Microsoft’s new Surface tablet has been met with some mixed, but generally favorable reviews. The New York Times product reviewer, David Pogue, calls the operating system “smooth, beautiful, and fun to use.” A blogger for the technology Web site, The Verge, said Surface is an “exciting piece of hardware and extremely well-designed.” The Verge also shined the spotlight on the leader of the Surface team, Microsoft’s Panos Panay. Verge blogger Vlad Savov tweeted, “Panos Panay is by far Microsoft’s best presenter. He’s excellent, should be running every keynote.”
Savov’s tweet caught my attention, as did this tweet by TIME technology editor, Harry McCracken: “Panos Panay has about 10,000% more passion than the average product guy.” I’ve never seen Panay give a presentation so I watched the streamed video. I agree with the bloggers. Panay is excellent and one of the best corporate presenters I’ve seen in a long time. Here’s what Panay does well and what you can learn from him.
Share your passion. Energy and passion go hand-in-hand. You cannot have one without the other. If you’re passionate about your product, you will have energy and enthusiasm when you take the stage. Panay has passion for his product and it’s clear he’s enthusiastic both onstage and off. Microsoft president of Windows, Steven Sinofsky, introduced Panay and said, “Passion is the word that fits the product and the team.” Panay took the stage right after Sinofsky showed the new Surface commercial. Panay commented, “Super cool. I love that commercial. It’s something I adore. Look at those girls and how intense they dance. It’s one of my favorite parts of that thing.” Right out of the gate Panay connected with the audience by expressing his passion for his brand. Passion is contagious and it starts with the team leader. As leader of the Surface team, Panay leads the way.
Expressive body language. Panay uses a lot of natural and genuine hand gestures. Hand gestures are good. Great speakers use more hand gestures than average. A professor I once talked to at the University of Chicago said complex hand gestures reflect complex thinking. Hand gestures actually give the audience more confidence in the speaker. Panay’s hand gestures were fluid and effortless, complementing his message.
Conversational delivery. Panay didn’t read from notes or a teleprompter, unlike many executives in a major product launch. Panay also didn’t read from his slides at all. Instead Panay had a conversation with his audience. He forgot the name of his New York hotel, but it didn’t bother him. He kept on with his presentation, just as he would if he was having a casual conversation at a restaurant or a bar.
Visual slides. Panay never read from his PowerPoint slides because there was very little text to read from. Most presenters turn to their slides and read bullet points word for word. Most of Panay’s slides contained visuals, very little text, and no bullet points. He used presentation slides the way I think slides should be used—to complement the story.
Make it personal. Panay told several personal stories to reinforce a product feature. For example, Surface has a MicroSD slot. Panay said it allows him to watch 10 full hours of full HD movies on his frequent trips to China. “It keeps me sane while I’m traveling all the way to China to make sure our products come off the line great.”
Panay also told a story about his family to discuss the Surface camera. He even paced the story well, slowing down his rapid delivery. Panay said, “I’m going to slow down because this is most important story for me. I’m a dad. I have four kids. It turns out whenever there’s a photo of my kids, I’m not in it. Does anyone else have that feeling? You look at photos of your vacation and it’s someone elses’ vacation? My daughter recently turned 10. We were back in Seattle and we had a birthday party.” As he talked about the party, Panay explained how he used the Surfaces’ unique ‘kickstand’ to set the tablet on a table so he could walk back to the party and record the entire room. “I kicked out the kickstand, set it down, hit record, and I was part of the memory. That seems so simple, but to me, so important.”
Include the audience. Panay was very comfortable with the audience, walked off the stage several times and, much to everyone’s surprise, gave Surface tablets to several people. During one exchange Panay walked into the audience, handed a device to a young woman who didn’t seem like she expected it. He said she looked like she wanted a Surface, so he gave the one in his hands to her to keep.
Think about the end of the stage as an imaginary wall between the presenter and the audience. Most speakers don’t have the confidence to break through the wall. Panay was comfortable on both sides of the wall.
Create wow moments. Great product launches have what I call a ‘wow moment,’ that one moment in a demonstration where you say, “I want to have one of those!” Panay had one such moment when he held the tablet at arms reach and dropped it on the stage. Panay said, “How many people drop a machine on stage? Have you ever seen that before? Everybody told me not to do that, but I’ve got to tell you it’s not going to break. You can actually drop it in 72 different ways…you can have every bit of confidence that Surface is going to kick ass for you.” Twitter lit up when Panay dropped the tablet. He knew it would. Panay had built a wow moment into his presentation.
After the presentation someone posted this Tweet: “Wow. Panos Panay the guy behind the Surface really rocked the stage.”
Paney did “rock the stage.” Follow his lead and you, too, can deliver a rockin’ presentation.