Breaking Murphy's Law » Problems with People

PowerPoint Ninja: “Emergency Preparedness for PowerPoint”

Lee Potts — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 01:20:39 +0000

Brent Dykes, The PowerPoint Ninja, strikes at the dark heart of a potential presentation disaster with this story of uncooperative hardware and a decidedly nonsupportive support person:

What I didn’t anticipate was that the presentation remote would only work with the desktop computer in the auditorium.

No problem. I had all of the presentations also loaded on to a USB flash drive so I could transfer the files on to the desktop. However, in its infinite wisdom, the university’s IT group blocked any files from being installed on the desktop including a font file that one of the teams needed. After explaining the situation to an IT “support” person, he indicated nothing could be done before our event started. Aaagggh. Luckily, someone had brought their own presentation remote so we could just run the presentations from my laptop.

Often it’s easier said than done “to be prepared”, but we often focus so much on the actual presentation itself and forget the other small technical details that can completely ruin our beautiful slides and well-rehearsed thoughts. In reflecting on this recent situation, I had several takeaways for presenters who want to be more prepared for PowerPoint emergencies…

Check out the full post for Brent’s outstanding suggestions for being prepared when things like this happen.

Sharing: del.icio.us Twitter
Categories: Pre-presentation, Problems with Equipment, Problems with People, Problems with Software
Tags:

"PowerPoint Ninja: “Emergency Preparedness for PowerPoint”" was originally posted on Breaking Murphy's Law on December 29, 2011. Copyright 2011 Lee Potts and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0. All other rights reserved.

Alice’s Restaurant: Presentation technology failure circa 1965

Lee Potts — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:59:48 +0000

As seems to be the case nationwide, the local classic rock radio station has a long tradition of filling up its Thanksgiving playlist with the Arlo Guthrie’s brilliant, comic, 18 1/2 minute ode to hippie sensibilities, “Alice’s Restaurant“. Although I’ve listened many times over the years, it wasn’t until recently that I realized the song’s lyrics/monologue convey an important lesson about making sure your technology will work as expected before your presentation is due to begin.

We walked in, sat down, Obie came in with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one, sat down. Man came in said, “All rise.” We all stood up, and Obie stood up with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures, and the judge walked in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he sat down, we sat down. Obie looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog. And then at twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry, ’cause Obie came to the realization that it was a typical case of American blind justice, and there wasn’t nothing he could do about it, and the judge wasn’t going to look at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And we was fined $50 and had to pick up the garbage in the snow, but thats not what I came to tell you about.

If you haven’t already, do yourself a favor and listen to the entire song. The text alone, without the music and without Arlo’s dry, satiric delivery doesn’t do it justice.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Sharing: del.icio.us Twitter
Categories: Pre-presentation, Problems with Equipment, Problems with People
Tags: alice's restaurant, Arlo Guthrie, technology failure, thanksgiving

"Alice’s Restaurant: Presentation technology failure circa 1965" was originally posted on Breaking Murphy's Law on November 24, 2011. Copyright 2011 Lee Potts and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0. All other rights reserved.

Overheard on Twitter: Your nose is running…

Lee Potts — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 13:35:12 +0000

Sick enough for the symptoms to interfere with your presentation but snot nearly sick enough to call it off. What do you do when a cold hits you right in the eyes, nose and throat when you’re due to hit the stage? Do you have a favorite trick to dry things up just before you go on? Tough call. You should probably avoid most over the counter cold medicines and they tend to make folks loopy and you might end up completely lost and forget where you are in your talk. I guess the best thing to do is to avoid getting sick in the first place. It can be hard to not burn the candle at both ends those last few days before you present, but getting enough sleep and eating right can go a long way toward preventing all your hard work from going down the drain. Along with all that gunk the neti pot dislodged.

Sharing: del.icio.us Twitter
Categories: Pre-presentation, Problems with People, Problems with Time
Tags: cold, flu. sick, neti pot, remedy

"Overheard on Twitter: Your nose is running…" was originally posted on Breaking Murphy's Law on November 22, 2011. Copyright 2011 Lee Potts and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0. All other rights reserved.

Basic Questions Too Often Unasked

Lee Potts — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 13:37:22 +0000

(Thanks to Michael Wade for providing the inspiration for this post.)

1) Who will bring the projector?

2) What if the flight is delayed that morning?

3) Where is the presentation backed up to?

4) Are any of the presenters using a Mac?

5) Is that 9 o’clock Eastern or Central time?

6) Are there any protests anticipated at our meeting? In the vicinity of the meeting venue?

7) What time is the hotel going to have the meeting room ready?

8) What if we can’t get online at the meeting venue?

Sharing: del.icio.us Twitter
Categories: Pre-presentation, Problems with Content, Problems with Equipment, Problems with People, Problems with Software, Problems with Staging, Problems with Time, Problems with Transportation, Problems with Venue
Tags: BACKUP, flight delays, macs, online, projector, protests, time zones, Wifi

"Basic Questions Too Often Unasked" was originally posted on Breaking Murphy's Law on November 21, 2011. Copyright 2011 Lee Potts and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0. All other rights reserved.

Presentation Mishaps A to Z: B is for Bait

Lee Potts — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 16:47:50 +0000

Brody: You’re gonna need a bigger boat.
~Jaws (1975)

Sometimes I find it entertaining to think of presentation mishaps as sharks sliding silently, heavily, somewhere beneath a perfectly calm ocean. You may not see fins break the surface but you know they’re out there somewhere and you are doing everything you can to not give them a reason to swim over and remove any body parts that you use on a regular basis.

Unfortunately, from time to time, we have all worked with a person who might best be thought of as mishap bait.

You’re busy taking every possible precaution to keep the mishap sharks from attacking and this person seems determined to fling bucket after slimy bucket of chum off the back of the boat. Not only do they tend to indulge an unfortunate predilection for swimming out to that really spooky buoy in the middle of the night, they also splash around like a wounded tuna while doing so.

In less metaphoric terms, they are the person that everything bad seems to happen to. They tempt fate. They are disaster baiters.

You might be tempted to put someone like this off the boat onto their own little rubber dinghy where they can dangle their feet in the water to their heart’s content. The sharks will most likely follow them. That might be good for you but it will most likely be bad for them and you’ll be a crew member short.

What’s the best way you’ve found for dealing with the dreaded disaster baiter? Do you throw them overboard or do you force them to watch Shark Week reruns until they get it?

Sharing: del.icio.us Twitter
Categories: Presentation Mishaps A to Z, Problems with People
Tags: 2, 4, 7, baiter, Brody, bucket, crew member, disaster, fins, jaws, mishaps, rubber dinghy, shark week, sharks

"Presentation Mishaps A to Z: B is for Bait" was originally posted on Breaking Murphy's Law on August 03, 2011. Copyright 2011 Lee Potts and licensed for reuse under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0. All other rights reserved.