At the suggestion of a friend (thanks, Karmelle!), I bought Resonate, one of the best books I read last year. Author Nancy Duarte has worked on thousands of presentations, most notably An Inconvenient Truth. In the book, she draws on the likes of Joseph Campbell, Martin Luther King, Martha Graham, Abraham Lincoln and Steve Jobs to illustrate what makes a presentation powerful and compelling.
You can watch Nancy Duarte talk about the basic concepts on the TED presentation, but if you’ve got anything at all to say to help change the world, you’ve got to get the book.
A few key thoughts from Resonate:
- Have a clear Big Idea, what the audience can do and why it’s important.
- The audience (not you, the presenter) is the hero who is being called on a big adventure.
- Create dramatic tension between What Is and What Could Be.
- Tell stories and use a “sparkline.”
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