Scott Berkun's Blog, page 73

Update on my next book

It's been awhile since I've said anything about my next book. Time for an update.

The book's primary theme is: Intelligent Provocation.

What does this mean? These days, discourse is heavily polarized. We rarely see or hear intelligent arguments. Many of our popular voices are not thoughtful about how they express their thoughts.

The goal of the book is to take on big questions, provocative ones, in a thoughtful but challenging way.  Much of the book will be heavily revised essays and posts I've already published, with 1/3rd or more of new material written to make the entire project work well as single great read.

Since I plan to write many books in my life, I need this one to be self-published. I'm sure in the future I'll want to write books publishers will be afraid of, and I can only do that if I do it myself. I need to start somewhere, and this book is a great place to start.

Weeks ago I hired an editor, Krista Stevens, and recently I hired Tim Kordik to join the project as the book designer (and yes, he's being paid). We are officially on a roll. We have a complete outline, some draft sections finished – things are well on their way.  The current plan is for the book to be out late spring of this year.

I'm working on ways to involve you readers in the process. So stay tuned!

Related posts:Update on my next book
Help wanted: designer for next book (updated)
Berkun plan 2004
London book update
Help Wanted: Designer for my next book

How to prepare: checklist for great talks

To help celebrate the recent release of the paperback edition of Confessions of a Public Speaker, as well as it's 100th review on amazon.com, here's a checklist you can use to help make sure things go well at your next presentation.

Before the event

Questions to ask to prepare:

Who is the audience? Why are they coming?
Can organizer provide demographics?
Can you look at last year's programs? Were there reviews of the event on blogs?
What are other speakers speaking about?


Will this be a keynote lecture (more scripted) or small (more interactive)?
Create a list of questions audience will want answered in the talk
Prioritize the list and sketch out stories / ideas / points
Budget at least 10x time to prepare ( 1 hour talk will take roughly 10 hours of preparation)
Develop ten minutes of rough draft material
Practice the ten minutes. Do not procrastinate.
Revise material when it doesn't work, then practice again from beginning. Repeat as necessary. (See Chapter 5 of Confessions for a full description of how I prepare)
Do a test run in front of people who will give honest feedback (Or videotape and watch).
Practice with a clock with goal to end reliably with an extra 5 minutes.
Ask for emergency contact cell#, give organizer yours
Get directions to the venue, including office-park insanity, and within building insanity
If appropriate, post slides to web, include URL at end of talk

Leaving for the event

Get an hour of exercise that morning or night before.
Check laptop: do you have all cables? Is it working fine? Are slides on it? Battery charged?
Bring backup slides on flash drive / Extra-backup online somewhere / Print back-up of slides
Bring remote control: Check battery
Shower, shave, prune, scrub, brush, deodorize
Ensure you avoid all avoidable stress (get there early no matter what)

At the event

Register and let organizer know you've arrived (txt message if necessary)
Find your room and watch another speaker speak in it. Notice anything?
If time allows, mingle and meet people who might be in your audience
Return to room to catch (at least) tail end of last speaker before you – maximize time to set up.
Get laptop hooked up to projector immediately. Most problems occur here.
Find tech person, or call organizer – you'll need their help to get microphone set up, or to deal with any tech issues.
Test remote. Test any fancy videos or fancy anything.
Walk the stage. Get your body comfortable.
Make sure you have a glass of water or preferred beverage at the lectern.
Sit in the back row for a few seconds, and imagine yourself on stage.  Also check that the text on your slides is readable from back there.
Relax. You're prepared and all set. Nothing left to do. Nothing you do now will change anything. Either you prepared well or you didn't. Enjoy the ride.
If needed, distract yourself by going for a walk or other physical activity

After the event

If a speaker follows you in the room, get out of their way so they can get set up
Make yourself visible so people can find you to ask questions about your talk
Write questions from attendees on their business cards so you can answer in email later
Post slides if appropriate
Email people who gave you their cards, answering their questions
Thank the organizer and ask for any feedback (positive/negative)
If your talk was videotaped, ask for a copy so you can watch and improve.
Have a beer

If you're a frequent speaker, what else would you add? What might you remove? (Keep in mind, good checklists are short and smart)

Related posts:How to speak to a bored audience
Ignite: How speakers prepare
Q&A from webcast on public speaking
Lessons learned: radio interview
Why conferences have bad speakers

How to prepare: Checklist for great talks

To help celebrate the recent release of the paperback edition of Confessions of a Public Speaker, as well as it's 100th review on amazon.com, here's a checklist you can use to help make sure things go well at your next presentation.

Before the event

Questions to ask to prepare:

Who is the audience? Why are they coming?
Can organizer provide demographics?
Can you look at last year's programs? Were there reviews of the event on blogs?
What are other speakers speaking about?


Will this be a keynote lecture (more scripted) or small (more interactive)?
Create a list of questions audience will want answered in the talk
Prioritize the list and sketch out stories / ideas / points
Budget at least 10x time to prepare ( 1 hour talk will take roughly 10 hours of preparation)
Develop ten minutes of rough draft material
Practice the ten minutes. Do not procrastinate.
Revise material when it doesn't work, then practice again from beginning. Repeat as necessary. (See Chapter 5 of Confessions for a full description of how I prepare)
Do a test run in front of people who will give honest feedback (Or videotape and watch).
Practice with a clock with goal to end reliably with an extra 5 minutes.
Ask for emergency contact cell#, give organizer yours
Get directions to the venue, including office-park insanity, and within building insanity
If appropriate, post slides to web, include URL at end of talk

Leaving for the event

Get an hour of exercise that morning or night before.
Check laptop: do you have all cables? Is it working fine? Are slides on it? Battery charged?
Bring backup slides on flash drive / Extra-backup online somewhere / Print back-up of slides
Bring remote control: Check battery
Shower, shave, prune, scrub, brush, deodorize
Ensure you avoid all avoidable stress (get there early no matter what)

At the event

Register and let organizer know you've arrived (txt message if necessary)
Find your room and watch another speaker speak in it. Notice anything?
If time allows, mingle and meet people who might be in your audience
Return to room to catch (at least) tail end of last speaker before you – maximize time to set up.
Get laptop hooked up to projector immediately. Most problems occur here.
Test remote. Test any fancy videos or fancy anything.
Walk the stage. Get your body comfortable.
Make sure you have a glass of water or preferred beverage at the lectern.
Sit in the back row for a few seconds, and imagine yourself on stage.  Also check that the text on your slides is readable from back there.
Relax. You're prepared and all set. Nothing left to do. Nothing you do now will change anything. Either you prepared well or you didn't. Enjoy the ride.
If needed, distract yourself by going for a walk or other physical activity

After the event

If a speaker follows you in the room, get out of their way so they can get set up
Make yourself visible so people can find you to ask questions about your talk
Write questions from attendees on their business cards so you can answer in email later
Post slides if appropriate
Email people who gave you their cards, answering their questions
Thank the organizer and ask for any feedback (positive/negative)
If your talk was videotaped, ask for a copy so you can watch and improve.
Have a beer

If you're a frequent speaker, what else would you add? What might you remove? (Keep in mind, good checklists are short and smart)

Related posts:How to speak to a bored audience
Ignite: How speakers prepare
Q&A from webcast on public speaking
Lessons learned: radio interview
Why conferences have bad speakers

How to prepare: Checklist for speakers

To help celebrate the recent release of the paperback edition of Confessions of a Public Speaker, as well as it's 100th review on amazon.com, here's a checklist you can use to help make sure things go well at your next presentation.

Before the event

Questions to ask to prepare:

Who is the audience? Why are they coming?
Can organizer provide demographics?
Can you look at last year's programs? Were there reviews of the event on blogs?
What are other speakers speaking about?


Will this be a keynote lecture (more scripted) or small (more interactive)?
Create a list of questions audience will want answered in the talk
Prioritize the list and sketch out stories / ideas / points
Develop ten minutes of rough draft material
Practice the ten minutes. Do not procrastinate.
Revise material when it doesn't work, then practice again from beginning. Repeat as necessary. (See Chapter 5 of Confessions for a full description of how I prepare)
Practice with a clock with goal to end reliably with an extra 5 minutes.
Ask for emergency contact cell#, give organizer yours
Get directions to the venue, including office-park insanity, and within building insanity
If appropriate, post slides to web, include URL at end of talk

Leaving for the event

Get an hour of exercise that morning or night before.
Check laptop: do you have all cables? Is it working fine? Are slides on it? Battery charged?
Bring backup slides on flash drive / Extra-backup online somewhere / Print back-up of slides
Bring remote control: Check battery
Shower, shave, prune, scrub, brush, deodorize
Ensure you avoid all avoidable stress (get there early no matter what)

At the event

Register and let organizer know you've arrived (txt message if necessary)
Find your room and watch another speaker speak in it. Notice anything?
If time allows, mingle and meet people who might be in your audience
Return to room to catch (at least) tail end of last speaker before you – maximize time to set up.
Get laptop hooked up to projector immediately. Most problems occur here.
Test remote. Test any fancy videos or fancy anything.
Walk the stage. Get your body comfortable.
Sit in the back row for a few seconds and imagine yourself on stage.
Relax. You're prepared and all set. Nothing left to do. Nothing you do now will change anything. Either you prepared well or you didn't. Enjoy the ride.
If needed, distract yourself by going for a walk or other physical activity

After the event

If a speaker follows you in the room, get out of their way so they can get set up
Make yourself visible so people can find you to ask questions about your talk
Write questions from attendees on their business cards so you can answer in email later
Post slides if appropriate
Email people who gave you their cards, answering their questions
Thank the organizer and ask for any feedback (positive/negative)
If your talk was videotaped, ask for a copy so you can watch and improve.
Have a beer

If you're a frequent speaker, what else would you add? What might you remove? (Keep in mind, good checklists and short and smart)

Related posts:Ignite: How speakers prepare
Why conferences have bad speakers
How to speak to a bored audience
The challenge of visible twitter at conferences
Q&A from webcast on public speaking

Innovation Abuse: a case study

I've written before that we'd all be better off if people stopped saying Innovation. Calling something innovative doesn't make it so – it's just a word, a word that's been abused to the point it has almost no meaning. History bears out many creative and successful organizations rarely use that word at all. They don't need to. It's often people who want to seem special, or creative, or productive, who use that word as a mask for their insecurities.

Recently I got unrequested email about a site called Innovation management. On their front page alone I counted more than 7o uses of the word.  What a disappointment.  It defeats their own purpose.

It's not a surprise that the site seems designed to push PDF articles for sale, articles I presume, based on the site, suffer from an inability to use the age old innovation called a thesaurus.

Related posts:Practicing what I preach: Innovation abuse
New coke: an innovation case study
The explosion of innovation books
Usability review #3: Ginablack.net
Innovation case study: Opera Web browser

What are the most annoying platitudes?

I'm working on the next book (more on that soon) – One part of the book is looking at popular platitudes, the annoying ones people say, and tearing them apart.

To help me out, I need a list. What are the most annoying, stupid, untrue, or patronizing platitudes?

Here's a short list to get you started:

There's no I in Team
Good things come to those who wait
It was meant to be
Time heals all wounds

What comes to mind? Leave a comment. Thanks.

Related posts:This week in pm-clinic: Dealing with the powerful but annoying
Winners of 5 signed copies are…
Do you use / teach with the artofpm book?
Book Tour: Part 2?
Melbourne meetup – Sunday!

Toastmasters on Confessions (Podcast)

To celebrate the release of the paperback edition of Confessions of a Public Speaker, here's a kick-off post for a week of posts on public speaking.

The good folks at Toastmasters published an excerpt of Confessions in the November edition of their newsletter. And to follow it up, they invited me on to their monthly Podcast (MP3), a show called, simply enough, The Toastmasters Podcast.

We talked about hecklers, grandstanders, the dreaded rambling question and other situations most speakers fear – it's a good 20 minutes of advice.

Download (MP3) or listen from their site.

Related posts:Confessions now in Paperback
Podcast interview about myths of innovation
Slashdot reviews Confessions
Learning from London's speakers' corner
Reviews for Confessions so far – updated

Confessions now in Paperback

Confessions of a Public Speaker has reached the sweet milestone of being republished in Paperback.  It's now cheaper, smaller, and friendlier. It won't hurt your foot so much if you drop the book on it, and you can bend the cover in all kinds of creative ways to fit into bags, big pockets or tight corners.

It's really an amazing little book, garnering nearly 100 reviews on amazon, 96 of them 4 or 5 stars.

If you've been waiting for the paperback edition to buy a zillion copies for your co-workers who regularly put you sleep with PowerPoint, or to find a volume slim enough to secretly slip under the office doors of your executive team, the time is now.

And you can of course check out great free excerpts from the book: Attack of the Butterflies and How to make $30,000 an hour.

To celebrate the release of this new edition, I'll be posting once a day this week on speaking.

Related posts:Free copies of Myths of Innovation
This week in pm-clinic: the boss who won't listen
Corrections wanted for paperback edition of Myths of Innovation
Winners of 5 signed copies are…
How to design an office for designers?

Free copies of Myths of Innovation

O'Reilly Media has started a new blogger review program – If you're willing to write a review, both on your blog and on amazon.com, you can get free copies of many of their books.

And of course you are free to write positive or negative reviews.

The paperback edition of my bestseller, The Myths of Innovation is, for a limited time, part of the program (They change which books are in or out frequently)

If you want to participate, head here now.  Look forward to your review!

Related posts:The book: The Myths of Innovation
Free Myths Webcast: Wed Oct 13th
Winners of 5 signed copies are…
5 signed copies of Myths – leave a comment!
I need your help with the new book

Quote of the week

A person of good intelligence and of sensitivity cannot exist in this society very long without having some anger about the inequality – and it's not just a bleeding-heart, knee-jerk, liberal kind of a thing – it is just a normal human reaction to a nonsensical set of values where we have cinnamon flavoured dental floss and there are people sleeping in the street.

– George Carlin (unreliable source)

I find this quote interesting because I'm intensely ambivalent about it.

On the one hand, compassion, or at least empathy, is good. I agree with Carlin there. Anyone of true Christian faith, or most faiths, is compelled to treat the poor well and it's clear in most scriptures that helping those in need is one of the greatest, and holiest, things a person can do.

But the fact that we make cinnamon flavored dental floss (or not) has no relationship to whether there are poor people in the world, or how we go about handling poor people in our communities.  There's something naive in assuming one is causing or has any effect on the other.

Carlin himself was fond of explain how unfair and illogical the universe as a whole is, but here he's equating a surplus in one area with being related to, or causing, a lack in another, which applies a kind of logic that isn't necessarily inherent in the universe.

If anything, dental floss is cheap. Cinnamon flavoring is cheap. The $50 people spent to see Carlin perform is more of an extravagance than the fanciest dental floss.  People worried about scratches in their $80,000 car, or getting stressed out about their summer vacation plans, as people around them can't get their basic needs met is a better comparison of inequality that's hard at times to comprehend.

Related posts:Why do arguments become hostile?
Right for the wrong reasons
Quote of the week
The cult of busy
Book review: A whole new mind