IS INTERNET KILLING CREATIVITY

    I tasked a YO (young officer) to prepare a presentation for 10-15 minutes on any subject of his choice and told him that he will be speaking in front of at least 70-80 officers including some of the very senior ones. I also advised him that it would be a perfect way to showcase him in front of all and to leave a positive impression. The time available to him was approximately 2 and 1/2 weeks. 

      Over next two days he selected some topics and bounced back with me and then finally selected one and started preparing.

      Before the final day he called on to me for a dress rehearsal and for possible suggestions for improvements.

      I sat through the full 15m of his presentations (slides and write up) and though I made some points for improvements but nothing drastic. The topic was also of common interest.

      Finally, the D-day arrived....... In the full auditorium he spoke well the slides were also good, the topic was interesting but I could gauge the disconnect with the audience. In fact he could not hold his audience attention after first couple of minutes which surprised me. 

      My worst fears were confirmed when my immediate boss while walking out the auditorium looked deeply in my eyes, held the glaze and shrugged his shoulders. He, an accomplished speaker himself, was not at all impressed by his efforts and worst with his non-verbal communication he was telling me he wasn’t impressed by my efforts as well..... So what went wrong???? I mean I thought it was an OK talk. So why no one else was interested let alone impressed???

     I realised after introspection that I did the mistake of getting involved from the beginning itself and was equal partner in selecting the topic and reading the script along with the actual act of practicing the talk. In nutshell probably I fell into the ownership of presentation itself and thought that everyone else will also think like me and would love the talk. However, the opposite happen. Post talk, when I sat calmly and did the autopsy of the entire episode few pertinent points came out:-

1.       The topic was chosen from the internet.

2.       The officer chose the topic from the available presentations on the internet and then decided to prepare it rather than choosing the topic from the subject which interests him.

3.       He then searched the material available from the net and merged into one presentation rather than building a script (write up) first then making the power point presentation.

4.       As he found out the ready-made material he didn’t put in efforts in writing himself so the language used was not his and was almost foreign to him. Though he tried to remember the things which he was about to talk but those were not coming from his heart. I mean he wasn’t able to convince anyone including himself about the topic.

5.       Public speaking is all about selling oneself, I mean selling your ideas. Its equivalent to making a sales pitch. How can you sell a product to anyone when you are not convinced yourself?

Now I need to put up some question which I want readers to mull over and leave comments if they wish:-

1.       Is internet making us lethargic? Is it making us shirkers? I mean if it is not there then the officer has to do the hard work of researching the topic give some serious thoughts and then prepare the script before preparing the presentation.

2.       Is internet killing the creativity? What I mean....If the internet is not there would we be more creative? And by this I mean not the artistic people but the common people like the presenter in this article.

3.       In today’s world of easy availability of semi-knocked-down-units; on internet in terms of literature; are we creating run of the mill material?