Ever wondered what a typical Chicago drive to Wrigley Field looks like?

Using my new GoPro Hero3 as a DashCam I created this video of the drive from my house to Wrigley Field on a Saturday morning to see the Cubs.

22 miles.  Six minutes.

I won a cool GoPro Hero3! Thanks IAmLug Sponsors!

How awesome is this?  I go to IAmLUG in St. Louis and win this awesome GoPro Hero3 Silver camera!

Bah ha ha ha ha. (I am just thrilled with it.  Can you tell?)  What an awesome piece of technology!

Now I am not going to be any aerial vids (yet) like Carl Tyler but I am planning on using it initially as a DashCam to record and comment on the oft-frustrating driving that is Chicago driving.

THANK YOU to all of the IAmLug sponsors who made this awesome prize possible:

NotesCode

www.notescode.com

A service for the Notes and Domino community to find solutions, watch webinars and demos, and see interesting surveys.

Maarga Systems

www.maargasystems.com

They offer XPages development, Connections Enablement and Application Management services

Reduce Mail Pro

www.reducemailpro.com

They offer solutions for email archiving, journaling, and e-discovery

Extracomm

www.extracomm.com

They offer a solution to track and monitor all e-mail messages and associated events

Instant-Tech

www.instant-tech.com

They offer a solution to enable Sametime for “click to chat” for websites and help desk services.

Finding Your Own Presenting Voice + Let Me Know If You Would Like Feedback

Find Your Voice

You have to decide or learn what your voice is when presenting.

We have a lot of excellent speakers in our orbit that have very effective yet different speaking styles and you can learn something from all of them.

• Wes Morgan gives a great presentation and his style is definitely professional grade.  I dig it.
  
  
• Chris Miller has an almost Robin Williams-esque presentation style backed by a CRAZY level of technical knowledge that is extremely effective.
  
  
• Kathy Brown, the loud laugher and insane Twitterer (15 accounts really?), has an affable style when she speaks that really keeps your interest.  She also had some good advice on being yourself in this post.
  
  
• Julian Robicheaux is so witty that I get more entertainment from his off the cuff comments during his presentations that I often forget about his point.
  
  
• Paul Calhoun has that whole Texas Gentleman thing going for him coupled with a pretty unique sense of humor that is good for laughs to break up "the tech."

The only way to find your own style is to do some speaking.


I was told last week that not too many people actually want to be speakers.  I wonder then, as I have many times over the years, why are there supposedly over a thousand abstracts submitted for Connect for something that, in reality, are only about 100 (if that) truly "open" speaking slots?

"There is a huge sea change going on in our industry and there are plenty of opportunities for new speakers."

A week has gone by since I wrote that and I have talked to a lot of folks. After all the chatting, I can say that it is very likely there will be even more opportunity to speak than I at first believed so if speaking is something you're interested in trying, I encourage you to give it a shot.

For years I have been saying that we should have more new speakers.  This set of posts has been geared towards that.

And now the offer...if you want some feedback on your slides or your speaking I'd be glad to help.

Want a slide editor? Send me some of your slides and I'll give you feedback.

Want feedback of your speaking style, pace or prep?  Let's Skype/G+ Hangout and you do some talkin' at me and I'll provide feedback.


So...Break a leg!

How to Handle Critical Presentation Evals

Unfortunately, sessions are either "good" or they're not and you may not have any control over that.

(What do you mean?  I do the writing, the demoing and the speaking...I control everything.)

Au contraire mon ami. You are not in control of who shows up to listen.

Different people are going to react differently to your presentation and sometimes absolutely nothing you could have done would have made your presentation "good" for some of those people.

David Leedy sent me this quote yesterday and it is so true:

“To avoid criticism say nothing, do nothing, be nothing." 

- Aristotle

"Advice on Session Speaking" or "Want To Speak At Connect 2014?"

Since 1986-2006 and 2009-2012 as a music teacher, choir and chorus director, certified instructor and seminar speaker I have been talking in front of people a lot for a long time.  A lot.  Often daily but always multiple times a month.  That's a lot of time to get comfortable doing it.

Here's the problem:   I am not a natural limelight seeker.  I am not naturally witty or funny.  I am not particularly glib, never was overly easy on the eyes and, despite what I said before, I don't consider myself to be smarter than anyone else.  Not a great set of attributes to qualify one to deliver technical presentations.

On the flipside I can say this: While I have certainly given bad presentations and had bad teaching days, for the most part my teaching/sessions/presentations are markedly above average and every so often I deliver a really spectacular presentation.

When I think about the times when everything aligned for a great session (I felt good about the session, the evals really looked good, colleagues commented on how well it went, people seemed to be engaged, etc.) a few things seem to be consistent factors to the success of the session.

If I follow these guidelines, my speakin' tends to go pretty well.