Has your manager ever said, “Could you build the team slide deck?” Have you felt unsure where to begin?
Communicating through PowerPoint, also known as a “slide deck”, is an important part of any consulting, strategy, or analyst role. These materials serve multiple purposes including as a visual presentation aid, material that can be shared with executives, and training material for team members.
A standout slide deck can be shared without presentation, easily transfers information to its reader, and is concise yet comprehensive.
Below are six tips that you can follow to aid your process of slide development and help you build incredible presentations.
1. Accumulate Information
Before opening PowerPoint, you need to accumulate the important information that will go into the slide deck. Spend the days prior to building a presentation collecting information. Collate your research in a word document. This could include data points, links to articles, key takeaways from internal reports, data visualizations, academic research, and other information that you want to convey to your audience. Having all the pieces of the puzzle in front of you will make slide development much easier.
2. Develop a Story Board
Structure your notes into a story that takes your audience on a step-by-step journey, answering key questions that they might have about the topic of your presentation. This will make it easier for you to build your slide deck.
Before opening PowerPoint, you should use pen and paper to story board the deck. This means sketching out what the deck could look like, what points you would like to cover, how you intuitively think information should be presented. By sketching a plan, you become intentional about building a presentation.
If you’re presenting on a business case, a typical story board might include the following sections:
- Problem and solution – What is the key problem facing the business? You can frame the problem statement in the form of a question. For example, why did XYZ’s profitability decrease by 20% during 2022? It is not a good idea to be the bearer of bad news, and so it is suggested that you also include the proposed solution. You can think of this section as an introduction, which tells your audience the key message. The remainder of your presentation will provide details and analysis that clarify the problem and justify your chosen solution.
- Executive summary – Why will your proposed solution work? If a senior executive does not have time to sit through your entire presentation, then what key points do they need to know? You might want to draw on relevant data about the product, market, and competition.
- Industry Analysis – Is the problem industry wide or company specific? Focus on key trends in the industry by employing standard frameworks like PEST or Porter’s Five Forces and highlighting financial performance. Include graphs, charts, and quotes in order to effectively communicate your message.
- Company Analysis – What are the company’s core strengths and weaknesses? Employ standard frameworks such as SWOT analysis in order to show the link between strengths and market opportunities and between weaknesses and potential threats.
- Options – How well do various options address the key issues faced by the business? Showcase three alternative solutions that you have considered. Less than three options is not comprehensive, and more than three is overkill. Provide the pros and cons for each option. Consider using a simple chart that lists the options and key issues (decision criteria) so that your audience can see which option ticks all the boxes.
- Recommendation – How can the proposed solution be implemented successfully? Your audience already knows which solution you have endorsed. In this section, you can add value by focusing on:
- Material risks – Identify the key risks and strategies to avoid, mitigate, or transfer those risks
- Timeline – Provide a high level timeline that breaks the project into a number of phases and outlines what is needed to complete each phase
- Communication Strategy – Prioritize which stakeholder groups need to be closely managed by employing a basic framework like Mendelow’s Matrix
- Next Steps – What tangible steps would need to be taken to get the ball rolling? The aim should be to secure quick wins to build positive momentum for the project.
3. Check for Templates
Before opening a blank presentation, check your organization’s knowledge base for presentation templates. Many organizations have a bank of commonly used resources that you can access through the firm’s intranet. This should include presentation templates and previously created decks that you can adapt to your needs.
4. Start Building
The primary purpose of a slide deck is to communicate information, make an argument, or share information, not to develop the most aesthetically pleasing slides. Keep that in mind when developing a slide deck.
Start by inserting the core content, then supplemental details. Build your deck around the core arguments or points you are trying to convey. Constantly put yourself in your audience’s shoes to check if the information has a logical flow. Anticipate your audience’s questions and incorporate those responses into the presentation.
5. Insert Aesthetics
After focusing on your core content, you can then focus on the style and layout of your slide deck. Style and layout are important because they give credibility to your content, and make it easier to digest. For example, if a client sees that your fonts are inconsistent or boxes are misaligned, they may question whether you’ve made mistakes on your strategic recommendations as well.
6. Seek Feedback
When building a slide deck, set an earlier deadline for yourself so that you can obtain feedback from your manager. Feedback is important because managers will have a better understanding of how to make your materials more impactful. They may be more familiar with the intended audience, better able to see the big picture, in possession of some key details that you have overlooked, or able to improve the overall positioning of your message.
After developing a first draft, share your slide deck with your manager to obtain feedback. You should aim to produce a first draft which is client ready, or as close to client ready as possible. The goal is to obtain feedback that will allow you to perfect the slide deck, not to delegate upwards and have your manager create the slide deck for you. Take the feedback you receive, incorporate it into the slide deck, and iterate.
Final Thoughts
A slide deck can be a powerful communication tool, or a way to put your audience to sleep.
By following the six tips outlined in this article, you will be able to build a slide deck that effectively communicates your message and has a lasting impact on your audience.
Zuhair Imaduddin is a labor relations student at Cornell University. He was a Product Management Intern at PNC Bank and is an incoming Innovation Development Summer Analyst at JPMorgan Chase.
Image: Unsplash