Using Ignite style lightning talks for brown bag presentations?

Question

Recently, I ran across Ignite and thought that style of presentation (five minutes, 20 slides, rotated automatically after 15 seconds) could work for "brown bag" sessions. It would be a way to take a lunch hour and get through a range of topics for the purpose of knowledge sharing. Because each talk is only five minutes, it could get people introduced to many topics, and if any particular topic was uninteresting, it would be over quickly. Also, it could give more individuals opportunities to present. Thoughts on the format?

As far as logistics, I would guess you would need to leave 5 minutes on each end of the hour for a buffer, and probably only schedule 8 time slots (5 minutes + 1 minute transition between). That is 57 minutes (10 buffer + 8 * 5 presentations + 7 * 1 transitions) total time. Thoughts on this scheduling? Too aggressive?

Lastly, I'm not sure if PowerPoint (or another presentation application) has an auto advance feature, or if that has to be externally scripted. Any tips here?

Answer 1

This is essentially the same format that I use in my presentations. I use PowerPoint, which does have a slide auto-advance feature. When I went to Phoenix University I did dozens of these. The format does work well.

As far as being too aggressive: if as a presenter you are organized properly, you should have no problem at all with the format.

I agree with Thanatos, though. One minute between presentations is too short. I would go for six presentations per hour. That gives 2 minutes setup, and 5 minutes questions per presentation, for a total of 12 minutes per presentation.

Answer 2

I once used PowerPoint as a sort of screensaver: fading between slides every X seconds, and cycling the whole presentation. (Each slide had a photo on it.) Don't remember how I did it, just that it is possible.

That's an interesting idea for a presentation that I've never heard of before. Are you not allowed to field questions from the audience afterwards?

I'd worry that your transition is too short - 60 seconds to change presenters is quick. If you do, you should make sure that they don't have to setup the laptop or the presentation itself - opening PowerPoint alone will eat more than 60 seconds of switch times. (And if someone has to setup a laptop... forget it.)