This is a great talk on how to give engaging tech talks. Ben Orenstein demonstrates how to engage your audience through a series of lightning talks.

Main Argument

It is more important to be entertaining than informative. You want people to enjoy and remember your talk.

He gives tons of tips-

• Hit people with the thesis right away
• Throw something weird at them
• Good default language for talks (hold your hands out, rather than crossing your arms)
• To reduce anxiety in advance, practice "power poses" in advance - acting confident makes you feel confident.
• To work with anxiety during the delivery, scan for a "nodder" in the audience and make eye contact periodically - pretend you're giving the talk to this person
• Good information with unenthusiastic delivery bores people - pick topics you care about
• Avoid - "Sorry you can't see this from the back" - check the slides from the back of the room in advance
• Don't apologize in advance to set expectations low
• Don't be afraid of dead sound - if you ask for questions, people need a few seconds to think
• Take a listening pose while waiting for questions
• Speaking in a small, but packed room is high energy compared, but a big room that is half full will feel low energy

Discussion Questions

Have you found any tips that improved your talks?

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