My first VMUG presentation

I did my first VMUG presentation at the Danish VMUG meeting on April 3., in Palads Biograf in Copenhagen.

For a summary of the day, go read Terkel Olsen’s blogpost: “Great VMUG Meeting in Denmark”

My subject/title was “100% virtualized on Apple hardware”, which I had 30 minutes to talk about. I was scheduled as the second speaker of the day, just a short break after Tommy Drægert from BitDefender.

I had done some presentations before, for maybe 30-35 people.

At the Danish VMUG meeting there were around 100 people in the cinema, so I was naturally a little nervous. It might also have had something to do with the fact that I decided, like 20-25 minutes before my presentation, to translate my complete slide deck from Danish to English, and also do the speaking in English instead of Danish.

The reason for the drastic change occurred during Tommy Drægert’s session which was in Danish. Scott Lowe (who was there to give a session about NSX, later in the day) commented on Twitter that it was strange to be at a VMUG meeting and be unable to understand what was being talked about on stage.

It then occurred to me, that beside my own session, the rest of the day would be in English by foreign guest speakers.

I then suggested on Twitter that I could do the presentation in English, but that my slides would be in Danish. A few people commented on Twitter that it would be a nice gesture for the foreign speakers.

When Tommy Drægerts session ended there where a 30 minute break, for coffee and socializing.

During that break I opened up my slides, and quickly looked through them, and decided to do a quick translate. (luckily my slides were simple with only little text and I only had around 20 slides).

So fast forward 20-25 minutes and I am on stage with a English slide deck and ready to do a presentation in English :-)

My presentation went very well, people seemed interested in my topic and asked a few questions when I was done with the main part of the presentation.

My slides are available here in PDF format:

Just to be clear, my presentation was originally scheduled to be in Danish, and the VMUG leaders said afterwards that it would have been totally fine for me to do it in the Danish.

So it was my own personally decision to do the presentation in English.

I had a great time on stage and had some good interactions with my fellow VMUG’ers in the breaks after.

If I am given the opportunity I would love to do it again.

Below I would like to give a few suggestions for first time speakers, and also give a little feedback to the VMUG leaders.

Suggestions / recommendations for first time speakers:

• Make you slides as simple as possible, with as little text as needed. Tell your story, instead of letting the audience read it.
• Know how your computer needs to be configured, when hooking it up to a projector. Time is limited just before your presentation.
• Be on time, and get on stage as soon as you are allowed, so that you can get your computer hooked up, without getting stressed about that part.
• Rule of thumb: No more than 1 slide per minute. So if you have 30 minutes to present, you should not have more than 30 slides.
• Leave room for questions at the end. So make your presentation a few minutes short, thereby a few slides less than your scheduled time.
• Look at the audience, instead of your computer-screen (or worse the projector-screen).

Feedback for the VMUG leaders:

• If available, provide information about projector resolution and connectivity as soon as possible.
• If possible, please pre-register speakers, and inform the speakers that they have been pre-registered for the event.