{"id":3647,"date":"2024-04-13T13:33:50","date_gmt":"2024-04-13T19:33:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/?p=3647"},"modified":"2024-04-13T13:34:01","modified_gmt":"2024-04-13T19:34:01","slug":"talk-checklist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/archives\/3647","title":{"rendered":"Tech talk checklist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When you do a software related talk at a conference or a meetup, there are lots of things to consider.<\/p>\n<p>This is a checklist so that next time I do a talk, I have something to reference.<\/p>\n<p>My target audience is technical folks at meetups and conferences where the audience size is 5ish to 100ish. I&#8217;m sure things change as audience size and content types do.<\/p>\n<h3>Slide content<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Have a QR code for slides<\/li>\n<li>Have a QR code for any other action you want\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;Apply for a job with us&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Try our software&#8221;<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Read our content&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>End on QR code slides and include &#8220;thanks&#8221; and contact info<\/li>\n<li>Have a resources slide with more info<\/li>\n<li>Display your twitter\/social handle on every slide in the corner<\/li>\n<li>The infamous about me slide\n<ul>\n<li>Make it quick (&gt; 1 min)<\/li>\n<li>Even &#8220;who cares&#8221;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Have a conclusion slide just before the QR code\/Thanks slide<\/li>\n<li>Ranking of content (all other things being equal)\n<ul>\n<li>Fewer words is better than more words<\/li>\n<li>Pictures or memes are better than words<\/li>\n<li>Animated diagrams are better than pictures\n<ul>\n<li>Easy implementation: have multiple slides that you arrow through<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Demos are better than animated diagrams<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Audiences are forgiving of demos, but you can always record a video for backup if the stakes are too high<\/li>\n<li>Make code big enough to read\n<ul>\n<li>Including if you are displaying it from your IDE<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Highlight important code bits with color<\/li>\n<li>Add code to liberally licensed repo\n<ul>\n<li>Include on the resources slide<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>If presentation is long, break into sections and have section nav on the main section pages to orient audience<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t be afraid of too many slides\n<ul>\n<li>Be afraid of people reading your slides<\/li>\n<li>Be afraid of boring people<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Delivery<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Sections of audience won&#8217;t be paying attention\n<ul>\n<li>Focus on those who are<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Remember that you are the expert and people want you to succeed<\/li>\n<li>Pause for questions\n<ul>\n<li>Include a slide or time at the end<\/li>\n<li>Incorporate answers into talk if you get them regularly<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Be good about time limit\n<ul>\n<li>Practice<\/li>\n<li>Cut stuff in the middle (questions, other sections) to get to conclusion<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Prep\/Followup<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Promote on socials (schedule it)\n<ul>\n<li>2-3 weeks out<\/li>\n<li>2-3 days out<\/li>\n<li>same day<\/li>\n<li>after (include slides)<\/li>\n<li>Tag the organizer or conference\/meetup if you can<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t plan on doing anything intense the hour or so before your talk<\/li>\n<li>Download a PDF of your presentation in case you don&#8217;t have internet<\/li>\n<li>Get to the presentation room at least 15 minutes ahead of time<\/li>\n<li>Test AV connections including mic if needed<\/li>\n<li>Bring your power cord for your computer<\/li>\n<li>Connect to people who attended talk if they send a request<\/li>\n<li>After talk, hang out for a bit if you have time, to chat with folks. Many won&#8217;t ask questions during talk, but will after.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I&#8217;ll plan to add more to this as I think of it, but this is a good starting checklist for me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When you do a software related talk at a conference or a meetup, there are lots of things to consider. This is a checklist so that next time I do [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[91,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3647","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-devrel","category-presentations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3647"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3647\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3650,"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3647\/revisions\/3650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mooreds.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}