00:12
you have made it to the end of droidcon
00:14
New York that is impressive in and of
00:18
itself especially considering a lot of
00:20
people had to wake up at like 7:00 a.m.
00:22
this morning and I never do that so I do
00:26
want to play a little bit of an intro
00:27
cuz you know it's fun
00:41
so I kind of bring that up so you know
00:46
the song Stacy's mom right like Stacy
00:49
you're just not the one for me I'm
00:53
really into your mom and sometimes we
00:55
feel that way right like sometimes we
00:57
feel like you know the person that we
00:59
think is really into us isn't actually
01:01
into us and that's true in the business
01:03
world too and that kind of rejection is
01:06
what we're always fearing we especially
01:08
fear it when we're talking about public
01:10
speaking right so getting up on stage
01:13
not exactly the easiest thing in the
01:15
world so I wanted to give you a little
01:18
bit of a meta of a meta of a meta
01:19
situation here it's a talk about talking
01:22
it's a talk so that's an important thing
01:26
to think about here is that yeah we're
01:29
just gonna talk about talking in a very
01:31
odd kind of way but it's not exactly
01:36
that really this should be named talking
01:42
like you know things the finer points of
01:47
speaking like you mean it
01:48
so the reality is we don't know
01:52
everything about a subject matter we're
01:54
never gonna know everything about a
01:56
certain subject matter and quite frankly
01:59
a lot of times the people who even made
02:01
the thing don't know everything about it
02:03
but we need to know enough and we need
02:06
to seem like we're knowledgeable enough
02:09
to be a presenter on it so it's really
02:12
about seeming kind of like you know what
02:14
you're talking about and you can go
02:18
right back to not knowing anything right
02:19
afterward so if we think about like a
02:25
really bad example of this is your boss
02:29
comes and says you know what what are
02:31
you here you're like office space what
02:33
do you exactly do here and the guy's
02:35
just comes out like what do you mean I
02:37
have people skills I talked to people
02:39
he's trying to justify he doesn't know
02:41
what he's actually supposed to be
02:43
talking about he wasn't prepared he
02:45
wasn't thinking about all of these
02:47
questions that everybody else in that
02:49
office had already had asked to them
02:53
a presentation is can be something
02:55
impromptu but it can also be something
02:57
that's thought out and just a little bit
02:60
of preparation don't you think that this
03:01
guy would have given way better response
03:04
than freaking out in front of a bunch of
03:06
people that are I mean quite obviously
03:08
at this point going to fire him and what
03:10
we really want to have happen is a
03:12
situation more like Elle Woods who are
03:15
you just like oh my gosh I got picked
03:17
I'm gonna do something and then you have
03:20
the result where you just have that
03:23
moment at the end we're like you're the
03:25
number one person in the entire
03:26
situation and you're telling everybody
03:29
to believe in themselves you're the
03:31
inspiration and it's not like those are
03:34
necessarily two separate people because
03:37
if you ask somebody in day-to-day life
03:39
that first guy is probably much more
03:41
prepared for his job then L was going
03:44
into Harvard right and at least you know
03:47
it's a fictional movie but it's a good
03:49
example nonetheless and it's all about
03:51
preparation and all of the work that
03:53
went into it so let's throw a scenario
03:59
out here your boss comes to you in a
04:01
very real situation to talk about a
04:04
feature that maybe you designed or want
04:07
to implement or even that you actually
04:09
led the project on that's kind of
04:13
intimidating especially because you
04:15
might be speaking to people in the C
04:19
quite honestly I keep a my laptop on a
04:23
cover for my stickers so I can take them
04:25
up take the laptop cover off so I look
04:27
more professional from talking to people
04:29
in that higher level and that just shows
04:31
my own intimidation sometimes but if you
04:35
think about that in terms of what's your
04:37
purpose you're there to present
04:38
information as that subject matter
04:41
expert and your real question that you
04:45
should ask here is why should anyone
04:47
care yeah you know like why does anybody
04:52
care about the thing that you've spent
04:54
hours of your life working on and going
05:02
so when we think about why you would
05:05
want to be actually making a
05:06
presentation and not just writing an
05:08
article about it to throw out on to the
05:10
email news stream that I swear to god I
05:12
check once a month in terms of
05:15
randomness you have to think about your
05:18
purpose why are you making a
05:19
presentation about this why are you
05:21
presenting it to that group what why
05:24
would you even bother it's really about
05:27
sharing information there are things
05:30
that you can do in a presentation about
05:32
sharing information that they cannot get
05:34
in a 10 minute write up
05:35
part of that is emotional buy-in part of
05:38
that is depth of knowledge and another
05:40
part of it is a personal touch that you
05:44
yourself bring and that comes in
05:47
straight into perspective perspective is
05:51
unique it is you it is no one else how
05:56
do you feel about this subject matter
05:58
how do you feel about the work that you
05:60
did or even maybe the work you probably
06:02
had to fix there was probably a lot of
06:05
fixing of things in order to build
06:07
something new correct I mean if you look
06:10
at New York they take down a building to
06:11
put up a new one you have to take it
06:13
down in order to build something new
06:15
sometimes and that perspective and that
06:18
prospectus as to why you're giving that
06:20
makes a big difference and research
06:23
yours you're the person who knows the
06:28
most about it you're not an expert but
06:30
you know quote stuff right like we
06:33
talked about earlier the finer points of
06:35
speaking like you mean it essentially in
06:37
this case you're gonna be treated like a
06:39
subject-matter expert whether or not
06:41
that's actually true so what you think
06:45
is your job in this scenario like why am
06:49
i there like why do I even bother your
06:54
priorities as you see them as somebody
06:56
who's maybe not so experienced in
06:58
speaking and giving presentations and
07:01
making presentations
07:03
you think that you need to be all puffed
07:06
up confident and all that stuff right
07:09
did you need to know everything you have
07:12
to inform everyone on every single finer
07:14
point and detail of your technical
07:17
knowledge so they know how smart you are
07:18
how cool the thing you made is yeah a
07:23
little bit of seeming important it's
07:27
true that most of the time when you
07:29
actually make a presentation and give a
07:31
presentation you are not the most
07:34
important person in that room but you
07:37
think that you have to be in that moment
07:39
it's kind of true to a certain extent
07:42
maybe just if we think about attention
07:44
spans and that kind of thing and that
07:47
you have to be confident overtly
07:50
confident people do not inspire others
07:53
straight off because somebody who's
07:56
maybe challenging you know kind of the
08:00
known status quo in that room isn't
08:03
necessarily always going to get the
08:05
respect that they should or deserve and
08:07
most importantly you think I need to not
08:10
fail failing is impossible and part of
08:13
that is fear of questions fear of what
08:16
comes out you start speaking too quickly
08:18
and this is how that sounds no one
08:20
really wants to listen and pay attention
08:24
if they're not engaged with the content
08:25
so failing failing is a lot different
08:30
than tripping up what your actual
08:34
priorities are and it's a far smaller
08:39
list when it comes to actually giving a
08:42
presentation you are there to entertain
08:48
and inform so the main reason the why
08:53
you are probably approached is to inform
08:56
and because of your knowledge on a
08:58
certain subject matter or even that you
09:00
put forth on your base off of your
09:03
experience but another part of this is
09:05
entertaining you can't always make sure
09:10
that you inform somebody else about
09:13
something they didn't know about who's
09:14
in that room because you don't know
09:16
how much everyone in that room already
09:18
knows about the thing that you're going
09:19
to present on you're never going to be
09:21
able to know but what you can do is make
09:25
sure that they had a good time so that's
09:28
an important thing to think about your
09:30
energy and the way that you project
09:32
things says a lot about not just what
09:34
you're doing but who you are and the
09:38
actual value that you bring and that's
09:41
pretty much it it's surprisingly simple
09:45
is it not you really don't have as many
09:49
things to think about in the moment as
09:51
you thought you did
09:52
that's going to help you in relaxing and
09:55
not maybe going as crazy as you thought
09:57
that you might need to in getting every
09:60
single detail nailed down it's very
10:05
important that you realize this you are
10:09
not giving a TED talk I mean unless you
10:14
are right so if you're if you are
10:19
presenting to even this group or a much
10:22
smaller one you're not giving a TED talk
10:25
you're not here to go and I am the
10:27
person who saved a hundred million lives
10:30
from dying from this very rare form of
10:31
cancer but somehow has 100 million
10:33
people die from it a year that's very
10:37
very important to think about is that
10:40
it's not that big of a deal
10:44
you're gonna mess up you're gonna say um
10:46
see I've been throwing those in there
10:49
even though I've done a lot of practice
10:51
to get rid of it because it makes you
10:55
human and a certain amount of
10:56
humanization isn't a bad thing doesn't
10:60
detract from your presentation and it
11:02
doesn't make you seem less knowledgeable
11:04
or less of a person who can actually
11:11
so part of this is knowing your limits
11:13
so your audience right they need to have
11:19
content that's catered to them and I say
11:22
this is somebody who will take the same
11:24
slide deck and without actually having
11:28
to make a change to the slide deck
11:29
actually change the content in the way
11:32
that it's presented for the audience at
11:34
hand so if I'm going to be speaking at
11:37
something that's highly technical and
11:38
everybody there knows you know at least
11:43
three or four years of experience on the
11:45
same kind of things that I do every day
11:47
I know that I can go deep I can go
11:50
really deep into that technical content
11:53
but I know if that I'm presenting at say
11:55
a local meetup group I need to make sure
11:58
that somebody only has a year or two in
12:00
the game understands everything I'm
12:03
talking about and I really have to kind
12:06
of gloss over some of those some of
12:08
those details or at least present them
12:10
in a more analogous way right so I
12:12
explain something with something else I
12:15
can't use deep technical terms and quite
12:19
honestly a lot of the times I find that
12:20
going too deep really just makes you
12:24
come off kind of like an a-hole um a
12:27
little bit just a little bit because it
12:31
says a certain thing about you and being
12:33
a little bit over Atlee pretentious in
12:35
in knowing everyone's experience level
12:38
and and maybe not making it as relatable
12:40
as it could be time you have 30 to 40
12:45
minutes in even the most luxurious of
12:48
situations so if you are presenting to
12:50
c-suite you'll find that a lot of times
12:53
you get 15 to 20 so how do you go
12:56
through the same slide deck in 15 to 20
12:58
that you designed for 30 to 40 you have
13:01
to think about what those details are
13:02
and that content you also have to think
13:05
about pacing that group of people do not
13:10
want to hear the technical details of
13:11
your implementation but presenting that
13:15
same slide deck to let's say your
13:19
engineering manager who probably has a
13:21
fairly good exit you know idea of what
13:23
you've been working on
13:25
yeah you're gonna want to make that you
13:28
know much more together and paste a
13:31
little bit differently and also just
13:35
yeah bring it all together with more
13:38
details and last of all in this case
13:44
this has all been done before as a good
13:50
friend of mine who actually isn't here
13:53
today but you probably know who he is
13:56
Mike Mike neck amitavh had probably
13:59
absolutely destroyed his name he says
14:02
that he just keeps moving from company
14:04
to company making new forms of Instagram
14:07
so it's it's an important thing to
14:10
realize that this has all been done
14:12
before so in some regards we're always
14:15
building on the work of other people
14:17
even if you've built a quote brand new
14:19
feature it's based on something else or
14:22
a mash-up of other technologies and it's
14:25
also important to remember that yeah
14:28
it's all a remix everything is a remix
14:32
there's a great presentation that I kind
14:35
of have hooked up a little bit later
14:36
about embracing the remix but it apply
14:39
even though it's kind of tied more to
14:40
music it ties directly to this content
14:47
style how do you actually present how do
14:52
you actually bring your perspective who
14:56
face forward I'm fairly loud as you can
14:59
imagine I crack a few jokes I like an
15:02
obscene amount of gifts
15:03
that's all evident in my presentation
15:06
style also I'm slightly lazy but look at
15:13
how you greet somebody right
15:14
are you somebody's like what's up what's
15:16
up what's up what's up what's up sup sup
15:18
and then they say it was and then we
15:20
have that whole situation from that
15:22
commercial years ago that maybe some
15:24
people remember and not everybody else
15:27
but you have to think about how you
15:30
actually greet someone
15:31
when you actually greet someone for the
15:34
first time what do you do to say hello
15:37
so at these kinds of events I use swag
15:42
as my icebreaker you should actually and
15:47
I hope Alexios passing them out but I
15:49
don't know where he went
15:50
I'll get stickers from from me you come
15:55
to one of my presentations you're always
15:57
going to get some sort of little piece
15:59
of swag but that's actually a way that I
16:02
ice break because if you're giving
16:05
somebody something it instantly makes it
16:07
so that you can have a conversation with
16:09
them for the most part and when you say
16:14
hello to a new group of people do you
16:16
just jump right in and say hi I'm Stacie
16:20
pleasure to meet you done it out of that
16:22
or are you somebody who kind of goes in
16:24
and just goes oh you know kind of
16:28
listens for a while till you find one
16:30
thing that somebody has said in that
16:31
group that you just really resonate with
16:33
and then you jump in on right so that's
16:38
something that you have to think about
16:39
when you're actually putting together
16:41
your presentation style and a big part
16:45
of that is knowing yourself so how many
16:50
of you actually feel and this is a raise
16:52
of hands question that you know who you
16:54
are and what you represent not not the
16:57
work you do that's a different thing say
17:01
work let's say family is stripped away
17:04
do you know who you are as an individual
17:10
that's not everyone it's not everyone
17:14
right and so a big part of actually
17:18
making effective presentations is
17:20
knowing who you are knowing your
17:22
perspective knowing your experience and
17:25
acknowledging those holes so you
17:26
actually know that those holes are the
17:28
pitfalls that you can walk around and so
17:33
that quite honestly you don't end up
17:35
standing in front of everyone just
17:37
babbling and going I don't know I don't
17:38
know I don't know in your head instead
17:40
of just saying you know on that question
17:44
that you had I don't have the answer for
17:47
but if you give me an opportunity I'm
17:49
gonna actually go back and get the
17:51
answer and I'll email you kind of
17:53
offline so to speak that's a very simple
17:57
way to get around those kind of pinholes
17:59
but again how would you explain that
18:05
subject matter that you're talking about
18:08
to yourself or a co-worker that's what
18:12
I always write an outline so I started
18:16
out with like bullet points of what I
18:17
want to talk about and then I start
18:19
filling in that subject matter it makes
18:22
a huge difference when I think that I'm
18:24
talking to an individual versus I think
18:26
I'm talking to a group of a hundred
18:28
people there's no way I can have a
18:31
personal conversation with a hundred
18:33
people that's why I'm constantly looking
18:35
out into the audience to look for
18:37
friendly eyes to talk to right and that
18:40
actually really helps and when we think
18:45
about who that person is that person
18:47
that we're trying to have that
18:48
conversation with should align with your
18:51
content and your audience so when I talk
18:55
about talking to a co-worker
18:57
it's gonna have a totally different
18:59
situation than me talking to like my
19:01
best friend who doesn't even work in
19:02
this area or me talking to quite
19:06
honestly my mom where I'm really gonna
19:08
have to tone it down because my best
19:10
friend writes a lot of C++ code so he
19:14
gets it shake butt or my husband like
19:17
he's he's a coder he gets it to a
19:20
certain extent like but my mom is my mom
19:24
works with plants so not a lot of
19:28
commonality there but I can still cater
19:32
that same presentation that same slide
19:35
deck for her I just have to think about
19:38
it all right so now we're getting to the
19:43
point where we're going to make this
19:45
cohesive we're gonna make this all come
19:47
together and this is where you know the
19:54
doing it I work for Nike so little point
19:58
to the little Nike sign just do it right
20:04
this is when you know that you're kind
20:06
of ready to move forward so the runner
20:10
that we actually have on the right is
20:11
somebody who spent an incredible amount
20:13
of time training and really knows his
20:16
subject matter very well but ultimately
20:20
getting towards the finish line he
20:22
failed right because it's not just about
20:27
preparation ahead of time its
20:30
preparation the day of its getting
20:32
yourself set up in order to succeed it's
20:35
not it's not just the long game it's the
20:37
short game too so part of that is the
20:41
long game having that outline ready
20:43
where you've actually built all of that
20:45
kind of content and bullet points
20:47
that'll help you actually move forward
20:50
what you know know your key core points
20:53
know them back and forward you don't
20:56
have to be a subject matter expert but
20:58
you do need to know what the heck you're
20:59
talking about in the moment that you're
21:01
talking about it and you've trained
21:03
right so this this individual has gone
21:06
through and trained like crazy practiced
21:10
research we're fine do not overly
21:13
practice your content quite honestly I
21:17
know a lot of people who get on stage
21:19
and they've practiced their talk ten
21:22
times and they have a lot of problems
21:25
the day of because they haven't
21:28
practiced effectively one thing I do and
21:32
some other people might do this too is I
21:36
will go through and I will practice in a
21:38
crowded space something like this where
21:41
there's lots of distractions and there's
21:43
lots of people and there's also lots of
21:45
people giving you weird looks
21:48
Walmart is great for this there is
21:51
nothing you can do in a Walmart that
21:53
will surprise anyone I have seen people
21:56
in cutoff pajama pants in a Walmart
21:58
there is nothing you can do that will
22:01
upset them and also Walmart please do
22:04
not sue me for for this but at the same
22:06
point in time like you know you know so
22:10
that's part of training so it's just to
22:13
get that in you make that part of your
22:16
everyday routine may
22:18
little bits of it part of your everyday
22:20
routine you don't have to go through the
22:21
whole thing every time there's no reason
22:23
for that that's a lot of work and
22:27
prepared and preparation is not the same
22:30
as training preparation is the same
22:35
thing I did here today every time that
22:39
I'm gonna give a presentation I do not
22:41
eat anything an hour ahead of time
22:47
anything sugar whatever because you want
22:50
yourself to be in a very even-keeled
22:52
situation and also not to drink too much
22:56
water and especially not coffee
22:59
because quite honestly drinking a bunch
23:03
of milk or something like that you could
23:05
have something go badly and you do not
23:07
want to be the reason that everyone has
23:09
to get up and out of the room because
23:11
something something went off in your
23:13
system it's it's very you know it's it's
23:18
part of that preparation right and part
23:20
of that professionalism and if that
23:23
happens to you it's embarrassing you can
23:24
move on from it but you will forever be
23:26
known as the guy who like bombed the car
23:28
the conference room and that's not what
23:30
you want you want to actually have
23:32
yourself in a situation where you are
23:34
calm and professional an hour ahead of
23:38
not with anybody else here I was going
23:41
through each of my slides all of my
23:43
content making sure that all of my
23:45
animations were what I wanted them to be
23:47
my major my clicker was charged I made
23:51
sure that all of these kind of little
23:53
finer points that I wanted to talk about
23:55
where really thought through if you
23:58
actually look at how many bullet points
23:59
I have versus how many things I'm
24:01
talking about there's a big discrepancy
24:05
as they're not right I'm not just
24:07
talking through the slides I'm talking
24:09
about the slides and you know that's
24:13
that's a that's another component that
24:16
gets missed and it's the day of just
24:19
making sure that you're just all there
24:21
and aligned any last minute final
24:23
touches same thing that you would do say
24:26
a week before you're about to ship a new
24:28
feature right you go through you make
24:31
every little bug every little thing that
24:33
you can possibly get to has been kind of
24:35
taken care of finessed made a little bit
24:38
prettier made a little bit nicer or
24:40
maybe I'm just a weirdo who's a little
24:42
bit too much of a perfectionist and I do
24:43
that but hopefully you do that too and
24:46
then that you've gotten feedback so that
24:51
same person identified you probably too
24:55
you know goes through their whole
24:56
presentation ten times they did it by
25:01
themselves that's not very helpful are
25:05
you presenting to no one
25:08
no you're presenting to a group of
25:10
people right so you need to actually
25:14
have active feedback from somebody
25:16
somebody in this case can be in just an
25:20
and sometimes that audience of one can
25:22
be a toddler because they have similar
25:24
attention spans to adults to anyway and
25:26
if if you think about that if you can
25:30
get them to pay attention for an hour
25:32
there's no way that you can have
25:34
problems with adults paying attention to
25:36
you for 30-40 minutes kind of regardless
25:39
an audience of one is still an audience
25:42
and it's always important to get that
25:44
feedback there are great groups that you
25:47
might have in your local area or even
25:49
within your own company to help you in
25:51
this regard one thing that we have
25:53
inside of Nike to throw something out
25:55
there is we actually have a group
25:57
meeting once a month with all of the
25:60
Android developers and there is a
26:01
presentation given internally by
26:03
somebody on the end on the Android teams
26:06
that we have and it's really cool it
26:09
helps people get a lot of good feedback
26:11
and it's also helped in expanding those
26:14
people to feel confident in their
26:15
content in order to bring it to the
26:17
local community or even further
26:21
so kind of final thoughts here I talked
26:26
about that idea and that purpose in the
26:27
beginning but it as we go through this
26:30
what you realize is you've been telling
26:33
a story you could be telling the story
26:35
of a product you'll be telling the story
26:38
of yourself but you want to have an idea
26:41
you want to explore that idea or have
26:43
that have that hero go on a quest and
26:46
tell them how you got to the end right
26:49
where you finally captured the the
26:51
golden sword and and defeated the dragon
26:54
and and moved through and had that kind
26:57
of congratulatory end you're telling a
26:59
story even if it's a technical -
27:01
presentation the audience is on your
27:06
side the audience wants you to succeed
27:08
that's why they're there right they want
27:12
you to actually present them their
27:13
information that they need or want and
27:16
they want it to be you know good and
27:19
they want you to do well in the future
27:24
I've definitely messed up a lot I
27:28
continue to mess up it's how we get
27:31
better it's how we progress if polar
27:35
requests are any indication you know
27:38
yeah you know most of mine like just fly
27:42
through now like with maybe one or two
27:45
small comments on a name or something
27:46
like that but when you think about
27:48
earlier in your career you may have seen
27:51
like two pages of PR comments right like
27:54
you saw well you should really think
27:57
about doing this like the architecture
27:59
that we have set up in this core module
28:01
XYZ and and all of that kind of stuff so
28:04
no one's perfect you just get better
28:07
over time and part of that is experience
28:10
more experience equals more better and
28:12
that is purposely said that way because
28:16
you both improve but again that doesn't
28:20
necessarily mean that you improve to
28:23
perfection right you're just getting
28:25
more better it's I just like that saying
28:31
and if I had a mic right now that I
28:35
didn't have to worry about the person
28:36
behind they're getting really mad at me
28:38
I totally drop it right now
28:41
but this was not a great talk but it's
28:47
mine and it's written quickly so here
28:52
are some great resources that will
28:55
actually you know kind of inform other
28:58
areas that I talked about earlier in
28:59
this talk the talk about talking talk
29:03
embrace the remix Anita Singh also did a
29:08
great one on terrified of speaking at a
29:10
conference and why you should quote ted
29:14
secret to great public speaking and
29:16
another one on great places to learn
29:19
public speaking skills that are already
29:21
in your community and with that thank
29:26
you and i here are the slides and there
29:32
is a survey that i really appreciate if
29:35
you could actually fill out and just
29:38
some information about me and feel free
29:40
to contact me at any time
