An article worth reading if you are interested in how technology is being applied to help overcome short attention spans.
Now all you have to do is convince your audiences to wear them!
How are you using technology to engage with your audiences?
Tag Archive for 'digital natives'
How do you learn?
Are you a “just in case” learner? Who likes to research without a clear specific purpose, who cuts and pastes information into a word document that never gets used. Who has a large pile of dusty conference notes unorganised in your office, a pile of books not finished. Do you enjoy knowledge for knowledge’s sake? Chances are you are using a digital immigrant learning strategy.
Are you a “just in time” learner? Do you only look for information when there is a clear end-goal or outcome? Do you turn to your network of peers and friends to search for this information? Who cuts-pastes, shares, gets feedback and refines before the end product is complete. Who is comfortable using a variety of sources including informal and crowdsourced (eg wikipedia) references. Who is impatient when there is no specifc purpose? You could be employing a digital natives learning strategy.
Not all young people are learning like digital natives and not all “older” people confine themselves to speaking digital as a second language. The good news is that if you continue to work on a second language, it improves. Today, you need to be nimble and adapt to new technologies and find a way to integrate them into your learning. Find a way that makes sense for you.
What is your learning strategy?
5 minute presentations
I am sure you have all sat through many teeth-grindingly long presentations with 89 PowerPoint slides. But what if the presentation was only 5 minutes long, with 20 slides and each slide automatically rotated after 15 seconds. Sounds great!
There are a number of new events springing up which ‘force’ presenters to be concise. I think this is a great thing. It is much harder to be concise and still remain compelling, but the philosophy of The One Minute Presenter is just this. With today’s short-attention span audiences, it is becoming more and more important to be concise.
If you cannot get along to one of Ignite’s events (Wiki page) – try this method when you are preparing for your next presentation. It will help you deliver a to-the-point message and finish on time.
Understanding your audience is essential to successful business presentations. Especially if you are presenting to audiences with short attention spans. Digital natives are regarded as having less patience for (traditional) presentations, so what can you do to adapt yourself to your audience?
Well a clue lies in a school in England whose headmaster claim that all teenagers need a lie-in and that classes should start at 11am. The claim is based on the way the teenage body clock is functioning which results in students falling asleep in class. In tests so far memory has improved and received (not surprisingly) good response from the students.
While you may not be faced with a teenage audience, business audiences today are just as distracted and likely to tune out if you cannot capture their attention. If it’s within your control think about the timing of your presentation. Just after lunch most people are sluggish and likely to drift off. Later in the afternoon people’s brains become tired and attention spans drop off. Mid to late mornings usually work well for most audiences. Also, be aware of spacing your content so that you don’t overload your audience with information. Add breaks every 10 minutes or so to allow your message to digest and for a different format of presenting like a video, a story or an activity.
Today’s tip covers two aspects of presentations and presenting. First, a presentation is linear. Second, the best presenter uses random access methods throughout their presentation.
Let’s start with the presentation. A presentation is a linear form of communication. While you are speaking, the audience has no idea of the words you can going to speak next. They may have an idea of the gist if you are presenting with clarity – but the actual words are unknown to them until you speak. And then, once spoken, there is no way that the audience can go back to what you have just said unless they interrupt you and ask you to repeat yourself (annoying) or they have one of those global remote controls that Adam Sandler had in the movie, Click (freaky).
Compare this form of communication with reading a book. At any time, you can jump ahead to read the next few pages or even read the last page like Billy Crystal’s character in When Harry met Sally. Or if you wish to stop and reflect on a paragraph you just read, you can. This method of communication is called random access. Using the internet is very much a random access experience with all the distractions of hyperlinks.
Today’s digital natives have grown up with a completely different approach to accessing information (learning). In the past, knowledge was passed from one generation to the next through the spoken traditions of storytelling which evolved into lecturing (how did that happen?). This took a further evolution into PowerPoint slides which have done more than any other tool to stifle learning in the business world. It’s not the software’s fault, just the way we use it. Today with the internet, we learn by using wikipedia, accessing interest-specific forums, seeing what our friends recommend and see how other people rate the problems through digg or delicious.
If I want to find a software or fix an IT problem, I could go and listen to my IT guy give me a long-winded explanation about something completely (to my mind) irrelevant. Linear communication. Or I could jump online and google the problem. Check what people with similar problems are saying on computer forums, search computer web sites for software. Check out their credibility on wiki. And then perhaps ask some friends via Twitter and Facebook. Random access communication.
Your challenge as a presenter is to use more random access methods of communication while you are presenting to give your audience the chance to make the learning experience their own. Examples include, discussion within a group at their tables, doing online research, reviewing notes and re-presenting or interpreting the learning points via a case study or role play. How else can you provide jump off points for your audience?
Whether you like marshmallows or not, a four-year-old child certainly does. What’s not to like? Chewy, sweet, synthetic colorful lumps of candy. But how long can a child go between a marshmallow? This was tested in the 1960s and brainy psychologists worked out that the longer a child could hold out – the higher their IQ and generally well-roundedness later in life.
Daniel Goleman has suggested that an important component of emotional intelligence is a concept called “delayed gratification”. People who lack this trait are said to need instant gratification and may suffer from poor impulse control.
The need for instant gratification is a feature of digital natives regardless of whether they like marshmallows or not. But what has this got to do with presenting? You don’t need to be a insightful commentator to realise that the developed world is trending towards instant gratification. We are continually informed with our mobile phones, blogs and now Facebook and Twitter (instant gratification of connectedness). Online shopping means we can continue when the shopping mall closes (some never do!)(instant gratification of consumption). Reality shows, Pop Idol imitations all contribute to this trend (instant gratification of popularity).
Back to presenting, what this means for you is that your audience is increasingly likely to expect a reward during your presentation. A reward? You mean just listening to my presentation is not enough to keep the audience happy? Don’t they know how smart, witty and insightful I am?
So what rewards can you use with your demanding audience? It doesn’t need to cost you anything. Let the audience be a part of the ‘journey’, let them take part and participate along with you as the guide. A presentation shouldn’t be a dump of information, it should be a joint discovery. If you ever feel that your presentations are becoming too predictable and canned, it’s time to change it up. Enjoy the journey!
Toddlers, goldfish and puppies are not the most especially attentive of audiences. But you can learn a lot from their attention spans. There’s short. And they won’t hang around if they feel bored.
Does your audience ever feel bored? This often happens when you present too much information with not enough time to connect the dots with vivid examples and practical applications. The result? Very little digestion and a completely unmotivated audience.
Brain studies have shown that using graphics (images, charts, pictures) first while introducing a topic the retention and interest goes up. Digital natives – who have grown up with interactive technology (video games, internet) like to think in fast bursts. Use graphics to quickly show a path, overview a topic or summarise findings.
Goldfishes are not known for having long memories. But to be honest, today’s audiences can often resemble goldfishes. But that’s your fault. Test it. Ask someone who has listened to your presentation one week later, what some of the key messages were and you will be amazed if they even remember listening to the presentation. Boring information is like watching paint dry: it takes up some time and then you forget all about it. Instead of delivering a “watermelon” of information to your audience, use spaced learning techniques. Help your audience recall key points but going back to them during the presentation, refreshing them after breaks, inserting colorful summary slides or graphics and giving quick “Q&A quizzes” throughout the day. The more you create chances for your audience to deepen their understanding, the higher their memory retention.
(Wo)man’s best friend he may be, but a puppy can be a real handful. Puppies learn through play and massive amounts of interactivity. They bring a digital native attitude to learning. Growing up playing PlayStation, Xbox, and countlesss other handheld consoles, digital natives expect all experiences to be “fun”. Work and learning included.
Yes. It’s important to treat yourself seriously and be good at what you do. But don’t treat your presentation too seriously if you want your audience to stay engaged and remember what your key messages are. Humour works. But even if you are not that funny, high amounts of interactivity will help you keep your audience awake. Pop quizzes, short discussion, role plays, two-player face offs (PK games) will all help increase interaction and keep the energy alive!
According to media philosopher Marshall McLuhan, the average attention span for a TV viewer was four to five minutes. In 1976. Today’s action movies with digital editing create cuts every three to four seconds.
Killian Avertising report on a recent study that concluded the average American spends two hours every day watching television. Reading, on the other hand, occupies seven minutes. So why are you forcing your audience to read PowerPoint slides full of text?
If you are presenting to a group of people who are used to watch movies with fast-paced, quick-changing action. And you deliver slide after slide of data-heavy content in a dead-pan voice, how long are they going to stay with you? Three minutes, four tops?
So why do so many presenters present like their audiences have attention spans of three hours. One reason lies in the differences between digital natives and digital immigrants.
Find out if you are digital native or digital immigrant.
Learn more about digital natives here. And digital immigrants here.
