Are you thinking of giving a talk?
That’s great. We encourage everyone to do a talk on the day to share their knowledge. It is what Product Camp is all about.
We encourage you to submit now but you can also pitch on the day. See what other people have proposed.
What should I talk about?
Whatever you want. This is about your unique knowledge and experience. However the session will be 30 minutes long, so it has a time constraint.
But! It doesn’t even have to be a pre-prepared talk. Other options include:
- Lead a discussion (e.g. what are common myths in product management)
- Lead an activity (e.g. better brainstorming through this activity)
- Create a panel of experts (e.g. what is the industry view on AI)
- Run a brainstorm on a problem you’re having (e.g. how do I help my team…)
We can help you make it happen. For example, someone asked about the business model of a 2 sided marketplace – so we found someone who could explain it and turned it into a session.
What we don’t want, and what isn’t going to get you votes, is a commercial pitch. Share, not sell.
How does this pitching work?
Product Camp is all about attendees sharing their knowledge.
We have found the best way to do this is get a set of people who want to do a presentation to quickly pitch their idea, and then get the attendees to vote on their favourites.
Yes, the attendee votes are what is used to create the agenda for the rest of the day.
To create this magic:
- During the morning of Camp, we put out a call to attendees who want to pitch
- Those amazing folks will come up to the stage to pitch.
- Everyone takes 30 seconds to quickly pitch their talk in any way they want. We’ll take a photo so we can find you later (photos not shared out). We will also give everyone a number which helps people remember who they want to vote for (Oh yeah, talk 4 sounds great!)
- We cover the walls with giant post-it notes with the name of the talk & your talk number.
- Every attendee gets 3 sticky dots to vote, and physically places dots on the pitch sheets around the room.
- Once all the voting is done, we count the dots. The highest voted talks get allocated to the largest rooms.
- We publish the agenda and we start. 🎉
This is an example queue of people preparing to pitch. You’re among friends!
Unfortunately you are not guaranteed a session. We usually have more people pitching than available rooms.
We do try to allocate the first session before the day so we can get people to sessions faster. However we can only do this if you submit your talk in advance.
What happens if I am selected?
Congratulations. Ideally our team will come looking for you (the photos help!), and tell you when you are on, and which room you are in.
Alternatively you will see your name on the agenda, with the room. Please turn up early so we can do any technical preparation.
How can I prepare in advance?
Things that will help prepare yourself before Product Camp:
- Prepare what you want to say about your topic. Have a catchy pitch, an engaging intro, interesting content, and key takeaways for the audience.
- Create a presentation. Google Slides, Keynote, PowerPoint, Gamma, whatever. It can help organise your thoughts, and nudge you when you forget you place. This is not essential. We have seen people create their talk on whiteboards or butchers paper on the day.
- While we try to supply stationary (pens, sharpies, some post its & paper), we don’t have OfficeWorks as a sponsor. We have some but not a ton. If you definitely need things, we suggest bringing those because we may not have them.
- If you have a presentation then bring your laptop with it ready to go (see below re: the tech). We recommend having a HDMI port or connector.
- Submit your talk early
Technical needs
Using the screens
If you are using slides or have something to share on the screen, screen share is either via Zoom or HDMI port. Prepare for both options, as different rooms have different setups.
- Zoom + Seek Wi-Fi:
- You must have the Zoom app downloaded to your laptop and logged in. You may need to create a free Zoom account to log in. You can not use zoom on the web.
- You must be connected to the Seek Wifi. You cannot hotspot in.
- Ideally test your setup before starting your session. You can use food breaks for this.
- HDMI
- There may be USB-C to HDMI connections in certain rooms. If you are reading this prior to camp, bring an adaptor. If you are at camp & need one, let a volunteer know & maybe we can help.
Prepare for lack of network coverage.
While there is Wi-Fi on site, prepare for not having it. You’ve done demos, you know how this can go!
- Have slides downloaded to your laptop or set Google Slides to off-line mode
- Have a copy in PDF format in case all technology fails
Additional Tips:
- The big screens are big, but low. Avoid using the bottom 20% of the slides for any key content as people often cannot see the bottom of the screen. See photo below
- Thinking of playing audio or a video in your presentation? Cool but also consider how you will manage in case there are any issues with playing it. See lack of network coverage above.
- Assume you will not have speakers notes visible. We have tried to have the laptop and the presentation as separate screens, but the placement is always awkward and difficult to use. Just assume you don’t have them
- Assume you will not have the internet.
