communicating more effectively with visuals

A few weeks ago I got around to reading Presentation Zen by Garr Williams. At first glance this is a book about Powerpoint or Business Presentations, but at a deeper level it is about the whole of communications.

First, the design of the book is top notch. It’s heavy paper and photos make it solid but immensely inviting to the eye. At times these heavy graphic books make it hard to read the text but Presentation Zen uses clear illustrations with consistent text formatting that made the concepts a joy to read.

Secondly, realize that this is essentially a derivative work with almost every chapter borrowed from another great book. The good news here is that the author has selected some excellent nuggets from these books and keeps them distinct by giving each book and its core ideas a separate chapter. Too many times I find authors mash together other works in a confusing manner. Williams makes it clear he is borrowing and simplifies and clarifies these author’s ideas about principles of great slide design.

While it is extensively illustrated with example presentations and ideas, Williams lays out each chapter as one primary idea. Here are some that stood out to me:

1. Realize that a projected powerpoint slide is different from graphics on a page. I drank deeply from Edward Tufte’s work a few years ago which is more about the visual display of complex information in a graphical way. And he hates powerpoint. On paper, one can linger over the depth of information on a page, but a slide is much different especially when accompanied by a live, (or even webinar,) speaker.
2. Simple. Williams is big on photo graphics to emphasize one point per slide. Use as few words a possible and NO BULLET POINTS. My linear mind resisted that at first but my sense kicked in later and now I am agreeing with him.
3. Less is more. Bottom line, fewer words, more photos and simple graphics to emphasize a point.
4. Finally, Williams stresses that good presentations are first developed with low tech tools – Yellow Pads, sticky notes and pens. Form your thoughts, boil them down, dream of photos, then move to the digital tools.

Application:

It is always best to apply a lesson to test the concepts. A few Sunday’s ago I had one of my bi-annual trips to preach. Basic message had a sermon powerpoint outline for a handout.

But for the congregation I had 10 slides. All photos with only three words on the final slide. The impact was huge. The imagery reinforced what I was saying but didn’t clutter the screen with words.

Of course the purpose of the presentation dictates style and format. We have a weekly all staff call that connects people from multiple locations and countries and we use gotowebinar.com to do that. We show slides with bullet points. I only spend one hour to produce the call each week because more time might make it better, but an investment too great for this type of call.

I saw on the Presentation Zen blog this week his examples of some new presentations and the top one was from Advent Conspiracy. Check it out here.

[*] Dave Travis is the Managing Director of Leadership Network. You can reach him at dave.travis@leadnet.org

Comments

[Lon Wong]

i follow the blog... it's fantastic for all things on communication. we can all be better..