There are a lot of ways to create bad presentations, but the way to improve them is almost always the same. Use less.
- Less content on each slide.
- Remove the transitions and special effects (unless they serve a specific purpose).
- Delete most of your slides.
The book “Smart Brevity” talks about many tactics for getting your ideas out there more quickly, and their main idea for presentations is pretty simple:
“The Harvard Business Review says a partner at McKinsey tells new hires to use this rule of thumb: For every 20 slides you want to put in your deck, use 2.“
Fewer slides is always a good thing, but I think the content per slide is a more important metric. I’ve heard the phrase “if it’s on the slide, it gets written down“, so be very careful with the number of words that you use on each slide.
I’m in the process now of putting together slides for a presentation this fall, and I’ll do my best to remove 90% of them before I’m done. I’m not sure I’ll get there, but it seems like a great goal to go after!
