Gnomedex was an amazing experience and the best technology conference that I’ve been to (which is admittedly not many.) Excellent sessions, excellent setup, excellent people. These are mostly lessons learned from mistakes, a couple of what I did right, but mostly mistakes.
Speaking
Gnomedex was my first speaking gig ever. Presenting in front of 280 Gnomedex attendees in addition to 850 viewers through the Ustream stream online was a nervewracking experience, which wasn’t particularly helped by some hardball questions. Nor did it help that, at 16, I was the youngest speaker at the conference.
1. You aren’t talking to 1130 people– you’re conversing with just one person.
This advice was given to me by Todd Sawicki of Lookery an hour before my presentation, which, as much as I wanted to make happen, on stage didn’t. The knowledge that more than a thousand people are watching you is intimidating. You aren’t afraid of speaking, you’re afraid of making a mistake.
After the presentation, Brian Westbrook asked me to participate in a radio interview. During the interview, I felt completely comfortable. Without stuttering or giving vague answers, I was able to bring up points I’d forgotten to mention in my presentation.
The way I’m going to look at this from now on is to think of the entire audience not as 200 people but a person directly in front of you that you’re demoing your deck to. The seats are empty.
When answering a question, you’re not addressing the entire audience, but the questioner.
As Todd also mentioned, it’s also much easier to think of that person in front of you or that questioner as someone you’ve talked to and feel comfortable with. In my case, I should have thought of this guy or that questioner as Brian or Todd or Ben Huh (of I Can Has Cheezburger.)
With this mindset, it’s much easier to hold a relaxed speaking session.
2. Actually take said advice, or you’ll be worse off.
On stage I doubted the effectiveness of Todd’s advice. (Though in hindsight, why the hell would I? He’s experienced in the matter.) Would I mess up that way, by applying that advice, taking the audience and removing them? Would it put me in the wrong mindset?
Answer is, if you don’t take it, you’ll be worse off. Still doubting? Consider my experience, first hand experience. First hand experience is what I lacked when trying to apply advice given, and now I have it. And in a way, now you do, too.
3. Don’t be a pessimist.
There are many times and places where it’s appropriate to be a pessimist. Speaking is not one of them. If you think you’ll mess up, chances are you will. Your mind will be far too preoccupied with that thought, and you’ll be dedicating concentration and attention to that, and you’ll have to ask for things to be repeated, not think correctly, forget to deliver vital points, and so on. Think positively.
4. Be humble.
Gnomedex pushed a lot of (maybe too much) recognition for myself, which was mostly my fault. I’m just as much of a developer as the next guy (or less so) and I wasn’t really anything special, nor was the stuff that I did that I was recognized for, even though that’s the idea that was given off.
Being an arrogant dbag doesn’t really go down well with the audience. When you can, refute false claims people make about you (or those that are simply exaggerated) make instead of laughing them off.
In addition, if someone underestimates you, don’t correct them unless it is vital to do so. I made the mistake of looking like an arrogant dbag, when Chris Pirillo said “he’s sold a Facebook app” and I corrected him with “actually like three.” (Update: Thanks all for your opinion. Didn’t really know what the audience thought – now I do. Many thanks!)
5. Even if you’re winging it, rehearse. A lot.
Not many presentations these days have the speaker looking down on a script (though you could say the new scripts are four-level bulleted 10 point text size slides, in which case put on your headphones and just read the slides like the speaker is.) Most presentations, people are taking it from their head. Rehearse a lot, and that doesn’t mean rehearse silently in your head. The ideas originate through your head, the ideas come through your mouth. It’ll get you into a procedure and regularity and you’ll help to prevent forgetting points and nervousness.
6. You have friends, they have a minute.
Chances are, your friends would be down with helping you rehearse your presentation and giving feedback on them, like my friend and business partner Dan Grover of Wonder Warp Software. Not only is it a relaxed environment, you’ll get better feedback than that voice in your head since they’re like an audience member. Do this with a few people to get a diverse range of minds. Do it over iChat theatre, Adobe Acrobat Connect, or send them the slides (if applicable) and do it over Skype or the phone. If you do this a few times, with the right people (as in those that are like the audience that you’re presenting to) you’ll get a general idea of what the audience will think.
Furthermore, don’t shrug off criticism, find out what caused it, if changing things would help, and then decide whether if you need to fix it. And, remember to return the favour.
7. Say “I don’t know.”
At my Gnomedex session, 30 minutes of the 45-minute session were devoted to Q&A. Many of their questions asked me to predict the future and make blanket statements and observations about Generation Y. Many of these I couldn’t answer; I’m an entrepreneur, not a fortune teller. So I opted to bullshit my way through. As a friend suggested, it would have been more effective to just say “I don’t know.”
8. You can’t please everyone.
After I stepped off the stage, I was in a state of panic. I thought I had screwed up badly. This wasn’t helped by the anonymous reviews on RateMyTalk, which contained a few “not interesting”s (more than one which made my blood pressure high.) J.P. Taylor offered the following, though: You can’t please everybody. There will always be critics. And that’s the risk you take when doing a speaking thing or presentation like this.
Jason L. Baptiste of Publictivity also offered the following to me online. You can’t lose confidence with yourself. Once you do, you’ll lose everything.
Networking
9. Continue the connection.
Often during the conference, someone would say “hey Mark, nice presentation” and I would say “hey, much thanks!” followed by an awkward period of both of us walking and not looking at each other. In this situation, STICK OUT YOUR FUCKING HAND and introduce yourself. Nothing sucks more than a loose end, and immediately after you miss the connection you’ll feel a sharp pang of regret, followed by you looking for that person, but they’re not anywhere in sight.
9a. Just network, damnit.
Like mentioned at Gnomedex by Ignite speaker, “relax, damnit!”, just network. Damnit. Chances are, the other person you see is just as happy to network with you as you are with them. Again, stick out your hand and introduce yourself. The worst thing that can happen is that they ignore you and don’t want to talk to you. And in such a case, is that a connection you really want to have anyway?
9b. If you’re just walking around trying to find someone to talk to, look for the guys that are as lonely as you are.
Actively seek, don’t passively wait. If you’re walking around, so is at least one other person that is trying to find someone to talk to. And don’t be afraid to get into a group conversation. Return the favour; if you see someone trying to get into a discussion circle you’re in, invite them and introduce them to the group.
10. Follow up.
This was a step I (and many other people) kinda forgot a lot. Following up serves two purposes, as a courtesy, and more importantly to initiate conversation that would have not been possible during the five minutes that you talked. This is part of continuing the connection. Don’t follow up immediately afterwards (”hey, it was a pleasure meeting you a minute and a half ago”) but rather the night or the next day after the event. And, it’s always nice to follow up, and since not many do so, you’ll be a more memorable contact, so do it.
11. If they don’t have a business card, you have a pen.
“I don’t have a card [with me]” and “oh, that’s fine, you have mine anyway” kind of sucks. A majority of people don’t follow up (and I used to not do so, so I’m also guilty of the sad truth) so grab an extra card of yours and a pen, and have them write it down on yours.
I’m extremely grateful for Chris and Ponzi Pirillo and Maryam Scoble for inviting me to speak at Gnomedex. That was the best weekend I’ve had, ever.
I’m also very thankful to have great people supporting me and giving me advice either at Gnomedex or outside of it.
–
Much thanks to Dan Grover of Wonder Warp Software for editing a first draft of this article.
18 Comments
Hi Mark,
Your #9b resonates with me because you did this with me when I walked in on Thursday. I was all alone, felt awkward, and you were the first to speak to me; you extended your hand right away and struck up a conversation. You have no idea how that made me feel, and that’s what I appreciate about you.
As for your other points, it was your first speaking engagement, and yes, it was obvious that you were nervous. Having a Q&A on your first speaking assignment is super tough. However, take the criticism you received and just polish up your skills. Concerning your company, ventures, and visions, have those absolutely memorized so that you can say that part with ease, and then you get your audience on your side, but avoid sounding like you’re bragging (which I didn’t detect, just some advice I had to learn the hard way).
I liked what Sarah Lacy did. She got the audience engaged and walked around and it was great, even if the topic was a bit heated.
When you speak in the future, remember her method and work your audience. Even if you don’t have much to say or are at a loss for words, having the audience feel like they are talking vs. being talked to is a winner everytime.
Anyway, those are just some tips from me. You are great and I was inspired by you, and I hope we can keep in touch!
A couple of things:
1. You’re being too hard on yourself. You did a great job speaking. I wouldn’t have known it was your first time.
2. You didn’t come off as a dbag when you said 3 facebook apps. It was a really funny line. Someone reading the transcript might misinterpret it, but those in the audience wouldn’t.
3. Make sure you distinguish between criticism of the organizers and criticism of the your talk. For example, I tweeted during your session about how hard it was to consider you representative of generation Y. I ended your session quite a bit, but I don’t like the way the session was positioned.
Frankly, the fact that you *aren’t* representative of your colleagues is much more interesting. I just wish the session would have been billed that way and that the questions that were posed to you would have been more reflective of who you are. I felt like for many questions you would have had to say, “Well, I do X. My classmates do Y” to answer the questions both about what you do as well as what a typical gen Y person does.
To sum it up, I thought you did a great job. I thought your answers were interesting. Once it was clear that you weren’t representative of your generation (seriously, how many startups do you run?), I’d rather have had the pretense dropped about you being representative and instead spent more time talking about what you do and how the Internet makes it possible for someone to be successful in this way as a high school student.
You were the star of the session. It would have been nice to have had more time to let you shine.
Argh. That should say, “I enjoyed your session quite a bit…” I have no idea how I turned into “I ended your session…”
This is a great primer of public presentations for anyone who is signed up to present to an audience of engaged, interested folks.
Presenting is not easy and doing a first at Gnomedex is heavy-duty. Practicing at Barcamps, smllaer conferences is great but not always possible - especially for interview style.
Sincerity speaks volumes and you had that in spades. Most everyone in the audience has experienced the same “oh my god, if i don’t shut up, they’ll know i am a fraud ;-)” feeling of questioning confidence before standing in front of a crowd. The trick - i find - is to ignore the slides, tell a story(ies), and express legitimate passion for the topic you are addressing.
As a younger presenter, the crowd was ready to cut you some slack but you didn’t need it - you rocked with a great speaking voice and true stories from the trenches. Ignore the naysayers - they are just a bunch of old curmudgeons who shoulda used the time to get a beverage if they were bored.
BTW, i interviewed Dmitri, the young drupal developer you mentioned for raincitystudios a while back and he is a great kid.
Hi Mark,
Regarding #4, I would also definitely say you weren’t arrogant in correcting Chris. You were simply stating a fact - being arrogant probably would have included a much lengthier description of how awesome you considered yourself for creating those apps.
One of the things I’ve learned is that you have to promote yourself, because in most cases if you don’t, nobody will. I learned this again at Gnomedex trying to push RateMyTalk. While some things do have an instantly viral network effect (Twitter), many things still need somebody out there promoting and marketing it and that includes our own personal brand.
Great job, and I’ll be checking out SpeakHQ soon - I’ve been wanting to build a group-like Twitter thing myself, as well!
Well through the lens of Camera 3, you did a terrific job.
I am a firm believer in standing up for yourself; the old cliché springs to mind:
“If you cannot laugh at yourself, how can you expect others to laugh at you?”
That statement echoes the need to be humble, but without taking yourself too seriously. I am sure that with the Irish quirkiness about me that I may have said a few things that I would regret if I know what I should have regretted saying, but it was like what I said on Chris’ stream afterwards: “I have no ego.” Paradoxial? Probably!
Having the best seat in the house (actually standing up most of the time) and seeing #Gnomedex thru the mini LCD-screen of a video camera shooting for UStream, I think you did a fine job. So to reiterate what’s been said before:
“If everyone is perfect, no-one would ever learn.”
I like my mottos. Ego? Probably!
You were far from looking like an arrogant dbag, when Chris Pirillo said “he’s sold a Facebook app” and you corrected him with “actually like three.”
You said it in a humble, matter of fact, way. In fact this was one of the conference quotes that I parroted back to the folks at my office. The reaction of the crowd (laughter) said it all. We weren’t laughing at either you or Chris, we were laughing at the whole situation.
Good job!
I’ll definitely agree with Jason–you’re much too hard on yourself! I was really impressed with the way you handled yourself on stage. This is an excellent post by the way, although I’ll disagree with your view that the Facebook line was a mistake. It’s hard to go wrong when you’re making people laugh
Mark,
As I told you personally, I thought you were being a little too harsh on yourself. And that’s OK too, because based on this post, you’ve ended up putting a lot of thought into where you can improve (on your own terms), and that’s a really excellent quality to have. But, remember that it’s not the end of the world, and you will have plenty of opportunities moving forward to place yourself in the image of your choice as time progresses.
A significant number of people have had much, much worse first presentations that you did; and of those, many are still much worse after 10, 20, and 30 presentations. You have a lot to be proud of, and you have a significant amount of opportunity ahead of you because of your talents, your age, and your ability to go for what you want. I know people “more” talented than you who squander away their opportunity because of their fears.
I harmonize with most of the comments here, and I’m really excited to see that other people recognized these same things. You’ve got a good core set of people who are supportive of you, and that’s a real blessing! There are people who aren’t that “lucky.”
Godspeed!
-Kevin
Mark,
It was wonderful to see you speak at Gnomedex. You have guts to take that on as your first speaking gig. You were amusing, well-informed, and enjoyable to listen to.
I also thought you did a great job of networking and following up. I got a quick E-mail from you very shortly after we met, which demonstrated exceptional networking etiquette.
We’re all looking forward to where you’re going, and what you’ll be doing next. It’s wonderful to have you as a part of the fantastic Gnomedex/Social Media community.
Sincerely,
Amber
This is a great list, Mark (I can’t believe #9b never occurred to me before). You were much, much better on stage than you seem to think you were, and if anyone thinks you came across as arrogant (I sure don’t, quite the opposite!), you neutralized that misimpression with this list. We all make mistakes, but not everyone cares so much about learning from them.
In Much Ado About Nothing, Benedick says, “Happy are they that hear their detractions and can put them to mending.” How much happier are they who, like you, put them to mending without having to hear them first?
Finally, take it from someone who’s done a fair number of interviews and presentations: you will always wish you had done something differently, or forget something and regret it afterward. What you got in was really good, so don’t sweat whatever you left out.
Hi Mark, your talk was great. I learned a lot from it and thought that you handled yourself with maturity and composure on stage. As the other commenters have said, don’t be so hard on yourself.
– Jeff;
Hello Mark,
Its Will Reynolds Young better known as TheeBayk1d in the chatroom.
Well to start of Mark you did an amazing job you came in chat the night before and I was trying to figure out what was going on cause you got voice right away. Little did I know I would have the pleasure of hearing you speak.
Perhaps it would help to practice in an empty auditorium and get used to walking the stage etc.,
For the next thing I know you have now found out you didn’t look like an arrogant dbag and I am sure Chris Pirillo himself would agree. When you said that the chat room erupted into laughter I am not sure if you can see the chat room from the Ustream video or not but I am not sure I would want to watch myself speak either because I would be nit picky at thing just like that. When in reality there isn’t anything better you could of said. Also it takes note that when someone is speaking about you, you have the right to correct there misinformation, even it is the leader of the conference.
I have a feeling you will get to the point where you won’t need to rehearse at all, there comes to be a certain point when you are a speaker where you just don’t need the practice.
Another nit picky thing, in my opinion, saying I Don’t Know, since I came to hear you speak I would most likely would much rather have you ramble all cause its opens up other doors and questions. Also I think doing talks over and over again will get you to be able to answer all of those Q and A’s.
Very true you can’t please everyone you need to find the people who matter in rating but that will also be honest. I will agree at first you were very nervous and stuttering but as the chat room and I agreed you really lightened up. But also this is to be expect 200 people you first speech, youngest person. Heck I don’t there is any practice that can get that noticeable part on the first speech, everyone has it even veteran speakers when getting use to a crowd.
I think you got everything about networking on the head. Just network and follow-up easy right?
Well to sum it up, I thought it was an incredible speech and I am trying to get DebateWare into our school debates. Also I some what disagree while you were not entirely representative of your generation I would say they were looking for the exceptional people there. the upcoming people if you will and you are for sure that and no DBAG.
I wish you great luck and hope to see you around chat and perhaps one day we will meet somewhere maybe even at Gnomedex.
Really enjoyed your talk! I think you did great! Presenting just takes practice and doing it more and more - and I’m sure you’ll have lots of opportunities for that.
Hi
Where did you get words for this paper? Is it from your head???
Ahh, Mark your a true inspiration.
Just at 16 years of age, just like myself your way a head of the game.
Not only are you thinking 2-3 steps head, your taking the effort and time to move forward.
I respect that. Hope to see you around maybe at a conference for young people making a difference in a few years time!
Regards
TeenProBlogger
Mark,
This is awesome. Quite the blog post.
You made some interesting points here.
Your truly amazing. My inspiration to think big and push forward. I love what you’re doing and the attitude you have toward it. I wish you all the best!
Regards
Clinton Skakun
You made some good points on this topic.
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