Materials for Reducing Risk and Commenting eSeminars

From time to time, Adobe asks me to present eSeminars on topics which are not exclusively related to the legal market.

Recently, I wrote the script and worked with a team to develop a scenario-based eSeminar called Acrobat in Action. During the event, we showed how Acrobat could be used by program managers, marketing, engineering and operations.

I was also asked to do two follow-up seminars which take place this week:

• Reducing Risk with Document Security
• Easier Reviews and Faster Feedback (Commenting)

I like to post my materials (presentation) for access by the audience, and my blog is a perfect place to do so. Since Adobe will be recording these events, I’ll update this blog entry once I have a link to the archived recordings.

For those who want to see something specifically legal-focused, try these archived eSeminars:

Legal Forms on Demand eSeminar

Acrobat for Legal Professionals on Demand eSeminar

Securing Legal Documents and Information eSeminar

Read on to download the materials and hear more about how I create the demos.

Materials Download for Reducing Risk and Faster Reviews eSeminar

All documents open in a new window.

File

Description

Size

Reducing Risk with Document Security Presentation

16-slide PDF presentation with speaker notes.

575K

Security Resources

Single PDF slide with links to security resources for Acrobat

28K

Easier Reviews and Faster Feedback Presentation and Resources

4-slide PDF document with with speaker notes and resources with clickable links

341K

My Process— In Case You Care

If you are in Legal IT, training, or maybe even just present in court using a computer, you may glean something useful from the information shared below.

Although I’ve presented hundreds of times, I always use a demo script.

The script represents the order in which I introduce the concepts and capabilities of the product. The cardinal rule of a good demo is “do useful work”. In other words, show features that solve real customer problems or save time.

If the script is just for me, it will be fairly simple and only include the basic steps and the names of the files, such as this sample demo script (34K PDF). If I’m doing a complex scenario-based demo, I’ll write suggested verbiage and very detailed steps for my co-presenters.

Good demos work and are easy to perform, allowing the presenter to focus on communicating with the audience. Demo designers and those who present demos should . . .

• Avoid House of Cards Demo Design
  Step 29 should not be reliant on perfectly executing Step 1.
• Run a Cooking Show when Appropriate
  On TV cooking shows, an hour passes and a lovely souffle magically pops out of the oven. I love to show full-text search in Acrobat, butI always pre-build the search index. Watching Acrobat whir through 10,000 files doesn’t add anything to a demo.
• Organize the Demo Files
  You look unprofessional when you can’t find your demo files. I organize my demo files in a single folder and prepend (put at the front) a three digit number so they stay in the order I need. e.g. 001_word_file.doc, 002_pdf_file.doc. If you are demoing Acrobat, the Organizer is an easy way to keep things organized.
• Test the Files
  There’s a big difference between thinking something will work and knowing it will work. There a number of operations in Acrobat that won’t work on a secure file.
• Understand Why Operations Might Fail and Fix it Gracefully
  Acrobat can’t combine a file if is already open in another application. If you understand the error message, it’s easy to plainly share with the audience the reason why and fix it live.
• Entertain, but no too much
  Your audience needs information and an appropriate level of humoror drama adds to comprehension and recall. Telling jokes outside of the context of the demo irritates the audience and wastes time.
• Use real files that the audience might use
  Your audience attends your demo expecting to find a workflow and files that is similar to what they do everyday.For the Acrobat in Action event, I created an RFQ and projector manual. The original manual, recycled from a previous seminar, had only greeked text and looked blatantly fake. It takes a lot of work to create new content that looks good, looks real and works well.
• Learn from Your Audience
  One of the benefits of doing live (in-person) demos, is that you can interact with your audience throughout.For example after showing a feature, you might ask, “Do you see how that might help you save time?. “Does that make sense to everybody?”If you get a mixed response, you may need to tweak your files or messaging.