The White Rabbit

Baldwin Berges, an advisor for the European Commission and the Islamic Development Bank, talks about doing business in emerging markets. In particular for us presentation-related folks, he talks about some of his tips and tricks for researching your audience, and a couple top-level frameworks you can use for understanding a group's dynamics.

Guest Brad Farris dives into how presence saves time. Often, we humans tend to think being present costs time. But listen up as Brad goes into how it can help you solve problems faster and have more time on your hands at the same time (no pun intended).

Our guest Luka Krejci, a presentation trainer from Croatia, talks about presentation training in general and his new book Presentation Cookbook in particular. Also, Matt and Alper focus on different aspects of the view outside Luka's office window.

Alper dives into an episode we did recently with Alex Smith, applying Alex's principles of strategy to the world of presentations.

Matt and Alper riff on a couple comments from recent guests, to the extent of us humans being less rational than we like to think we are, and what can we do about that, if anything.

Selim Selveroğlu, a product manager for Dell, goes into the "Me First" vs "Connection First" communications strategies framework, and some of the ways he trains people on how that framework can help them improve their communication.

Şebnem Dağ Güven goes into the importance of storytelling in sales and how she goes about training her people in that skill.

Alex Smith of basicarts.org talks about the two stories every company needs, and how important having a well-defined strategy is before making them.

In today's episode, Rick Pizzoli returns with valuable suggestions for startup companies who are moving from founder-led sales to a more professional sales team. Even if you're not in this startup demographic, there are some great learnings coming out of this episode about how the sales transition is going to affect your organization.

This episode's guest is Rick Pizzoli, the CEO of Sales Force Europe. Rick goes into things like what prompts a company to want to sell abroad, how to get your employees and investors on board, and some of the nuts and bolts of selling into the EU specifically.

Alper goes into the three mistakes he sees people making all the time. Learn what these are, don't make them, and you'll be ahead of half the game.

Yalın Yüregil goes into various aspects of selling into another country, specifically the importance of addressing operational issues you think you already figured out, adjusting your expectations, staying away from the all-to-common mindset of "it works here, so it will work there too," and the legacy experiences of your buyers.

Matt goes into what he took away, from a recent interview, about building trust. He touches on commitment (hat tip to Robert Cialdini, someone Matt and Alper both have mixed feelings about), how to build trust into a pitchdeck, the importance of describing the problem and its role in building trust, and a couple studies he found that looked into what parts of the body are involved in the building of trust.

Vlad Cazan, co-founder of Romania's KFactory, goes into his company's efforts to sell in other countries, particularly into the UK. In particular, he goes into the importance of patience and preparation, and what to do when you don't have any connections in the target country yet. Vlad also mentions the importance of, when considering what countries to target first, to ask yourself which ones are most open to doing business with a partner outside the country. Like some of our previous guests, Vlad also mentions that your star employees back home might not be your star employees in the new country.

Bertay Fişekçi, employee engagement expert extraordinaire, goes into his public speaking journey, starting with what initially prompted him to work on that skill, how he got past initial fears once he started down that road, and how it helps him in his daily life now.

Matt and Alper blow out the carbon (a phrase an old family friend of Matt's used to use to mean taking an old car out on the highway for some exercise). In this case, that means they cover a couple miscellaneous pieces of business. Matt is considering updating a staple of his trainings, The Four Things, and Alper discusses a video he recorded recently where he takes a side on the "visualize the positive" vs "prepare for the worst" debate.

In this episode Matt interviews Alper on other ways into angel investing. Matt has a dream that we can provide a service and magically become part owners of, say, Microsoft, but Alper squashes that dream, saying that yes, some actual money is probably going to be needed. But don't worry, if all you want is to brag to your friends over a beer, you can probably get in for not much, but you're probably going to get, well, not much.

Brad Farris returns to the podcast to describe a pivotal moment in the emotional regulation of how you show up for any communication event, be it a presentation or an employee's performance review. Matt plays the guinea pig (in other words, test subject), providing the disastrous subject matter Brad uses to troubleshoot and advise. This episode is perfect for anyone who wants to make sure the right person shows up for that crucial communication event.

In this episode, Melda Sofuoğlu, a former client of Matt's, goes into what she has picked up over the years in the presentation world. Also, Melda, having worked in multiple countries, weighs in on the age-old question: Is presenting less data on a slide a culture-specific thing, or is it universal?        

In this, the 100th episode of The White Rabbit, Matt and Alper talk about what has changed in the world of presentations over the past two years. In particular, what they keep coming back to is that the magic only appears when you show up regularly, and the possibility that others won't get what you were talking about, and don't take that too personally, sometimes you just need to let go.    

Following a recent episode, where Matt posed a question to Alper in binary terms, Alper digs deeper into the potential problems associated with any binary approach. Alper points out a recent Netflix documentary that provides an excellent view into what can go wrong if the presenter gets pig-headed, and instead of changing tack, ignores the signs and plows ahead with the plan anyway. Anyone uncomfortable with the presence of unknowns needs to listen to this episode.    

Matt asks Alper for his opinion on two perspectives, which Matt soon realizes sound opposite but are actually not, and Alper offers up a third perspective. If you've ever wondered who the most valuable person in the room is, this episode is for you.              

Alper compares PowerPoint, Keynote, Google Slides, and Canva. Each has its pros and cons, and Alper does his best to stay diplomatic and acknowledge that.  Listen in on this one if you want to hear a pro weigh in on the "should I export or not" question.    

Matt and Alper dig further into an article Alper wrote recently about how the beliefs and mindsets we carry around make it hard to present well. Interestingly, many of these scripts that run in the backs of our heads are useful elsewhere in other contexts, but can get in the way too!    

In this episode, economist Zombor Berezvai goes into the importance of telling stories, even when presenting to academic audiences. You'd think that academic audiences would be fine with the unprocessed presentation of data, but as Zombor reminds us, even those groups prefer the data be presented with a story that makes sense of it.   Zombor's LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zomborberezvai  

In this episode, Berk Temuroğlu goes further into organizational changes as a startup's sales base expands to other markets. In particular, how the company's investor base will evolve, how the new investors can help the company, the inevitability of a culture clash during the expansion, and more.

Berk Temuroğlu, in the first part of his repeat guest visit, goes into what challenges a startup, having conquered the world of domestic sales, typically faces when launching into the challenging world of international sales. In this episode, Berk talks about who to choose to lead the expansion, what he calls "the wheel of engagement," weathering the period of boredom, the inevitable evolution of the organization, etc.  

In this episode, Matt goes into three of the constraints he often puts his clients into. Sometimes the best way to cut is to subject yourself and your presentation to artificial constraints. In real life, you won't have to meet these artificial constraints, but if you're at 39 minutes and you have to cut it to 20 minutes, maybe top-down (39, 38, 37, etc, on down to 20) won't work. Maybe what you need to do is subject it to artificial constraints. The use of these artificial constraints forces a message discipline that you just don't get with the 45-minute format.      

This goes out to all the people out there in their mid-30s who say "My technical skills got me where I am now, so they'll be enough to keep me going." If that's you, you're absolutely correct about the first part, your technical wizardry, and your development of it, worked great for the first 10 years of your career.  But over the next few years of your career, you'll see your technical skills become table stakes, and the promotions will go overwhelmingly to the people with technical skills AND communication and presentation skills. Welcome to life after 35.

A couple weeks ago, Alper went into the spiritual side of the business for him. Today we turn the tables on Matt and make him explain the spiritual side from his perspective, and it has to do with bringing peace to others, but not in the way that phrase is usually used.

Berk Temuroğlu goes into corporate managers adopting a founder mindset (and vice versa), the importance of integrating the problem/solution cycle into your communications, and including risk in the ROI calculation. Berk, being that he has one foot in the startup world and another foot in the corporate world, points out that startup founders have, in recent years, become pretty good at describing the problem, but that this skill is all too often lacking in the corporate world these days. In his words, we tend to "fall in love" with our solution so much that we neglect to give adequate time to the description of the problem. Also, the way you frame the problem will change according to the audience. It's the same problem, but framed differently. You are basically, as Berk says, a movie director.              

Alper expounds on a more spiritual way of looking at presenting. Who would have thought Rumi would come up in a conversation about presentations? And yet in this episode, he does. Warning: The phrases "existential" and "serving others" come up in this episode, so be careful with this episode if presenting is nothing more to you than firing up PowerPoint and cranking out some slides.        

In this episode, Max Traylor, consultant to consultants, goes into ways creative businesses can productize their services, other than designing templates and selling them on Canva. One of the core points he makes is the importance of looking at your process, and the value in productizing your process, not just your output. Also, another interesting point he brings up is that consulting is like the kid's game Chutes And Ladders.  

In this episode, Memet Yazici, who runs a private investment advisory service, goes into a key part of the investment process, the management meeting, and in particular how the audience expectations are different in a meeting with venture capital people compared to a meeting with private equity people. For our listeners who are not in the investment world: This episode is about more than a step in the investment process, it is a reminder that audiences that might seem to be very similar at first can actually be radically different. Even if we think we understand the audience, we might be completely wrong.    

Matt and Alper debunk the 93% myth as it has been misapplied to communication, and give some alternatives about what key skills are needed instead. And who would have thought that drywall anchor bolts had something to do with presentations. In this episode, we learn that there is, in fact, a connection.        

Matt and Alper wish a Happy New Year to those celebrating, shoot down the idea of organizing this into seasons (after all, it's a podcast, not a TV series), and go into preparing for a non-linear presentation. For all of you who were hoping our recent discussions of non-linear presentations were excusing you from the need to prepare, sorry, they're not. 

You know the feeling. The palms are sweating, the temples are wet, the mouth is dry. Is it a heart attack, or is it just an old-fashioned case of the jitters? In this episode, Matt and Alper lay into the misconception that nervousness is always bad, that it should be stamped out completely wherever it appears. So grab a glass of water for that cotton mouth, kick back in a nice comfy chair, and learn why sometimes nervousness is perfectly okay. BTW, in this episode, you'll hear that sometimes Matt and Alper hit their marks on the first take, but sometimes they, too, mess up. ;-)

Inspired by a recent guest's comment, Matt and Alper dig into Alper's patented 4-step process for presenting bad news, not just bad news to the board, but bad news to pretty much any audience. The four steps are: 1. State the obvious (be upfront about the problem); 2. Tell them why you believe this happened; 3. Tell them what next steps you will be taking; 4. Give them a timeline. Anybody who needs to break some negative news to someone else (and who amongst us hasn't been in that boat at some point) should listen to this episode.      

In this episode, agency coach Brad Farris goes into the big picture of what a speaker is going through. Interestingly, he sees nervousness as not entirely a bad thing. He also goes into making mirror neurons work for you, how audience agreement doesn't necessarily mean everyone thinks like you do about something, and how to go about presenting bad news.

Today we talk about pitching to procurement. It's a department feared by many, and with a reputation for commoditizing all who appear before it, but Ebru reminds us that the procurement department is staffed by regular folks just like the rest of us, and the department is nothing to be feared. This episode is filled with ways to build a relationship with a company's procurement department so that when the price negotiation time comes, you'll be standing on better ground.    

Matt and Alper go into one of Matt's favorite phrases, "Kill your darlings," including how to implement it, why it won't make your audience think you're stupid and simple, what it means for slide design, and more. A hot tip: It's an alternative, easier, "back door" way to achieve a potentially difficult and nerve-wracking style they've discussed in the past, the non-linear presentation.

Jonathan Stark guests on the podcast again, this time to tell us how to have a conversation that will uncover the real reason the client has called you in. Jonathan outlines the three specific questions to ask, plus why it's so important to just sit there for a bit and let the client do the "brain dump." Also, the value of trying to talk them out of hiring you, and why they're unlikely to think, "Well, now that you mention it, actually, we don't need you."

In this episode, guest Jonathan Stark, the king of not billing hourly, goes into how he came to the realization that hourly billing is a huge mistake, how hourly rates are actually "corrosive" to your relationship with your client, and how moving past them ushers in a huge mindset change.  Also, dear listeners, feel no inadequacy. Notice that Jonathan mentions he started this process in 2006, so he has been at it for years. Don't think you have to wake up tomorrow and be the world's most perfect and thorough implementer of all things not hourly. It's a process with numerous intermediate steps, and it might take you a while. That's fine.

Alper riffs on a subject a guest brought up recently, that maybe the pushback you get during your presentation isn't about you, it is legitimate questions about your idea. We tend to take things personally (after all, we're human, at least most of us), but as Alper says, it's "crucial" to separate pushback related to you from pushback related to your idea, and to not get caught in the trap of feeling the need to justify yourself.

This week business owner and industry organization board member Ebru Demirel goes into how to present an idea to a company or organization. In particular, she talks about the need for transparency, the willingness to discuss the downside risks of an idea, the importance of training and preparation, and the value, for the leaders being pitched to, of making rapid decisions.        

Almost every slide designer has heard the phrase, "But we can get this done in [insert country here] for a fraction of the price. Slide designers aren't alone in feeling this pressure. So in the interests of hearing how another industry deals with this, today we talk to business coach Geraldine Carter to find out what Certified Public Accountants are doing about it.        

On the docket for today, measuring the efficacy of a presentation. Can it be done? Our answer: Yes. Actually, it's not so simple. Matt not-so-secretly suspects that the presentation itself has no value, and Alper suspects that it does. 

Matt and Alper revisit the low-hanging fruit, the clients' perennial favorite question: "I have a surprise presentation coming up in a few minutes, what are the quick things I should do first to get the biggest part of the improvement?" Hint: They are: 1. Answer the Three Questions, 2. Follow a simple story structure like "man in hole," 3. Make sure your headlines match your message, and 4. Use the "build" animation. And just to confirm, no actual horses were harmed in the making of this podcast.    

Amidst all the solopreneur emphasis on the need to niche one's business, Matt mentions that his favorite clients, by far, are the ones who, months later, have evolved to something that has absolutely nothing to do with his niche. He highly recommends that the other solopreneurs out there follow the niching literature and consider niching a vital survival technique, but he urges them to, at the same time, be open to the idea that some of their favorite clients won't fit into that niche at all.

Alper goes into the traits he sees making for a successful client. They are 1. Recognizing the power of exceptional communications, 2. Understanding that this is not an overnight process, 3. Recognizing the fine line between persuasion and fit, and 4. Understanding that a "no" today is not a "no" forever. Also, if someone knows how much a Lear Jet costs or what goes in a Mai Tai, please let us know.    

Matt describes what he sees as the three traits of clients who get the most out of the training. The traits are: 1. A history of serial problem solving, 2. A frustration coming from one of life's slaps in the face, and 3. The fear of god (an external force that makes them want to solve the problem that #2 brought to the forefront).