Dear Speakers - advice from Duncan Davidson ("photographer laureate of the O'Reilly tech conferences")
9 months ago
http://duncandavidson.com/2009/03/dear-speakers.html
- Please deliver your speech to the crowd, not the screen.
- Please pick a spot and stay. Move deliberately to another. Don’t pace aimlessly. And please don’t turn all the way around.
- Please take off your name tag.
- If you find yourself walking backwards, you are probably pacing very vigorously. Stop. Breathe.
- If you don’t make eye contact with your audience, you make it that much harder for them to connect to your message.
- The corner of the stage that you like to use to feel closer to the crowd is darker than rest of stage. They can see you less there.
- Rule of thumb for speaker clothing: Dress like you mean it. ~0 to 1 levels above mean “nice” for audience.
- When on a panel, don’t look at your shoes. Try to look at who’s talking. Otherwise, you look bored, even if you’re not.
