5 Reasons why Guy Kawasaki was easily my favorite session at SXSW-EDU

  1. Guy was humorous
  2. Guy is a storyteller
  3. Guy made it personal
  4. Guy shared relevant, actionable information
  5. Guy is not an educator

My Notes from Guy Kawasaki’s SXSW-edu talk:

"If I knew Then What I Know Now"

Guy's Top 10 things he wished kids were taught and his kids believed

1) How to continue to learn

  • It's not a sprint, its a marathon.
  • The goal is to become self-reliant. Learn to learn.
2) How to separate correlation from causation
  • Steve Jobs traded in his Mercedes every 6 months; never registered a car -- ever; he believed he could drive solo in the carpool lane, park in the handicap spot, wore blue jeans, black mock turtlenecks and new balance shoes...
  • If you do all these things, you will not be Steve Jobs.
3) How to pitch
  • Life is a constant pitch
    • Pitching for capital
    • Pitching for talent
    • Pitching for distribution
  • The idea is the easy part, buy-in is the hard part ( previously believed opposite)
  • Guy’s 10/20/30 rule for presentations
    • 10 slides
    • 20 minutes
    • 30 pt font ideal size (Age of oldest person in the audience / 2 = minimum font size)
4) How To Write Software
  • Everyone should learn the basics
  • Useful as a BS filter, if nothing else
5) How To Be Brief
  • Learn to write a one-pager
    • One sentence
    • One paragraph (elevator pitch)
    • One page
  • Mantra not Mission statement
    • Guy: empower people
    • Apple: democratized computing
    • Google: democratized data
    • Canva: democratized graphics
  • Emails: ideally 5 sentences; win or lose with subject line
6) Learn to use Graphics
  • Adding graphics double engagement (2x)
  • Canva allows you to quickly pick graphics
7) How to Make Video
  • An AV pitch is more persuasive
8) How to "work" Social Media
  • Market-driven approach to social media guidance
  • If I told you recruiters are going to reference your social media, might that govern what you post?
  • Use Social Media to market yourself
  • Repeat tweets 3x, 8 hours apart (to reach entire audience) and include a graphic for a 6x bump
  • Do you have a great avatar?
  • Do you have a great profile?
9) How to reciprocate in advance
  • Help people before they can help you
  • Default to "Yes"
  • There are two types of people: Bakers and Eaters
  • Book: Influence - Bob Childeny
  • When someone says, "Thank you", the correct response is not, "You're welcome", but, "I know you'd do the same for me." The implication is very different.
  • When someone owes you, the optimal response is to tell them how they can pay you back or return the favor.
10 Learn how to Suck it up

Steve Lomas
Web Consultant, Idea Mechanic
Founder and CEO, MojoMediaPros, Inc.