When I first started giving lectures to the public, that standard was 60minutes.  This was roughly divided into 5 minutes introduction to you and the topic, 40mins talk, 15 minutes questions and wrap up, plus clear away.  Then things got shorter and you were expected to go from start to finish in just 45 minutes. I came across another new ‘low’ this week – could I talk for 15 minutes and take 5 minutes for questions??? Goodness, and they wanted good shrubs for the area – how many of those can you do in 15 minutes – talk of fast.

The ladies were very nice, but really how much can you say in 15 minutes, and was it really worth the 2 hours it took me to find the pictures and make the show up?  I am recylcling the show though and making it into a 45 minutes show on ‘Color All Year round’.

The Prime Winter Flower

At the garden I am doing a series of lunchtime talks – just 30 minutes, plus 15 minutes for people to get there and back from the city offices (or their office).  They are going very well, and I think we may offer one in the fall too.

But I do wonder about attention spans – how short can a presentation be before you say it is not worth the effort?  Should you just give a brief talk with no images?? I guess we will wait to see how things work out in the next yr or two – maybe we will all be giving talks by video by then!