In search of practicing Presentation Zen.....

Through my general reading of Seth Godin and Guy Kawasaki, I was introduced to a great book called Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds. Garr effectively says that the best presentations are the ones that deliver the message effectively, in the simplest manner possible. He draws on the profound simplicity of Zen principles to illustrate how Presentations can be made more effective and essentially more communicative. After all, that's what presentations are supposed to do, right? Oh, and its not a How-to for Powerpoint, Keynote or the OpenSource Impress.... Its a great book. Garr also evangelizes about it on his supporting website.

But I have a small doubt [I usually have one with all the popular stuff, but then, that's just me!!!] Its great, when you're doing presentations like Seth or Guy or any other Management guru.... you have the choice of content, flow, design and many a time, delivery methodology.

But what about the little guy at the bottom [LGATB]?? Chances are, he works on more presentations than Guy and Seth together work on in a week. And chances are, someone else decides the content, the flow, the design [usually official] and even the delivery!!! So what's a LGATB to do if he's read Presentation Zen, the Laws of Simplicity and knows Guy's 10-20-30 rule by heart??? Some of the reasoning not to practice zen which come his way are:

1. Its not the official template and format. The big guys will object to that....
2. You're not going to put in the explanation text?? What do you mean "text heavy"??
3. This is a business presentation. We can't put cartoons in there....
4. Just one word?? Just the word "THINK" on a black background?? You're gonna waste the rest of the slide??? [I'm sure there were others who came up with that idea before IBM and its ad agencies did!!!]
5. What do you mean you won't put this graph?? Its not relevant and there's no space?? Increase the number of slides, but that graph stays. What if the boss comes with a question on that??

And the number one reasoning:

I'm the boss/presenter/speaker/the guy with his neck on the line!!! Just do it my way!!! No need to get creative!!!!

Ouch!! That last one kinda nails it!! If I had a penny for every time I heard that one.....

So I believe you have to write a few books, be a VC, start-up a few firms, make tons of money or in the least, be way up in the hierarchy to start practicing Presentation Zen.

Achieving nirvana, however, is a personal thing...........