Jarrod Shapiro, DPM
Practice Perfect Editor
Assistant Professor,
Dept. of Podiatric Medicine,
Surgery & Biomechanics
College of Podiatric Medicine
Western University of
Health Sciences,
St. Pomona, CA

Paint Me a Picture –
What makes a good lecture?

This week, I’m writing to you from sunny Denver, Colorado. Ha! Just kidding. It’s actually snowing and cold here in Denver, where I am attending the “Spring” Symposium on Advanced Wound Care, though you’d never know it’s spring here. Clearly, living in Southern California has thinned out my blood. When I lived in Michigan, I used to laugh at the weaklings from the west coast who were so cold when they came to conferences in the mid-West. Now who’s laughing?

Presentation Despite my poor cold tolerance, I am enjoying Denver and the SAWC Conference. The downtown area is beautifully planned for tourists, and, most importantly, there are a lot of places to eat. My belly is about to pop!

The one thing I haven’t learned to enjoy yet is a boring lecture. Now, I just got done listening to a talk by a highly regarded, well-known leader in the wound care world, but I should say I just got done trying desperately to stay awake. Unfortunately, I just didn’t learn much from this luminary of the profession. This brings me to the point of today’s Practice Perfect: lecturing. What makes a good lecture? What makes a bad one? What do I do with Power Point?

Normally this is the point where I give some kind of disclaimer saying I’m not the world’s expert in X or Y. This time, though, I can speak from at least a little experience. As an assistant professor at the Western University College of Podiatric Medicine, I’ve done A LOT of lectures over the past almost 3 years. I’ve also had the opportunity to see a large number of students give lectures (always fun) as well as many faculty members of various years of experience. With this in mind, I can easily speak with some authority on the subject.

Tonight's Premier Lecture is
A Primer on Posterior Tibial Tendon Dsyfuntion?
Ryan Fitzgerald, DPM

Nuts and Bolts of a Good Powerpoint Presentation

With that said, let’s get past the basics first and then move on to the fun stuff. Yes, it’s OK to use Power Point to create lectures. There are some cautions with this program that we’ll get to shortly, but here are some suggestions for putting together effective slides.

Keep it simple. Stay away from all the bells, whistles, and crashing car sounds, as well as the flying-in and spinning graphics. They simply detract from the presentation. The same is true for transitions between slides.
Ideas. Have just one major topic per slide. Don’t crowd one slide with a bunch of ideas. All of them will get lost in the jumble.
Background. The background should allow for contrast with the text. A moderate shade of blue with yellow letters, for example, is easy to read.
Font. Use 28-32 point font for the headline, centered on the slide, and 24 point for the body text. Use a font that is sans serif. The serif is the small bar on the tops of certain letters and will make the text harder to read. Arial and Helvetica are examples.
Don’t use ALL CAPITALS. We are trained to read capital letters as independent and if a word is in all capitals, then it slows down our reading and your viewers will pay less attention.
Text. The less the better. Use bullet phrases or individual words. The number of bullets and words varies with some experts recommending no more than 6 bullets and 6 words/bullet while others suggest a more spartan 3 bullets. I tend to fall on the 3-4 bullets side. If you have more to say, then split the slide into two.
Pictures. Put the picture on the left and the text on the right. Keep the picture-to-text relationship simple. The picture should reinforce and NOT distract from the point of the lecture or the slide.
Graphs, charts, and pathways. Keep them very simple. Audiences are easily overwhelmed by highly detailed and cumbersome graphs. I’ve heard speakers say something like, “I don’t want you to read this slide, but….” If you didn’t want me to read the slide, then why did you put all that junk on it?
Learn how to use the various Power Point modes before you lecture. It’s annoying for an audience to watch someone fumble around with the buttons trying to figure out how to start the presentation mode. Know before you go.

Lecture Successfully

Public speaking is not easy, but with some preparation and practice, everything will go well Now that we’ve gotten the mechanics out of the way, let’s talk about actually giving an interesting lecture. First, consider the one most important thing. The audience has come to see YOU speak. That means a couple of things. Engage the audience. Speak to them, not at them. Have a conversation. Vary your tone and pace of speech. Do not bea monotonous, boring speaker. The droning puts audiences to sleep. Do not, I’ll repeat, do not read from your Power Point slides. Remember how I said to keep them simple? The slides are supposed to be a supplement to YOU. You are not there to read the slides to the audience. If that were the case, then why would you be necessary? You could just as easily have passed out the printed version. You are the expert, and the slides are simply there for emphasis. Its is OK to be prompted by the slides, as if it is an outline. But resist the temptation to read them.

Second, for those of you who don’t give lectures often, practice. Practice your timing, practice speaking out loud, practice NOT looking much at your slides. Practice anything you think you need to practice. Practice also means doing as many lectures as you can. Almost no one is born with the innate ability to lecture. It’s a skill that is built with time and experience.

Third, make your lecture interesting. Sometimes, depending on the topic, it’s not possible. But there’s usually some way to engage the audience. When I give a technical podium-type lecture, I try to make some kind of argument or take a position on a subject instead of providing a book-report. For example, I once gave a lecture arguing that all 5th metatarsal Jones fractures should be treated surgically. This was my framework for discussing all of the pertinent topics involved such as anatomy, fixation methods, and the surgical literature. Alternatively, you might use patient case studies as a way to make the topic more personal.

Fourth, get out from behind the podium. It’s just a crutch. If you’re speaking at a conference where they are videotaping lecturers, then you might not have a choice. But in all other instances, walk around. Move. Be interesting.

Fifth, bring some water. Speaking causes the mouth to dry out. Coupled with nerves, this may make it more difficult to speak. It’s OK to pause for a couple of seconds for a drink. Just try to be smooth about it. Don’t follow Senator Marco Rubio’s example from his recent State of the Union Rebuttal, where he licked his dry mouth repeatedly and then at the most inopportune moment, gulped a bottle of water. It was an unfortunate move that drew attention away from the content – and gave gleeful reporters something to talk about for weeks.

Sixth, try to enjoy yourself (or at least make it look like you’re enjoying yourself). Public speaking is very stressful for some, but make it look like you are comfortable, even if you have to fake it. Breath. Relax. Speak clearly. Be confident. You know your stuff. You’re prepared. Look like you’re nervous, and everyone will know. Look like you’re confident, and no one will know just how nervous you are.

Public speaking is not easy, but with some preparation and practice everything will go well. When I watch a lecture, I want to be entertained, just as if I’m watching a movie. I want my speaker to guide me through a subject and keep my interest. I don’t want to read slides or struggle to understand impossibly tiny graphs. I want you to paint me a picture, so when I walk away from your lecture, my personal or professional life is that much more enriched. Best wishes on your next lecture.