DAN ROAM

"Dan’s art of visual thinking and presentation is a wonderful creative tool and is well worth mastering." 

— Ed Catmull, Cofounder of Pixar Animation & President of Disney Animation Studios

Dan Roam is the author of the several books including the international bestseller, The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures, which was named the innovation and creativity book of the year by Fast Company, BusinessWeek, and the Times of London. The Back of the Napkin has been published in 27 languages and topped the business book charts in the US, UK, Japan, Germany, China, Korea, and France. Dan and his whiteboard are frequent guests on CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox, and NPR.

Dan is also the author of Draw to Win: A Crash Course on How to Lead, Sell, and Innovate With Your Visual Mind and The Pop-up Pitch: The Two-Hour Creative Sprint to the Most Persuasive Presentation of Your Life.

Dan is the founder and president of Digital Roam Inc., a management-consulting firm that uses visual thinking to solve complex problems for such clients as Google, Boeing, eBay, Microsoft, Wal-Mart, Wells Fargo, the U.S. Navy, and the United States Senate.

Dan's analysis of American health care on 50 napkins was hailed by BusinessWeek as "The World's Greatest Presentation of 2009" and prompted the White House Office of Communications to invite Dan in for discussions on how to visually clarify complex policy issues.

 Follow Dan on Twitter @dan_roam 

Speech topics

The Back of the Napkin: How To Lead, Innovate, And Change The World With Pictures

In this fast-paced interactive session, international bestselling author Dan Roam will share his unique insights on the extraordinary power of visual-thinking and communications. Using the latest research from the science of vision, Dan will show how you can create, map, and share solution journeys with simple pictures -- even if you can't draw a thing. And bring a pen, because we are all going to DRAW! 

Draw to Win: 10 Rules to Lead, Sell, and Innovate with Your Visual Mind

For more than 25 years, bestselling author Dan Roam has led the visual-business revolution, traveling to five continents to share with business leaders the incredible problem-solving power of pictures. Dan’s breakthrough understanding of how to use pictures to succeed in business has captivated leading thinkers in technology, finance, science, politics, and education. In his fast-paced interactive presentation, Dan shares his top five visual rules he has learned and shows audiences exactly how to seize the power of pictures in their work. These simple but insightful revelations will have you rethinking how you approach the way you problem-solve, sell products, and lead innovation efforts. Dan shows audiences how vision drives all other modes of thought, and teaches them how to hot-wire the visual process for faster problem-solving. Even if you think you can’t draw Dan shows how simple pictures can make a big difference in your organization. 

The Back Of The Napkin: Solving Problems (And Selling Your Solutions) With Pictures

Pop quiz: You're on the way home from a conference. At the airport bar, you strike up a conversation with the person on the next stool. She asks, "What you do?" You say, "I manage Enterprise Architecture Projects for mission-critical business applications with an emphasis on Services Oriented Architectures." She smiles politely and says, "You broke your what?"

Let's face it: describing the complexity of today's working world is hard... unless we use pictures. In this session, Dan Roam demonstrates step-by-step how anyone -- regardless of artistic talent or training -- can use simple pictures to describe what we do, explain complex concepts, solve fuzzy problems, and sell others on breakthrough ideas.

LESSONS FROM THE PANDEMIC: HOW COMPANIES ARE BUILDING A POST-COVID HYBRID WORKPLACE AND GAINING COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE

The COVID-19 pandemic forced companies to innovate as they shifted to remote work overnight. Many were surprised when their new solutions were not just "good enough" but actually let them deliver better customer experience. Now those companies will build on those innovations. They also are adopting a hybrid model rather than bringing everyone back into the office. How do you build a hybrid model that enables you to gain competitive advantage? What are the challenges, and what are the opportunities? This talk includes actionable lessons from Silicon Valley software companies, retailers like Nike, and others. Dan Lyons is the best-selling author of Disrupted and Lab Rats, who has been called "the expert on the culture of work and how it's changing business and lives."

Executive Education – Workshops

Back of the Napkin: Training Conference

Nothing is more important for our professional and personal success than sharing our ideas in public. Yet nothing is more terrifying than public speaking. No wonder success can be so hard. But it doesn’t need to be!

In this engaging and interactive event, best-selling author Dan Roam shows how to turn a dreaded presentation into an extraordinary opportunity. Whether we’re pitching a room full of executives, sharing our idea with co-workers, trying to convince clients, or telling a story around the campfire, Dan can teach us how to effectively deliver our message with truth, story, and visuals. (And a whole lot of fun.)

In his two international bestsellers, The Back of the Napkin and Unfolding the Napkin, Roam taught readers how to solve complex problems and sell ideas by using visual thinking. Now in his latest, Show and Tell: How Everybody Can Make Extraordinary Presentations, Roam presents a pithy but powerful guide that takes away the jitters and gives anyone the confidence they need to share their story with any audience.

As Roam writes, “As presenters, our goal is simple: To help others see what we see. To do this we entertain, persuade, educate, motivate, and ultimately change our audience. In other words, we create and deliver a report, explanation, pitch, or story so captivating that our audience wants to see things the way we do.” Roam explains in detail how anyone can incorporate pictures, graphics, and—best of all—drawings into a presentation that will keep the audience glued to its seats.

Dan Roam has worked with such leading organizations as Microsoft, eBay, Google, Wal-Mart, Boeing, Lucas Film, Gap, Intel, Cisco, IBM, Kraft, the US Navy, the United States Senate, and the White House. He has appeared on CBS, CNN, MSNBC, ABC News, Fox News, and NPR. Dan’s visual explanation of American health care was selected by BusinessWeek as “The World’s Best Presentation of 2009.” 

The Art of the Extraordinary Presentation

INTRODUCTION:

There is nothing more important to our professional success than our ability to present our ideas effectively to others. Yet there is nothing more terrifying for most of us than public speaking. No wonder success can be so elusive; the one thing we need to do well is the one thing we’re most afraid of. But it doesn’t need to be.

In this dynamic and inspiring seminar, Dan Roam shows how, with a little planning and practice, making an extraordinary presentation can be easy and fun — both for us and for our audience. All we need to do is remember the three rules: tell the truth, tell it with a story, and tell that story with pictures.

WHO SHOULD ATTEND:

This session is ideal for anyone who needs to share an idea, sell a concept, generate support, or help others understand.

WHAT WILL YOU LEARN:

– The three rules of all extraordinary presentations

– The four essential storylines upon which all great presentations are built

– How to apply these concepts to the basics of creating and delivering presentations that truly change our audience 

Books

The Pop-up Pitch: The Two-Hour Creative Sprint to the Most Persuasive Presentation of Your Life

A fast and practical visual storytelling method that puts a powerful new toolkit into the hands of leaders, innovators, salespeople, teachers and anyone else who needs to quickly make an impact on increasingly distracted audiences.

OUT NOW

The Pop-Up Pitch is a radical new approach to help you create the perfect presentation, combining three key elements of persuasive storytelling-simple pictures, clear words, and powerful emotions-that together motivate audiences to pay attention, learn something new, and make effective decisions.

The Pop-Up Pitch weaves together the latest insights on visual cognition, behavioral economics, and classic story structures in an easy-to-learn and inspiring storytelling algorithm. In this new era of remote, work and online presenting, it delivers powerful and persuasive outcomes for time-limited professionals dealing with complex ideas, attention-deficit audiences, and the evolving challenges of modern meetings.

Draw to Win: A Crash Course on How to Lead, Sell, and Innovate With Your Visual Mind 

Get ready for the ultimate crash course in communicating and solving problems through simple pictures.

Show and Tell: How Everybody Can Make Remarkable Presentations 

“If I tell you the truth, if I tell it with a story, and if I tell that story with pictures, I can keep you glued to your seat. Let me show you how.” 

Blah Blah Blah: What To Do When Words Don't Work 

Through dozens of guided examples, Roam proves that anyone can apply this systematic approach, from leftbrain types who hate to draw to right-brainers who hate to write.

The Back of the Napkin: Solving Problems and Selling Ideas with Pictures 

Explaining how everybody is born with an innate talent for visual thinking, a guide to enhancing analytical skills by building up one's intrinsic abilities is a primer for business leaders on how to develop ideas and enable faster results using to-the-point visual methods.

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