How do you get people to devour your information?

29th June, 2010 - Posted by stellacollins - No Comments

How do you know the ‘stuff you know’? What helped you learn the vast amount of information you have;the way you do your job; the insights that you have about work; the background knowledge that can be called on at any time?
I’m willing to bet you didn’t learn most if it sitting comfortably in a lengthy presentation.

Some people may enjoy standard presentations, they may have a preference for receiving information through PowerPoint slides but even then the chances are their brains have still got plenty of capacity left to daydream or plan something else.

A little while ago we tested the difference between standard presentation techniques and an environment where people actively and physically participated in devouring and digesting information.

What we found surprised even those participants who were expert presenters.
First we presented technical information in a standard way with a neat bulleted flipchart and someone talking. People noticed they went into ‘spoon feeding’ mode; they felt passive, had to struggle to concentrate, accepted what they heard and didn’t ask questions. When tested they could recall some of it but were not confident they would remember the information the next day. One person even noticed that she’d been able to take in more information whilst belatedly grabbing a coffee than when she sat down and settled into ‘listening to presentations’ mode.

Next we had people actively and physically engaged in consuming the same technical information and this time they felt motivated and inspired, were eager to find out more. Importantly the number and quality of questions increased dramatically demonstrating that everyone was applying the information to their own situations. In fact they were so involved they realised they’d had little time to reflect on how they’d learnt the information; but they were much more confident that they would remember it the next day.

What would happen if instead of spoon feeding people you could make them devour information for themselves? How will you create an environment in which people participate, make sense of information for themselves, give it real meaning and make it easy to remember and apply.

Join us on July 15th/22nd for Powerful Persuasion for lots of ideas about building your confidence in presenting information in multiple ways.