Guest on 2D Is Against My Religion
Juraj Holub
International moderator and public speaking coach
LinkedIn ↗Juraj Holub is an international moderator and public speaking coach who moderated the 3DISE conference twice. On 2DIAMR, Juraj Holub explained how technical experts can present their work as stories and network with confidence.
Episode
1 h 38 minIn Juraj’s words
“Public speaking is a meta skill for all the other skills that we are actually building throughout our career.”
“If you do not want to sound boring as a tech guy, just use stories.”
“We are outsourcing the actual thinking to the AI tools.”
Quoted in our tech guides
Questions Juraj answered
- How can engineers and technical experts make their presentations less boring?
- Juraj Holub says technical speakers should use stories: pick a real project, such as scanning an old bridge for cracks, and narrate it – the problem, the search for a solution and the new reality afterwards. ▶ 13:51
- How do you explain technical terms like Gaussian splatting to a non-technical audience?
- Per Juraj Holub, jargon works with tech people, but for a general audience you should spell out abbreviations like GS, repeat the full term and use a simple analogy – and never overestimate what the audience already knows. ▶ 25:33
- What is a simple elevator pitch formula for networking events?
- Juraj Holub uses the formula “We help X to do Y by doing Z” from The Lean Startup: X is who you help, Y the tangible benefit and Z the service, product or technology. ▶ 60:14
- How should you start a conference presentation?
- Juraj Holub advises skipping the long bio and company introduction and opening with a strong punchline, adding a sentence or two, and only then introducing yourself – or not at all if the moderator already did. ▶ 71:48
- Is it a good idea to use ChatGPT or Claude to write a conference talk?
- Juraj Holub warns that speakers who read AI-written scripts outsource the thinking and become human teleprompters. Juraj Holub uses ChatGPT to research topics and draft questions, but always reworks the result. ▶ 77:08