Recently, a participant in one of our workshops asked me how to handle a situation where she sends a pre-read deck and then has to present it to people who have (presumably) already seen her deck. I was in a rush and gave an okay, but not fantastic answer. It has been haunting me ever since.
I’d like to remedy that. So, Lannon in Malvern, PA, this answer is for you.
It’s easy to ask: “What do I do when people have already seen the deck?” and wonder “Why am I presenting this at all? They’ve read it already.”
Those are fair questions. It does seem like the presentation itself would be repetitive, that you’ve already given out all the answers. It does seem that way.
There should be, however, a major difference between a pre-read deck and the actual presentation deck. Let’s get into it.
A pre-read is typically a text-heavy document sent to all attendees before a meeting or presentation. It can be a great tool to socialize data before finance executives get together, to catch everyone up on some data-heavy trends, or to set the stage for several challenges before a meaty discussion of possible solutions and outcomes.
Remember: A true presentation is meant to be presented … not read. So just like slides shouldn’t be text- or data-heavy, pre-reads shouldn’t be presented. Choosing the right visual aid is imperative to let your content shine.
By using pre-reads, you’re starting a great best practice of preventing busy slides. So when someone says to you, “Send me your slides,” pause, and rethink what data and information they need if your deck is being read. It’s probably more content than you have currently!
Amazon is famous for banning the corporate use of PowerPoint presentations back in 2004. The rationale was Bezos wanted more details than were provided in a PowerPoint presentation. And thus, the six-page memo was born. (If you haven’t heard, Amazon executives sit around a table and read six-page memos in silence at the start of every meeting.) That’s one way to do a pre-read before a meeting!
But if you wanted another pre-read document example, you could probably make that six-page memo a little more aesthetically pleasing. In fact, research shows that using visuals helps to boost retention. If you merely hear information, you’ll only remember 10% of it three days later. But if you add a picture to it, you’ll now remember 65%!
We get it. You’re not a graphic designer, and the big meeting is tomorrow. You’ve polished your presentation deck, but how are you going to make a six-page memo (or smaller) somewhat aesthetically pleasing?
That’s why we invented Slidedocs®.
Slidedocs® are the missing solution you need to quickly create visually digestible pre-reads to supplement a big presentation. They help you powerfully deliver your most important ideas, and can be seen as visual documents or chart-heavy research to give your audience some background before that big meeting.
Slidedocs® are ideal for:
Key takeaway: When you can’t present, they utilize the art of document design to get your key messages across.
Back to the original question. My advice would be to have never sent the deck in the first place. Instead, she should have sent a pre-read version of her deck, and to quickly whip one up, she should’ve used our free Slidedocs® templates to shape it.
But since she had already sent the deck, here is my advice:
The three tips above are good. But can they be better? Absolutely.
Tell a story. Giving a story before you go into the two-minute summary (aka your pre-read) of the Slidedoc™ will make anyone look like the best communicator in the room. The easiest way to tell an effective story in a presentation is to make it about a human being (or human beings) in the data population you’ve studied. For example:
Why tell a story? You capture your audience’s attention. Here’s an example:
Let’s say you’re a new operations hire at a major company and you’re in charge of increasing productivity and efficiency. Through your research, you found out that your average employee spends 45 minutes every year updating their HR benefits. Good stat. Understandable stat. Probably not one that moves the needle when there are more pressing issues. What does 45 minutes a year matter?
You know how much it matters, but how do you convey that to your manager? Well, if you connect to a human element and work the statistic into a story, you might have something like this. This is how you use the power of a three-act structure (ie: a story) in the business world:
This is Todd. Todd works in marketing. Every November he gets an email about updating his benefits. His life hasn’t changed substantially in the past year – no marriage, no kids, no need to change his medical, his dental, his 401k. All Todd wants to do is say “Hey, give me the same as last year.”
But there’s a problem. In order to say “Give me the same as last year,” Todd has to find his password (he doesn’t remember), write down how he answered all 42 of last year’s questions, and then click the appropriate boxes. Doesn’t sound like much, but it takes most employees 45 minutes for that whole process.
Well, I checked with benefits. 70% of our employees make zero changes year to year. Let’s do the math. We have 500 people at this company. That’s 350 Todd’s spending 45 unnecessary minutes each. We are losing 262 1/2 hours of manpower every year simply for people checking the exact same boxes they checked 12 months earlier.
(Insert your call to action here.) We need to change this.
Thankfully, I learned about Awesome Benefits Software X, which automates our answers from the previous year. I’ve previewed what I like about it in the Slidedoc™ pre-read deck I sent out. Let’s look through it together and I’ll try to answer any questions you have.
Now you have their attention.
Telling a story might feel weird, unnatural, or even risky. It does take more effort, and thus, more time. The voice in the back of your head might be saying “That sounds hard” or “That’s going to take too much time.” But it will give life to your pre-read and presentation in a way that gets your initiative approved or across the finish line.
Remember: The Slidedoc™ template can help you do the heavy lifting with your presentation. For the storytelling part, we have workshops for that. From our top-selling Duarte DataStory® workshop to our persuasive and story structure-informed Resonate®, you can upskill everything you need to run successful meetings with positive outcomes. And of course, when something shouldn’t be presented, you have your pre-read material to lean on as well.
This article was originally published on July 10, 2019. It has been updated in September 2024 for relevancy.
