5 Easy Steps to Avoid Death by Powerpoint in Meetings

I was recently working with Dan, a C suite manager who faced this challenge. First, he went through the deck as he’d planned while we recorded it on his phone. He was hunched over the pages of the deck, glued to all the points that we wanted to cover, not making any eye contact. And there were a LOT of points! The information went on and on! His voice turned into a monotone drone as he slogged on for another 20 minutes. After watching it back for 5 minutes, he said,

"Ok, that’s enough. OMG! I wouldn’t want to sit through that! I’d be bored out of my mind!"

So, how did we proceed? First, we clarified who was going to be in the room (if it’s more than one person, zero in on the key decision maker). Turns out, it was a senior manager who had been recently hired that Dan now reported into. I asked, “What would be the most helpful information that you could give to help out this new guy in his role?" He said, “He’s go a lot to learn about all of the different areas, so I need to let him know the key points about my group, where we’ve been, where we’re at, and the plans we have.” With this insight, we had a new starting point. He had a clear objective of why he’s meeting this guy and what this new manager needs from him.

Now it was just a matter of how best to organize the content in service of that. We chose one of my favorites: past, present and future. It’s a quick and efficient way to get anyone up to speed on where you’ve been, what you’ve been doing, and what you future plan is.

Next is to edit out anything that doesn’t speak to those points and slim down the bloated, avalanche of information that so often fills slide decks. As Andy Warhol said about art that you feel is too precious, “Kill your darlings.” Or just put them in the appendix for reference in case anyone wants to dive deeper.

The next time I met with Dan, he was no longer slogging through 50 slides. He'd slimmed it down to 10 and used it as a guide speaking conversationally about his points. Each slide supported his main points around past, present and future. He no longer spoke in a monotone voice. He harnessed all of the knowledge and insight he had to actively help out the new manager and transformed the deck into a living, relevant, and concise reference guide.

Do you have impenetrable slides that you’re slogging through? Follow these simple steps:

1. Identify who is in the audience, and what they need from you that will help them.
2. Organize your content to support that in 3 buckets, like: Past | Present | Future, 3 Reasons Why, or Situation | Crisis | Solution.
3. Edit out any slides that don’t support your main points. Throw them in the appendix (or out completely).
4. Speak through the deck out loud at least 5 times. Don’t read your slides. Include them as part of a conversation.
5. Record yourself and assess. You should sound like you’re having a conversation, not a lecture.

In the meeting, don’t immediately launch into the deck. Start out with a conversation about the main points you think will be most helpful, and refer to the deck as a way to support and guide the conversation you’ll be having. Your audience will feel included, engaged, and might even forget that you’re leading them through a slide deck.