Tag Archives: Presentations

Jobs Told to Face the Music

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It should come as no surprise to anyone that there is a mention of Apple CEO Steve Jobs in nearly every book Soundview Executive Book Summaries receives about leadership. Jobs is one of the handful of American business icons of the past 50 years and dozens of business authors use examples from his and Apple’s success to illustrate a variety of strategies and principles. In a time period when all eyes are already on Jobs due to his recent medical leave of absence, the famed CEO will come under increased scrutiny as a result of a U.S. Magistrate Judge ruling that lawyers in an anti-trust case have a right to question Jobs. The case deals with accusations that Apple created a monopoly by blocking music purchased from RealNetworks from being played on Apple’s iPod. Here’s an interesting article dealing with the case.

As I looked at the photo included in this story, it made me reflect on our Soundview Live event with Nancy Duarte last week. The photo in the news story is from one of Apple’s product launches (and from the looks of it, it was taken awhile ago). In Duarte’s book Resonate: Presenting Visual Stories that Transform Audiences, she points to Jobs’ presentations during these launches, particularly the Macbook Air and the iPhone, as being some of the best examples of using the power of story in a presentation.

Did you miss our Soundview Live Webinar with Nancy Duarte? Don’t worry! You can listen to the archive of the event right here! In fact, our archive of Soundview Live Webinars is rapidly becoming one of the most popular features at Soundview’s Web site, Summary.com. Take a look and see for yourself!

Soundview Live: Learn to Avoid “Me First!” Presentations

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Just wanted to send a reminder to everyone that Soundview is less than 48 hours away from the next great installment of Soundview Live, our interactive Webinar series that puts YOU in touch with today’s top authors. The next edition takes place on Wednesday, March 16 at Noon (Eastern). This edition of Soundview Live will feature Nancy Duarte, CEO of Duarte Design, Inc and author of Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences. She will instruct listeners about creating presentations that persuade.

One of the keys to delivering a great presentation is to avoid the “Me First” mentality into which too many presenters seem to fall. During the preparation process for Wednesday’s event, I had the opportunity to interview Nancy and asked her why this problem persists. Here’s what she said:

Sometimes I think it’s because maybe the presenter has so much anxiety about spending so much time around the information they think has to be conveyed. They are so inbred about their own thoughts and getting their own objectives out of the meeting that they rarely spend the time to think about the fact that they’re just one small moment in this other person’s life. This meeting might be very important to you, but it’s really just a small moment in the other person’s life. We rarely take the time to think about how can we add value to that person’s moment with us. Instead it’s all about what we can get out of the audience instead of what we can give.

Don’t forget to sign-up for Wednesday’s Soundview Live with Nancy Duarte. Soundview subscribers can attend this event for FREE. Duarte’s organization has created presentations for some of the most influential organizations in business today. This is your chance to receive personal insights direct from Nancy. Don’t miss it!

For more information on this and other Soundview events, visit us online at Summary.com.

Book Review: Resonate

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When it comes to giving a presentation, most speakers are headed in the wrong direction. According to author and CEO of Duarte Design, Inc. Nancy Duarte, too many speakers put the focus of their presentations on themselves rather than on the audience. In her book Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences, now available as a Soundview Executive Book Summary, Duarte reminds readers that the best presentations are stories where the audience stars as the hero.

Resonate provides one of the best methods ever to appear in a business book for creating a memorable presentation. It is the result of two years of intense research and work by Duarte. The core of the book’s philosophy, that presentations are stories that should take an audience to a destination, required Duarte to do extensive research into mythology, philosophy and psychology. Duarte wanted the book to be representative of a great presentation. This resulted in a book that is structured with great precision and reads with perfect pacing.

Duarte methodically rolls out the secrets to apply elements of storytelling, cinema and mythology to presentations. The purpose of each segment of Resonate leads to the ultimate goal of helping presenters establish a deeper connection with the audience.

If you visit Soundview online at Summary.com, you’ll see two unique opportunities to learn more from Nancy Duarte. First, you can pick up a copy of the summary of Resonate that’s now available.

You can also sign up to join Soundview next Wednesday, March 16 at Noon (Eastern) when Nancy Duarte is the guest on the next Soundview Live Webinar. She will deliver “Creating Presentations that Persuade.” Don’t forget, Soundview subscribers can attend Soundview Live for FREE. Visit Summary.com and sign-up today!

New Summary and Apple’s Big Announcement

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Whoever originally said “Christmas comes but once a year” obviously wasn’t an owner of Apple products. For the company’s legions of fans there are guaranteed to be at least two or three times each year when all eyes focus on the next product launch from the technology giant. Today’s expected announcement of a new version of the blockbuster iPad tablet device will no doubt send shockwaves through every facet of business. The moments that follow any Apple announcement are always interesting to watch. In many respects, they are a snapshot of the state of the business environment at that moment.

In fact, a book recently summarized by Soundview Executive Book Summaries devotes a considerable amount of page space to the power of an Apple launch, particularly when it’s led by CEO Steve Jobs. In Resonate: Present Visual Stories that Transform Audiences, author Nancy Duarte discusses the power of Jobs’ presentations and the secrets that you can learn from him. Duarte pays particular attention to Jobs’ launch of the MacBook Air. During his presentation for the laptop, Jobs built up the audience’s anticipation by describing certain aspects of the product. One of Duarte’s major points is that a great presentation should always contain a “STAR” moment (Something They’ll Always Remember). Jobs’ STAR moment came when he picked up an ordinary inter-office envelope, carefully opened it and withdrew the elegant, thin MacBook Air. The audience was stunned and Jobs had wowed the technology world yet again.

To learn more about delivering your own STAR moments in your presentations, get your copy of Soundview’s summary of Resonate. For more great business book summaries about presentations, visit Soundview online at Summary.com.