I stumbled into the wit and wisdom of Edwin Tufte after learning his advice led Amazon to ban Powerpoint. It gives me hope that at 52 I keep on learning and coming across practical wisdom from far more accomplished people.
The only thing I need to do is spend time looting his great ideas and applying them.
His course and books are excellent. A pleasant mind !uck.
His advice goes beyond giving a presentation to colleagues. Most of it can be transposed directly to engaging with civil servants and politicians. In this case, you should send them the documentation in advance of a meeting.
Tufte spells out the ethics you should deploy.
Below is an apple notes scan.
8 SMARTER PRESENTATIONS AND SHORTER MEETINGS
BEGIN ALL MEETINGS WITH A DOCUMENT (PAPER OR ELECTRONIC) AND STUDY HALL
Nonfiction meetings should begin with a silent reading of a briefing paper, narrative document, technical report – not a slide deck and bullet points. A document (paper or electronic) should be 2 to 6 pages long, written in sentences, with appropriate images and data displays. Do not send out your stuff in advance, people won’t read it.
Give people the document as they arrive or sign in, saying Read this, then we’ll talk bout it: Meetings with several topics may have several silent reading periods, Study hall is serious, 20% to 50% of total meeting time. Audience members read 2 or 3 times faster than you can talk. The document is in hand, everyone in the audience reads with their own eyes, at their own pace, their own choice of what to read closely. In slide presentations, viewers have no control over pace and sequence as the presenter clicks chrough a deck – viewers must sit in the dark waiting for the diamonds in the swamp.
Presenters, you have not lost control, you prepared the document in the first place.
Study hall is a wonderful time for presenters: people showed up, they’re all reading your stuff, and they’re not looking at you. If someone in study hall peeks at their email instead of reading, gently glare at them; the purpose of gathering together in meetings is total concentration on the content at hand. Document-based presentations naturally handle questions by answering them further down in the document. Your job is to provide intellectual leadership, which is why you are making the presentation.
Decks are easier to prepare than documents, however. Documents require coherence, thinking, sentences. But convenience in preparing decks harms the content and the audience. Optimizing presenter convenience is selfish, lazy, and worst of all, replaces thinking. Steve Jobs saying:
I hate the way people use slide presentations instead of thinking.
People who know what they’re talking about don’t need PowerPoint.
Jeff Bezos on Amazon meetings:
We have study hall at the beginning of our meetings. Staff meetings at Amazon begin with 30 minutes of silent reading. The traditional corporate meeting starts with a presentation. Somebody gets up in the front of the room and presents a PowerPoint presentation, some type of slide show. In our view you get very little information, you get bullet points. This is easy for the presenter, but difficult for the audience. And so instead, all our meetings are structured around a 6 page narrative memo.
This presentation method, beginning with a document and study hall, has a practical guarantee: meetings will be smarter and more efficient, the audience more active, and meetings 10% to 20% shorter. None ever wished them longer
CONTENT AND CREDIBILITY
Yon audience weeks to learn What is the substantive content? What are the reasons to believe the presenter? To improve presentations, improve the quality, relevance, integrity of your content. Provide a credible document, a coherent series of reasons, facts, data. If your number are boring. get bester numbers. Documents model information better than decks Data paragraphs are smarter than sentences. Sentences smarter than bullet lius. Evaluating content problecas: a sure sign of trouble is an inability to write a paragraph explaining
What the problem is
Why it is relevant, why anyone should care.
What you’re going to do to solve the problem.
Credibility derives from your reputation, data sources, comparing various viewpoints, demonstrating (briefly) mastery of detail, use of quotations from experts in the field, avoiding business school/ military/hi-tech jargon buzz words. A good way to have credibility with your colleagues is not to have lied to them last week. Your credibility depends on a continuing reputation for honest communication and getting it right.
Presentation documents should provide quotations from experts (mention their credentials) on your topic. This helps the audience learn technical jargon as used correctly by experts, and suggests to the audience that you know about what’s going on in your field. Experts can express strong views, say things presenters can’t possibly say, and demonstrate what intellectual leadership and analytical thinking look like. Quotes gets your presentation out of your own precious voice and into the voices of experts. Use quotes with specific relevance to the topic at hand, not faux- inspirational cheerleading.
The fundamental quality control mechanism for presentation integrity is documentation. Authors must be named, sponsors revealed, interests and agendas unveiled, measurements verified. Documentation is a necessary but not sufficient sign that a report was constructed with some care and integrity. Deceptive documentation may disqualify presenters from 5, as happened in medical research Every paragraph, every visualization should provide reasons to believe. Presenters should provide data downlinks with a clean code book. Fear that others may look at your data encourages getting it right in the first place
THINKING ABOUT YOUR AUDIENCE
Think the best you possibly can of your audience, behave with the greatest civility you can muster. You should be happy that people showed up to your presentation. A common error in audience research is to underestimate the audience, a big mistake. Instead have endless respect for your audience – after all, they were smart enough to attend your talk, read your document. Do not spin, pander, or dumb things down. Your job is to get it right, be honest, make everyone smarter. All three.
AFTER STUDY HALL, TIME TO TALK
Now the benefits of a document and study hall repay your work. You didn’t have to rend sies a loud rush through or worry about the audience not laughing at your jokes. After 2 to 6 pages of reading, your audience knows a lot. When you talk, do not merely repeat what they read. Instead, dig deeper and discuss relevant parts of our document, saying “In the third paragraph of the budget statement, we don’t have a consensus:’ Your audience turns to their document,handout, this one about budgetary s, you show the budget statement on the steen, perhaps even give
PRACTICE YOUR PRESENTATION: REMEARSAL IMPROVES PERFORMANCE
A grand truth about human behaviour is that rehearsal improves performance. If you have a diplomatic colleague from whom you can take criticism, have them comment during your rehearsal. A live performance or a rehearsal video will ruthlessly reveal incoherence, nervous habits and place holders like um un and so like, as I mentioned earlier so I mean like you know um like. Your audience might appear to be taking notes, but no, they re keeping score, even betting “three likes in the next minute, for a late.” Identifying problems leads to eliminating them. Rehearsals are difficult and nervous-making, but your presentations will be better. Don’t let rehearsal nerves deflect you.
SHOW UP EARLY. FINISH EARLY.
Show up early to your own presentation. As people arrive, get them started on study hall. have the document ready at each seat or screen, and a slide saying in a gracious way ‘read his now, “don’t touch your cell phone here Showing up early may deflect minor prob-lams (eg, meeting room double-booked). If you are a higher-up, make it a point to show up early; some bosses are notorious for flouncing in late with their entourage, disrespecting their colleagues.
Finish early, 10% to 20% early. People in the audience will be thrilled, amazed, and delighted. Word of what you did will spread like crazy throughout the building: They finished early, they finished early!’ As people leave, they will say ‘great meeting.’ Others might ask “When’s the next meeting?” No, they won’t … in your dreams!….
THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF SPECTATORSHIP
When you attend a presentation, stay on the content. That’s why you are there, that’s why the presenter and the objects observed are there. See with an open mind but not an empty head. Be able to change your mind. Give your undivided attention as long as you can, loot the presentation for useful material, make the best of it. Don’t let contrary elements in a presentation spoil your seeing and learning. If you require perfect agreement with presenters, stay home and stare at your immutable self in the damn mirror all day long. Just because someone disagrees with the third paragraph of your budget statement doesn’t mean that they are Satanic. Their motives are no better or worse than your own. Listen, see, think, learn. Treat presenters as you would like to be treated. (emphasis added).
Source: Edward R.Tufte, Seeing with Fresh Eyes: Meaning, Space, Data, Truth, pages 151-154 (Link)