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Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

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Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#61

Post by abritinthebay »

Step 1 - write a talk. Or several. Aim for 20mins. That’ll do to start.

Step 2 - present at a company meeting or local meetup. Take notes on what works & what doesn’t.

Step 3 - repeat until you feel confident that you’re comfortable doing this. You’ll start to find your voice and beats that work. Can be the same talk at different places but I suggest a couple just to mix it up for you.

Step 4 - submit proposals to conferences. Start local if possible, smaller is a good way to start with (less competition).

See step 3 :)

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#62

Post by mburst »

I think the secret is just to apply. You'd be surprised how few people apply to give tech talks at conferences, especially local oriented ones. If you want to give talks at more major conferences I've found it helps to have some sort of public profile about your topic.

In my case I used to blog a ton and one of my blog posts was about doing realtime processing with Django (before it was built in to the framework). So I submitted a short proposal for Djangocon and ended up getting selected to give a 3 hour tutorial talk. It was definitely a bit scary having my first major talk be 3 hours long, but as long as you know your topic pretty well you'll do great!

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#63

Post by yarrel »

* Practice in private. Practice, practice, practice. People will tell you that you can over-practice a talk, and that's true, but it's not true the first time you're giving a talk. Or the third.

* Practice recovering when you lose your thread. The difference between amateurs and professionals isn't that professionals don't make mistakes, it's that they recover from them without it affecting the rest of their performance.

* Learn how to trick your brain into thinking that fear is excitement. You don't have to be able to do it very long, just the ten seconds before you're about to start, but it makes all the difference.

* Talk about something you know inside out. This helps with confidence, with recovering from losing your thread, and with answering questions.

* Keep it short and sweet (if people are interested they will ask questions), but remember that you'll talk faster on stage.

* Learn to periodically check your speaking speed, to pace yourself, and slow down when needed.

* Find a slide style you are comfortable standing in front of when it is projected. I know, I know, but it does make a difference.

* Ignore any advice that doesn't work for you.

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#64

Post by Rudism »

pmarreck wrote: post #59
alanfranz wrote: post #8

1) Start small. Start in your company. Then go to local user groups (LUG, universities, etc). Then submit applications to small/local tech conferences, then go on to large ones. 2) Read something about the topic, e.g: https://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Public-Speaker-Scott-Berk... (there're tons of other books and resources, I won't provide everything here) 3) Speak about something you know very well. 4) Reharse. One…

What about confronting crowd fear? I think I was scarred by my first presentation ever at the age of 12 (on DNA) in front of not 1 but 2 classes full of people, because I basically stuttered through the entire thing (speaking to 1 person- Fine. Speaking to 5 people- Fine. Speaking to 10 people- Mostly fine. Speaking to 30+ people- NOT FINE. lol). I took a public speaking class in college and they videotaped us while…

The only way to really get over the fear is through regular exposure. Finding a local public speaking meetup or Toastmasters group is a great way to practice and build up your confidence.

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#65

Post by altonzheng »

yarrel wrote: post #63

* Practice in private. Practice, practice, practice. People will tell you that you can over-practice a talk, and that's true, but it's not true the first time you're giving a talk. Or the third. * Practice recovering when you lose your thread. The difference between amateurs and professionals isn't that professionals don't make mistakes, it's that they recover from them without it affecting the rest of their performa…

Great advice.

> Learn how to trick your brain into thinking that fear is excitement. You don't have to be able to do it very long, just the ten seconds before you're about to start, but it makes all the difference.

I would say that fear and excitement are actually the same underlying emotion, just interpreted differently. So it's less about tricking yourself than it is just making a cognitive decision.

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#66

Post by cripblip »

alanfranz wrote: post #8

1) Start small. Start in your company. Then go to local user groups (LUG, universities, etc). Then submit applications to small/local tech conferences, then go on to large ones. 2) Read something about the topic, e.g: https://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Public-Speaker-Scott-Berk... (there're tons of other books and resources, I won't provide everything here) 3) Speak about something you know very well. 4) Reharse. One…

Preparation for me:

- note all the key points you want to make, collate into groups, these become slides

- generate slides, focus on diagram not text, you are going to speak the text. Ensure a key is present if necessary

- if the diagrams are complex, do a flick book : generate the final picture and duplicate the slide subtracting content working backwards, you will end up with lots of slides but they print cleanly stand alone and are clear

- print the slides . Write notes along side them, repeat repeat repeat, distill into the following per slide:

3 intro points

3 content points

3 summary points

And most importantly .. a lead into the next slide; these become your notes

-give the talk, the notes slides are your anchors, you can easily glance down to remember where you are if you are lost, giving the 3 summary points builds your confidence along the way, and the link to the next slide keeps everything flowing nicely

- if you are nervous. Get a plant in the audience to ask you an easy question on the 2nd or 3rd content slide, I calm down immediately if I get a question I can answer early on

Good luck !

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#68

Post by lprubin »

diegoperini wrote: post #31

Everything many people said here + RECORD YOUR TALK and watch a few times with a paper and pen to note things you don't like. Things to look for are: * Disturbing pauses * Unnecessarily long sentences * Too little jokes * Too much jokes * Repetitions (this is actually really hard to do, people tend to think every single phrase has its own unique meaning, but actually...) * Slides hard to read from afar * Slides with…

I completely agree with recording yourself. By recording a trial run you'll also get good practice being nervous. Just turning the camera on you helps to simulate the stress of talking in front of a crowd.

Re: Ask HN: How do you start giving tech talks?

#70

Post by JefeChulo »

I think you're asking more along the lines of how do you get people interested in what you have to say. Of course you could just look up public speaking techniques instead of asking here, which is why I assume that's not what you're asking.

In order to be a successful public speaker, you need credentials. You should start by having a good position in a successful company. This adds a lot to your credentials. You could also write research papers, or books. Have a successful blog, etc.

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