is in print and through various advertising media. And what would he use in the way of presentation aids?

The answer to the first question is that Dave Trott educated, inspired and charmed every one of the 500 or so people who had come to hear him and he stayed very late into the evening signing books and engaging personally with every purchaser. As for his presentation aids, he announced: “We’re going old school” and proceeded to scrawl a series of little doodles on an overhead projector! Admittedly it was probably actually a ‘visualiser’, but it was about as far from PowerPoint as you can get. And it worked perfectly in terms of amplifying the topics he was communicating.

Now, in my book Presentation Magic I referred to a discussion with a friend many years ago when we theorized about what would make the perfect presentation tool. After much debate we decided on the flipchart because you could appear to be making up the content as you went, enabling you to tailor your content directly to feedback you were receiving from your audience, so making them feel they are truly a part of all that is being discussed. Of course, nobody actually does this because flipcharts are old tech and I have even see text books that say ‘flipcharts have no role in presentation’. Here, however, Dave Trott was putting the principle into action, albeit with a tool that can reach an audience in excess of 500.

You can see some of Trott’s doodles here. What would your marketing department make of those? Believe me, though, they were perfect as a tool for supporting the speaker on this occasion. And that is how we must perceive presentation aids of all types – as a tool to help you as a speaker to get your point across. I often show the people I am coaching videos of Steve Jobs and I point to the way he never puts anything on the screen unless it is actively helping him at that moment. Dave Trott takes the principle several stages further by bringing real personalisation to the process.

While we are on the subject of Dave Trott, I urge you to read his book Predatory Thinking. Essentially, it is Trott’s take on the concept of ‘Disruptive Activity’ that has become the by-word for securing an advantage and getting ahead. His favourite story of a ‘powerful strategy to out-think the competition’ goes like this:

Two explorers are walking through the jungle. Suddenly they hear a tiger roar. One explorer sits down and takes a pair of running shoes out of his backpack. ‘You’re crazy, you’ll never out-run a tiger,’ says the other explorer. ‘I don’t have to out-run the tiger,’ he replies. ‘I just have to out-run you.’

The pages of Predatory Thinking are full of stories like that, with Trott telling them straight from the heart is his own distinctive style – very much as he speaks. I describe it as ‘street wisdom’ because it’s all about people and, woven in amongst classic examples such as Churchill, Einstein and Jobs you find actors, guitarists, racing drivers, football coaches and people as diverse as Vietcong soldiers and a plumber.

Predatory Thinking – and its predecessor Creative Mischief – give you the distilled wisdom of a lifetime and it’s too good to be confined simply to the creative community that usually follow Dave Trott. You will find yourself choosing your favourite stories, telling them at your next meeting and wanting more. And the brilliant thing is that you can feed the habit because these books are essentially compilations of Dave Trott’s regular blogposts. Which means you can find more on a regular basis at these sites:

http://davetrott.campaignlive.co.uk/