Free Steve Jobs by Presentation Secrets Page B

innovative
    companies.

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    50 CREATE THE STORY

    Jobs draws a verbal road map for his audience, a preview of
    coming attractions. Typically these road maps are outlined in
    groups of three—a presentation might be broken into “three
    acts,” a product description into “three features,” a demo into
    “three parts.” Jobs’s love of threes can be traced back at least as early as the original Macintosh introduction on January 24,
    1984. Appearing at the Flint Center, in Cupertino, California,
    Jobs told the audience, “There have only been two milestone
    products in our industry: the Apple II in 1977 and the IBM PC
    in 1981. Today we are introducing the third industry milestone
    product, the Macintosh. And it has turned out insanely great! ”2

    Verbal guideposts serve as road maps, helping your listeners
    follow the story. When coaching clients to appear in the media,
    I always instruct them to create an easy-to-follow story by clearly
    outlining three or, at the most, four main points before filling
    in the details. When this technique is followed, reporters will
    often take extensive notes. If the spokesperson misses a point,
    reporters will ask, “Didn’t you say you had three points? I heard
    only two.” A verbal road map of three things will help your lis-
    teners keep their place. See Figure 5.1.
    Figure 5.1 Jobs sticks to the rule of three in his presentations.
    ROBYN BECK/AFP/Getty Images

    DRAW A ROAD MAP 51

    It is well established that we can hold only small amounts
    of information in short-term, or “active,” memory. In 1956, Bell
    Labs research scientist George Miller published a classic paper
    titled “The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two.” Miller
    cited studies that showed we have a hard time retaining more
    than seven to nine digits in short-term memory. Contemporary
    scientists have put the number of items we can easily recall
    closer to three or four. So, it should not be surprising that Jobs
    rarely offers more than three or four key message points. As for
    that, in a Steve Jobs presentation, the number three is much
    more common than four. Steve understands that the “rule of
    three” is one of the most powerful concepts in communication
    theory.
    Why Goldilocks Didn’t
    Encounter Four Bears
    Listeners like lists. But how many points should you include in
    the list?

    Three is the magic number.
    Comedians know that three is funnier than two. Writers
    know that three is more dramatic than four. Jobs knows that
    three is more persuasive than five. Every great movie, book, play,
    or presentation has a three-act structure. There were three mus-
    keteers, not five. Goldilocks encountered three bears, not four.
    There were three stooges, not two. Legendary NFL coach Vince
    Lombardi told his players there were three important things in
    life: family, religion, and the Green Bay Packers. And the U.S.
    Declaration of Independence states that Americans have a right
    to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” not simply life
    and liberty. The rule of three is a fundamental principle in writ-
    ing, in humor, and in a Steve Jobs presentation.
    The U.S. Marine Corps has conducted extensive research
    into this subject and has concluded that three is more effec-
    tive than two or four. Divisions within the marines are divided
    into three: a corporal commands a team of three; a sergeant

    52 CREATE THE STORY
    commands three rifle teams in a squad; a captain has three pla-
    toons; and so on. If the marines were kind enough to study this
    stuff, why should we reinvent the wheel? Go ahead and use it.
    So few communicators incorporate the rule of three in their pre-
    sentations that you will stand apart simply by doing so. The rule
    of three—it works for the marines, it works for Jobs, and it will
    work for you.
    At the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference on June 6,
    2005, Jobs announced the switch from IBM’s PowerPC chips to
    Intel microprocessors. “Let’s talk about