GENERAL PRESENTATION RESOURCES

There are a number of competing approaches to presentations that are worth mentioning.

• Perhaps the most influential figure in presentations is Garr Reynolds. His blog is at www.prezentationzen.com. In 2006, I started to learn about presentations from this blog. “Death by PowerPoint” was mostly a compilation of Garr's ideas put in a sequence and visualized. Since I started reading his blog, Garr has written three books: Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery (storytellingand slides), Presentation Zen Design: Simple Design Principles and Techniques to Enhance Your Presentations (slide design), and The Naked Presenter: Delivering Powerful Presentations With or Without Slides (delivery). If you don't have any of the Garr's books, get the first one. It's the industry's bible.
• Next comes Beyond Bullet Points: Using Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007 to Create Presentations That Inform, Motivate, and Inspire by Cliff Atkinson. This was the first book on presentations that I ever read. It was first published in 2005 and later updated; make sure you get the latest edition. As the name suggests, the best part of the book is about slides, but it also covers some basic aspects of storytelling and delivery. At the time I first read this the main advantage of this book for me was the abundance of useful PowerPoint tips; Microsoft Press published this book.
• Finally, another approach is Dr. Andrew Abela's 10-step extreme presentation method. His book is called Advanced Presentations by Design: Creating Communication that Drives Action. It doesn't cover delivery, only slides and structure. It is extremely thorough, detailed, and step-by-step; it contains worksheets, sample layouts, and more.

Next, I deal specifically with storytelling, slides, and delivery, one by one.