HOW TO REHEARSE FOR AN IMPORTANT PRESENTATION

 

“1000 songs in your pocket”- this is how Steve Jobs chose to describe iPod when it was first launched in 2001. I distinctly remember getting awed with the utility that iPod provided and ended up buying one a couple of years later (when it became available in India). The moot point here being- Storytelling, the way the message is presented, matters.

It's a given that the presentation skills are crucial not only for glorious product launches but also in our day-to-day work lives. The topic of enhancing one's presentation skills has been sliced and diced in many ways in too many books. It really gives way to the feeling that there is hardly anything left to write about it.

I too felt the same way till i read Carmine Gallo's HBR article https://bit.ly/3kS7K7X . What stood out for me in this article is the singular (and often underrated) focus on one aspect of growing one's presentation skills- Rehearsals.

For a presentation to be successful, rehearsals have to be purposeful and systematic. Ken Kocienda, Apple engineer who wrote this fantastic book "Creative Selection", had following to say about Steve Jobs' presentation skills:

"This was one of Steve's great secrets of success as a presented, he practiced. A lot. He went over and over the material until he had the presentation honed and he knew it cold. Steve thought about what each line meant to him and what those lines could mean to an audience. He worked on pace, on using his voice, his body, and his gestures to supplement his words."

Carmine's article brings forward some of the finer aspects of presentation rehearsals to the fore. Few are:
1. Commit to 10x Improvement
2. Start as Strong as You End
3. Practice Under Mild Stress
4. Record Your Rehearsal
5. Ask for Feedback

My favorite of these is the suggestion to practice under mild stress. Not all stress is bad. The more you rehearse under real-world conditions, less likely will you crack under pressure.

Highly recommend reading the article https://bit.ly/3kS7K7X and applying. Catch my summary of the key learnings in the sketchnote.

What are some of the ways you rehearse for presentations ?

My Sketchnote:
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6848960773625143296/

THE COST OF FAILURE IS EDUCATION

 

The Cloud Communication Platforms company Twilio went public in 2016. At that time, Uber was their key customer and constituted >10% of their revenue. At the beginning of 2017, Uber indicated to Twilio that they would start reducing their spend (as cost saving was becoming a priority for them). In Q1 2017, Twilio now a public company, disclosed the same in the earnings call. This led to Twilio's stock being dropped by 30%. Twilio leadership realized their misstep of over-relying on top few customers. The revenue contribution of top customers went down from 30% in 2016 to 14% in 2020.

How did they turned around the situation ?

No rocket science here. During this time, Twilio CEO had asked the CFO to run a blameless postmortem. Blameless postmortems focus on improving performance moving forward without putting blame on people. The question in this case was “Why did we have such a big investor-facing misstep?” It would have been easy to blame the sales rep covering the Uber account, but it wouldn’t have gotten them to the true root cause.

They asked "Why" multiple times and it came down to two true root causes. First, Twilio had a small handful of customers who, because of their usage-based pricing model, had grown too large and therefore represented risk. They figured out that they needed to manage “customer concentration” better, even if it meant proactively lowering prices. But more important, the other true root cause was that they didn’t have enough salespeople covering all of our accounts.
(Source: Adapted from the book- "Ask Your Developer")

They fixed these anomalies, leading them to objectively learn from the failure and fix the situation.

As with most situations, the true root cause of missteps is rarely technical in nature—it’s more often organizational. When things go wrong, it’s either a time to blame, or a time to learn. A failure becomes a good failure after you extract all the learnings from it (see Sketchnote). Like they say- "Never let a good crisis go to waste" likewise "Never let a failure go to waste"

What are some of the ways you have handled failures at work ?

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_the-cost-of-failure-is-education-the-cloud-activity-6847850256424685568-j5qE/

HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR RETENTION

 

Ever since I read 'Moonwalking with Einstein', the subject of memory and retention has fascinated me. This book is about Joshua Foer's journey to becoming the US Memory Champion.

In 1920-40, scientists tested world-class chess players on their general cognitive abilities, such as memory. They found that although expert players were far better at chess than average players, they did not perform significantly better on any of the general tests. They found that expert chess players do have a so called "chess memory" enabling them to see the chessboard differently than less experienced players. Rather than perceiving the board as 32 pieces, they see a few relevant pieces of the board.

Likewise, all of us has something called as "work memory" that enables us to remember things at work but that memory may not translate to other areas of life.

In ancient times, there was a strong association of memory with intelligence. But apparently, the invention of printing press in 1400s made books and printed material more accessible and democratized reading. The same phenomenon expanded manifold with the advent of search engines in early 2000s. That makes one wonder- if all the information is so easily accessible and searchable, why should i care about memory ?

I feel that the timely recall of information is crucial in our growth as professionals. One may read tonnes of stuff but active recall of knowledge when the situation demands is paramount as well. Imagine being in a high stakes meeting and a fact misses you the moment it had to be stated for achieving maximum impact. Or the importance of remembering and recalling people's name can't be overstated (one of the foundational aspect of relationship building). Accumulated knowledge can only be compounded well if we work to build effective recall mechanisms.

So, how does one improve retention and recall ? I liked the ideas shared by Sahil Bloom in this twitter thread https://bit.ly/3i68lkt
He suggests a 5 step process involving the steps:

1. Inspired Consumption: When you feel genuinely pulled (and not forced) to consume an information.
2. Unstructured Note-Taking: You should have a note-taking system in front of you when consuming info.
3. Consolidation: Unstructured note-taking creates a bunch of dots, consolidation is where you start connecting them.
4. Analogize: Making clear comparisons and connections between new and existing information.
5. Idea Exercise: If you use the idea, it will stick and grow.

Have included the summary in my sketchnote.

Do you think improving the retention skills is important ? What conscious methods do you apply to improve memory/recall ?

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_how-to-improve-your-retention-ever-since-activity-6847347122665336832-5FTu/

THE POWER OF PRODUCT THINKING

 

In his influential article, "Selling pickaxes during a gold rush", https://bit.ly/3Cz2Um8 entrepreneur and investor Chris Dixon brings forward a powerful analogy. California Gold Rush began in 1848, when gold was found in Coloma, California. The news of gold brought approximately 300,000 people to the state from the rest of the United States and abroad. During the gold rush, some of the most successful business people such as Levi Strauss and Samuel Brannan didn’t mine for gold themselves but instead sold supplies to miners – wheelbarrows, tents, jeans, pickaxes etc. Mining for gold was the more glamorous path but actually turned out, in aggregate, to be a worse return on capital and labor than selling supplies.

On a slightly different but related tangent, I was reading the book "The One Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results", the authors narrate a story about Steve Jobs' ability to stay ahead of trends and shares-
"No one knew how to go small better than Steve Jobs. He was famously as proud of the products he didn't pursue as he was of the transformative products Apple created. In the two years after his return in 1999, he took the company from 350 products to ten. That's 340 no.s, not counting anything else during that period.”

Both these stories represents different aspects of Product Thinking or Product Sense as it is sometimes referred as. In case of Levi Strauss, it was about applying a second order thinking and finding gaps and needs in an non-obvious manner. Steve Jobs' case was more of finding the product direction by subtraction.

What really is Product Thinking ? and Can it be honed as a skill ?
Julie Zhuo states in this popular Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) blog https://bit.ly/39oP2hJ on the subject-
"The simplest way to define product thinking is that it is the skill of knowing what makes a product useful — and loved — by people. As with all skills, it can be nurtured and developed; it’s not just an instinct one does or doesn’t have (and even instincts are trained, after all)."

Would highly recommend reading the blog. Catch the summary in my sketchnote.

What are some of the ways you use to hone the product thinking ?

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6846083280844922880/

PRINCIPLES OF PRODUCT WORK

 

In his book-'Only the Paranoid Survive', the former Intel CEO, Andy Grove mentions this memorable anecdote:

Andy Grove and Robert Noyce were at the office late one night discussing how to deal with Japanese firm's thread to their D-RAM business and they were talking to each other.

- Andy says to Robert: Wow we got a problem!
- Robert says we sure do.
- Andy asks- If Board says we would get the new guys to solve this problem, what would the new guys do.
- Robert says Oh that’s easy, they will get us out of the D-RAM business.
- So Andy Grove says, Yes why don't we do that before these other guys get in.

What happened next is history. Intel shunned the D-RAM business and got into microprocessor business, leading to one of the most outstanding business turnarounds.

Andy’s question about “what would new guys do” is quite profound because it reflects that Andy was more willing to be a beginner again. Embracing Beginner's mindset is one of the key principles to possess in #ProductManagement

I got reminded of this story while reading one of the finely crafted '15 Principles of Product Work', absolute pearls of wisdom by Shreyas Doshi. Catch the complete thread here- https://bit.ly/2Haf1hZ

For summary, read my sketchnote below

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_productmanagement-activity-6844819271227469824-cN-0/

IF YOU WANT TO CHANGE THE WORLD, START BY MAKING YOUR BED

 

More often than we acknowledge, the technologies that made its way into civilian life were originated via military tech or defense tech at large. The origin of technologies like digital camera, ambulances, duct tape to internet, drones etc. can be traced back to the defense world.

It's just not the technologies, even some of the outstanding people management practices can be traced back to defense. Some examples:
1. If you are a trainer in any of the defense establishment, it is considered as a source of pride and recognition. In fact, most of the trainings of new cadets are conducted by people who are current officers/leaders. It is quite contrary to corporate training practices where training is often offloaded to external players with lesser involvement from the leadership.

2. Years ago, i had applied for India Air Force Services Selection Board (SSB). I vividly recall at the end of 3 days of rigorous test, all the applicants were called in a big room where the results were announced. I wasn't selected but that's not the only thing i remember. The way they announced the rejections left an lasting impression on me. They first called out the names of popular celebrities who appeared in the SSB and weren't selected but still made it big in life. It was their way of encouraging rejected applicants, something we easily forget as a part of corporate hiring practices.

Thus, when i came across this book "Make Your Bed: Feel grounded and think positive in 10 simple steps" by US Navy Admiral William H. McRaven, i knew i had to pick up and read. And what a fascinating read it was!
I have included my key learnings from book in the sketchnote. Sharing 3 points that i loved:

1. Start your day off by making your bed. Life is hard and sometimes there is very little we can do to affect the outcome of the day.
Sometimes the simple act of making our bed can give us the lift we need to start our day.

2. Life is not supposed to be fair all the time. The sooner we learn this the better for us. It is easy to stop trying because you believe that fate is against you.

3. Those who live in the fear of failure or embarrassment will never see their full potential. Without pushing our limits, we would never know what is possible in life.

Would highly recommend reading it.

Do share in comments, which of these learnings resonated the most with you ?

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_if-you-want-to-change-the-world-start-by-activity-6844288075447828481-IvE1/

SHOW YOUR WORK EARLY AND OFTEN

 

Ed Catmull, the co-founder and the former President at Pixar, in his book "Creativity, Inc." does a wonderful job of explaining the creative process behind the magic that Pixar movies have managed to create.

He says "Candor is the key to collaborating effectively. Lack of candor leads to dysfunctional environments." Candor, simply put, is the quality of being open and honest.

One of the key mechanisms with which Pixar injects excellence into it's movie making process is "The Braintrust". The Braintrust is a group of trusted colleagues that gets together periodically to review the progress of a Pixar film that is in development. Its premise is simple: Put smart, passionate people in a room together, charge them with identifying and solving problems, and encourage them to be candid. So Candor is the foundation on which the Braintrust works.

While reading, i developed the appreciation for the principles on which the Braintrust worked but what i appreciated more was the fact that Pixar's culture encouraged the 'In-Progress', 'raw' work to be subject to intense review. As Ed says in the book- "Pixar films are not good at first, and our job is to make them so–to go, as I say, “from suck to not-suck.”

I believe every creative work (including the act of writing code) goes on from being "not-so-good" to "good-enough" to "near-perfect". One of my observations when leading Innovation teams was that the teams that were open to subject their work for review early on in the cycle, eventually delivered something that was more meaningful, that satisfied the need of stakeholders and met what customers wanted. On the contrary, the teams that delayed showing their work, got the feedback late and had to struggle at later stages.

Julie Zhuo is this insightful twitter thread https://bit.ly/3tA8i4W tells about virtues of showing the work early, and often. Have included some of the reasons shared in this thread via my sketchnote.

Of course, sharing the work early and often doesn't work in certain situations which demands perfection e.g. presentation to execs, demos to customers etc. but most knowledge work outputs stand to gain if shared early in the development cycle, helps in shortening the feedback loops, instill validation early-on and install quality.

What's your take on this ? What , according to you, are some of the impediments to sharing your work early on ?
Do share your thoughts in the comments.

My LinkedIn Post:

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/anujmagazine_show-your-work-early-and-often-ed-catmull-activity-6842829981001900032-t0K0/