How to Transmit Information – What a presenter/author/teacher need to know
Everyone of us needs to transmit information in daily interactions with others. Besides banters between friends just to be sociable, we often need to transmit information correctly, efficiently, and be understood by the intended audience in whatever time frame allowed. This is particularly important when one is asked to give an invited speech, write a paper to be published, and/or otherwise influence the intended audience. Few of us are natural born speakers/authors. But becoming one is learnable and can be acquired if one pays attention to the task. Note to be invited to do such a task is an honor. It should not be used as an occasion to advertise yourself but one to reinforce/affirm whatever reputation you have already achieved to receive such an honor.
Over the years, I have written many articles about how to give talks and to write papers that receive citations and becoming known as a good speaker/author. My attempt here is to summarize and collect in one place everything I have learned in my 75+ years of experience in my profession for reference by others. I am not a person with natural borne talent for such task. In fact you can say I am the opposite being a very shy and reticent human being but an example of the fact that you can learn to be good at such tasks if you really wanted to be so. Okay, what are my
My qualifications:
1. 60+ years of experience at Harvard as an established academic. Although top university often emphasize research over teaching, being known as a good communicator does help your career.
2. I was three times invited keynote speakers at world congresses of my profession in 1981, 1990, and 1999. Being invited once is a recognition of one’s achievements in the profession. But being invited twice and three times (which I believe unique with me) are objective evidences of being recognized as a good speaker
3. Co-author of a bestselling textbook and the gold standard of the profession since 1969 that has over 44,000 citations in 56+ years without a revision published in English, Translated into Russian, and Chinese.
4. I was not born a natural speaker not English my first language. I learned to be a good explainer due to my lifetime teaching job
5. Over the years I have practiced nonstop improvement of my communication techniques. I firmly believe good communication techniques are a learnable skill for everyone.
So, what is the
Major Requirement: Write and organize your communication task from an audience-centered viewpoint. You believe you can explain anything to anybody in any amount of time at a level they can understand. To achieve this you must all talk or write what you think the audience will be interested not what interest you. You talk or write what you think the audience can understand not what all you have learned.
Major difference between giving a talk vs. writing a book or paper: A book or paper is permanent. It is used by one person at a time. So long as the content of the written book/article is complete for the purpose, the user can adapt how to use it to suit her/his needs. S/he can go over any portion at anytime for as many times as needed. In giving a talk you basically have to adapt your communication to many users simultaneously and you have only one chance to do it right. Except for Q&A period afterwards, it is difficult to repeat anything you did not do right the first time. Time is a big constraint. Of course if a talk is recorded and available afterwards helps. But it is not often a good solution for many.
So here begins a listing of
My articles on giving talks and writing paper/book (with link and sources)
How to give talks (1) https://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-1059634.html
How to give talks (2) mod=space&uid=1565&do=blog&id=1073547
How to give talks (3) https://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-1083069.html
How to give talks (4) https://blog.sciencenet.cn/blog-1565-1170578.html
Two years ago, I gave a course to a small group of Chinese Americans here in my home town of Lexington Mass USA on “How to Give Public talks”. It was several one hour long instruction/discussion over a period of three months with homework and practice talks by participants. There are plenty of other sources of info on the www about giving talks. Here is just an account of my own experience to be consulted together if needed with my posts below on the same topic:
Here are the salient points
1. Don’t put too much information on one slide when using PowerPoint. If you don’t have time to explain an item on a slide. Don’t leave it on the slide. It only distracts and confuses the listener. You have no obligation or necessity to put everything you know or found on your slides.
2. Your PowerPoint slides should be a self-contained summary/notes of your talk. Don’t READ your talk. Let the bullet points on your slide as reminder of what you want to say. Your talk will come across as far more natural and be absorbed by your audience.
3. Don’t be self-centered on what you want to say, but be audience-centered on what will be interesting to them
4. In the posts above, I have also mentioned two examples of good talk given by Prof. Cassandras of Boston University and Professor Pao of University of Colorado. Listen to them for inspirations.
5. Good talks are based on Preparation, Preparation, and Preparation: P1 is for preparing before the talk, P2 is for preparing for disasters and happenings beyond your control (e.g., always keep you slide file with you. Never check them with your luggage), P3 is for reviewing your talk after giving it for mistakes during delivery you don’t want to make again in the future even you know you won’t give the talk again.
6. Always rehearse your talk and observe the time limit given for the talk
7. Let the student practice talks be at least ten minutes long to allow sufficient time to cover all aspects of giving talks and allow for critiques
8. This was a course given by volunteer teacher and students. No fees were charged. I asked for minimal feedback for comments and suggestions for future improvements with assurance that I’ll not take anything personally. However despite repeated begging some students refuse to provide any feedback. I am not upset but somewhat disappointed and have no choice but to interpret this as their polite response that the course is a big waste of their time while others took time to offer genuine critique/feedback which will benefit future learners if I offer the service again.
Recently I wrote another article on “Giving a talk is different from writing a book” which gives pointers for presenter who did great research but tries to cram everything into a talk and onto the slides with the result that he is essentially trying to reproduce a book in limited time available – an impossible task! See https://blog.sciencenet.cn/home.php?mod=space&uid=1565&do=blog&id=1529974 A book is meant to be read by one person at a time. S/He can Read. Stop, Go back and repeat any portion at any time to suit her/his convenience. In a talk you are attempting to convey information to a large number of people in a limited amount of time with no possibility of adapting to individual need or repeating. This is why there are often Q&A period after a talk trying to ameliorate the constraints a little bit.
Yes, on the other hand, writing a paper or a book you don’t have to be time constraints and satisfying as many people simultaneously together at one time. While many of the major points such as Be audience-centered still applies, you can be and should be complete in content since you still have to satisfy many different users/readers. But you don’t have to do it simultaneously. Each separate reader/user can “pick-and choose”, repeat a section. Ignore some detail sand comeback as s/he choose. There is no time constraint and content constraint. For example, your can even include a short quiz or multiple choice exam as an appendix in a book to test readers’ understanding as s/he reads your text. I did in my co-authored bestselling textbook and received many good feedback about this feature.
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