Telling a cohesive story is one of the hardest parts of public speaking. Many fledgling speakers find it challenging to string concepts together in an order that makes sense to other people. They also find themselves struggling to explain things in a way that feels approachable. In this talk, I share methods to plan and present ideas so that your audience can better understand them. Readers will finish the talk knowing how to outline and design presentations for speaking engagements.
27. @cattsmall@cattsmall
Marilee “Brain Lady” Sprenger
The hippocampus gets the opportunity to draw on
previously stored patterns and compare the new
to the old. Some of those analogy components
might bring up personal memories that will
provide another learning link.
33. @cattsmall@cattsmall
Marilee “Brain Lady” Sprenger
Stories have emotional components that attract
the amygdala, the emotional center of the brain.
They also have beginnings, middles, and ends that
make sense to the hippocampus, the structure that
helps store these episodes.
39. @cattsmall@cattsmall
Drill down
● Intro - 1 min
● Technology as a silver bullet - 5 min
○ Technology has been improving for centuries
○ It has helped with countless issues
○ However, this doesnt always end so well
○ Why do we think about tech this way, even when its
repeatedly proven to not be a solution for everything?
● How tech fails people with good intentions - 10 min
○ Many people naturally want to help others
○ We see problems happening to ourselves that we want
to solve
○ We see problems happening to others too
○ We were told we can change the world
○ We use the skills we have
○ Inflated egos
● Creating a project for good that won't fix all the problems - 15
min
● Principles to follow - 10 min
● Conclusion - 4 min
40. @cattsmall@cattsmall
Identify opportunities
● Intro - 1 min
● Technology as a silver bullet - 5 min
○ Technology has been improving for centuries
○ It has helped with countless issues
○ However, this doesnt always end so well
○ Why do we think about tech this way, even when its
repeatedly proven to not be a solution for everything?
● How tech fails people with good intentions - 10 min
○ Many people naturally want to help others
○ We see problems happening to ourselves that we want
to solve
○ We see problems happening to others too
○ We were told we can change the world
○ We use the skills we have
○ Inflated egos
● Creating a project for good that won't fix all the problems -
15 min
● Principles to follow - 10 min
● Conclusion - 4 min
Story:
Examples of past failures
Story:
My project and what I
learned
55. @cattsmall@cattsmall
◇Stories can be used to make your
talk more engaging.
◇Listeners retain information more
when stories are included.
◇ People relate to stories.
In summary:
56. @cattsmall@cattsmall
◇Always outline your content first.
◇Consider your audience at all times.
◇Make sure your sub-stories
relatable, simple, and topical.
Advice for storytelling
Thanks
I attended the first event in 2013, so happy to be here!
Storytelling as a concept
And how to use storytelling in your presentations to make better and more engaging talks
Much of this is about public speaking but is also applicable to written work
But first, a bit about me so you have some context about where I’m coming from
I am many things
Senior Product Designer at Etsy
A website that lets people buy unique goods from around the world
I work on the marketing services team
We help sellers by building tools that help them market themselves to buyers
Cofounder at Brooklyn Gamery
Make endearing and weird video games
Organize diversity-focused events like the Game Devs of Color Expo
An event that highlights game developers of color
And teaches people of color to create their own games
I also make my own stuff when I’m not working
Games
Apps
Websites
Informal experiences
Comics
And I love to share my ideas through public speaking and writing!
I’ve spoken at lots of events like TEDx
Beyond Tellerrand
A cutting-edge technology conference in Germany
AIGA Design Conference
For designers of all kinds
And most recently Fusionconf
A one-day event in North Carolina for designers and front-end engineers!
I also have a blog where I’ve written about lots of topics over the past 8 years
This is a screenshot from my 10-part public speaking series
It details how I went from a very nervous, awkward, quiet person
To a very nervous, awkward, loud person with public speaking skills
My topics of discussion don’t always have much in common
They can be about design, technology, life
Or even public speaking
My talks all have one thing in common though...
Storytelling.
Just to give a brief definition so we’re all on the same page about what storytelling is...
I will be referring to storytelling as the social and cultural activity of sharing stories (according to Wikipedia)
Stories are made up of three components
Plot
Characters
Point of View
The plot refers to the sequence of events in the story
It can be long or short, involving few or many events
Characters are beings that exist within the story
By beings, I mean any objects that have agency or personality
They affect or are affected by the plot
For example, this can be people but also animals and other objects that have been given life
The point of view is the perspective of the narrator
In terms of why storytelling is important...
It is more engaging for your listeners
We have been primed from childhood to listen to stories
Fairy tales communicated societal morals and learnings to us
Think about anansi the spider and red Riding Hood
What did that communicate to you?
People LOVE the process of a plot moving from start to finish
We want to know what happens next
And how it ends
Even when we know how it ends, we want to know how events unfolded
Secondly, people relate more when they hear stories
Listeners put themselves in the shoes of the characters in the stories
They feel a sense of compassion for the narrator and characters in the story
Stories make you feel like an interesting and real human being
I used to be bad at telling stories within my social circles
The most relatable and social people in those circles were the ones who told stories more
It was because they were sharing life experiences
They were vulnerable, funny, and engaging
Now of course, we all are real human beings
This just communicates that to people because they can empathize more with you
Thirdly, people understand more when you use stories
They literally process information better
I’m not going to read this whole thing, but basically...
Our brains have what's called a hippocampus
It compares existing experiences with new stories we hear
Things that are related to personal experiences can be processed easily
Stories are more likely to be relatable to existing experiences and/or fears people have
There are two ways to do this...
You can use analogies to explain ideas that might be hard to understand otherwise
For example, explaining functions
Many people understand how animals learn
They can then relate that process to programming functions
And then they have a positive way to remember an otherwise scary concept
Larger, more personal stories can be used to explain how something worked or didn’t work
For example, your experience with a process can provide lessons for other people
In one talk, I describe how I got incredibly distracted by tools and perfection rather than understanding my projects context
That was a compelling argument for my stance on the talk, which was to concentrate less on being perfect and more on being flexible
By talking about a personal failure or frustration, you can transfer your negative experience into their success
Listeners appreciate the opportunity to learn from mistakes
From up there on stage, you seem really successful
It’s important to use that platform to share the learnings that got you there
And finally, because of the engagement, relatability, and understanding...
People remember more of your talk
Again, I’m not going to read this whole thing
But it’s basically easier to process and therefore store something that is packaged in a story format
Our brains have something called an amygdala and it likes things with beginnings, middles and ends
That’s probably why many people TV hate shows that never end
Looking at you, The Simpsons...
So now that you know what storytelling is within the realm of this talk
And why it’s awesome
Here’s how to use storytelling to put that extra awesome sparkle into your future talks
And your written work
I’ll be going through my entire process from start to finished product
But first... I want to point out something
Like books, presentations also have two layers of stories
The overarching story
The sub-stories that hone in on the lessons shared in each section of the talk
I’m going to talk about how to create an overarching story
Then identify opportunities for sub-stories
Now let’s talk about how to make this happen in your talk
All of this is also applicable to written work
Once you’ve identified a talk idea, you need to flesh it out
I do this by writing an abstract
a summary of the contents of a book, article, or formal speech
I answer questions like...
What’s the talk about?
What am I trying to solve?
What will people watching the talk learn?
This last one is most important
This helps hone in the talk idea more and identify the talk’s audience
Next, I take the core talk idea and start mind mapping
Mind mapping is the process of writing down related ideas that come into your head
I usually do this by writing on paper
Or in a word processing program like Microsoft Word or Google Docs
So for example, this idea...
Once all the ideas are out of my head...
I take the brain dump and organize it into a structure that makes sense
This becomes a high-level outline that provides the direction for the finished talk
For example, once I have all the ideas out of my head for this talk, I might rearrange them so that they make sense
Then I transfer the high-level outline into a writing program
(if I wasn’t already in one)
I add time budgets to each section
For example, the intro gets 5 minutes and the other sections get 10
This helps me figure out how much to talk about each part of my presentation
How many slides I will probably make
And helps me remember how much time I have to talk in total
For writing, I might budget a number of words or paragraphs
I then brain dump more into each section until I have found a place for everything I’d like to cover in the talk
For example, adding (MENTION ONSCREEN THINGS)
I locate spaces in which the talk would benefit from sharing an experience of mine
Or others, it doesn’t have to be something that happened to you directly
For example, a time when something didn’t work out – or did
Looking at this idea, I might talk about how Facebook and Twitter negatively impacted the election
And then I might talk about what I did to make my project successful
Then I add the stories into my outline
After this, I usually move to creating the actual presentation
This is the process I used to make this talk (and many others) as well as write blog posts
Now that you know how I work, here are some lessons I’ve learned about storytelling and telling stories within talks
Some of these apply to the process of telling a cohesive story with your talk
Some just apply to the technique of adding stories to your talk
Stories need to be simple
They need to be easy to follow and concise
People will lose interest quickly
They can not process a lot of information at once
Avoid presenting too many concepts within a talk or a sub-story
Keep it simple
Secondly, stories within your talk must be low in quantity
Sub-stories are one of many techniques
Don’t overuse them or they will lose their impact
If you tell too many stories, people may feel like you're rambling to fill space
Your goal is to help people learn
Avoid making people recognize the technique by using it scarcely and intentionally
If they do recognize it, they will be distracted and it will no longer be beneficial to you
Thirdly, if your talk is not relevant to the time period it is being presented in...
Ensure that you figure out ways to make it more relevant
For example, talking about UX Design now is different than talking about it in 2012
How have things changed, and how can you adapt your presentation to the time?
In terms of sub-stories, they should be related to the concept
Present your idea and then attach a story to it
This is how people remember your idea and therefore the concept
One way to keep it relevant to people in the audience...
Ask yourself: would someone who doesn’t know me get why this is related?
Stories should also be down to earth
Again, you want people to remember that you are a real human being
Climb down from your fancy castle
Get comfortable with laughing at yourself
Share times when you’ve succeded and failed
Lessons about success and failure are equally useful
One person at a talk described a time in which he thought he had a heart attack
I still remember his lesson to live your life with full intention because it was so impactful
Finally, they should be easy to remember
The whole point of storytelling is to convey ideas more efficiently
If your listeners don’t remember the idea you shared, you must improve your technique
To wrap up...
Storytelling is a useful way to make your talk more engaging
Listeners remember stories more because they have a beginning, middle, and end
They relate to them because stories feel more down-to-earth and familiar
I always suggest outlining your talk before jumping into presentation design or trying to write about a topic
Think about your audience – they are the end users of your talk
Make sure that sub-stories in your talk are relatable, simple, and on-topic
Thank you so much!
If you have questions, send me a tweet or email