Top 20 Reasons Presentations Suck and How To Fix Them

Geoffrey James

Too Freakin' Long

• Diagnosis: It presents way more than anybody wants to know.

• Why It Happens: The speaker is “spraying and praying” in hope that something works.

• What Results: Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz… • How to Fix It: Always make your

presentation less than half as long as you think it should be.

Complicated Graphics

• Diagnosis: It's full of busy graphics with lots of little details.

• Why It Happens: One picture is worth a thousand words, right? (Uh, wrong.)

• What Results: The audience stared glassy-eyed, then pulled out smartphones and started checking emails.

• How to Fix It: Only include simple graphics; highlight the data point that’s important

Reading from Slides• Diagnosis: The speaker reads

aloud what everyone can read for themselves.

• Why It Happens: The speaker is unprepared and using slides as a memory-jogger.

• What Results: By the third slide, the audience is ready to kill the presenter.

• How to Fix It: Use slides to reinforce your message rather than to outline your data points.

Unreadable fonts• Diagnosis: The slides have fonts

that are too fancy, too small or both.

• Why It Happens: The fonts looked great on the desktop screen; on the projector… not so much.

• What Results: The audience squints and peers and then gives up.

• How to Fix It: Use large fonts in simple faces (like Ariel); avoid boldface, italics and UPPERCASE.

Redundant content

• Diagnosis: The presentation has slides that everyone has already seen.

• Why It Happens: Somebody is trying to “standardize” on a standard presentation.

• What Results: The audience gets bored to death.

• How to Fix It: Never present the same material to the same audience twice.

Busy backgrounds

• Diagnosis: The slides have background templates that are distracting.

• Why It Happens: Somebody thought it would make the slides look more “professional.”

• What Results: The audience gets headaches trying to see what is actually on each slide.

• How to Fix It: Use a simple, single color background. Always.

All opinion and no facts

• Diagnosis: The presentation is all opinions without any supporting data.

• Why It Happens: Laziness. It’s easy to claim “leadership”; it’s harder to actually be a leader.

• What Results: The speaker's credibility with the audience leaps down the toilet.

• How to Fix It: Only state opinions that you can back up with quantifiable data.

Biz-blab• Diagnosis: The presentation is

filled with tacky business buzzwords.

• Why It Happens: The speaker wrongly thinks that biz-blab sounds “business-like.”

• What Results: The audience assumes the speaker is 1) pompous, 2) crazy, or 3) talking in tongues.

• How to Fix It: Just stop it. Please. (The horror... The horror...)

Irrelevant information• Diagnosis: The speaker

includes material that doesn’t really belong in the presentation.

• Why It Happens: The speaker isn't clear about the message that needs to be conveyed.

• What Results: The audience loses the train of thought.

• How to Fix It: Only include material that’s relevant to your overall message.

Crappy clip art

• Diagnosis: It has graphics lifted directly from a low-grade clip art library.

• Why It Happens: Somebody was trying to save a few bucks and a few minutes.

• What Results: The audience figures that the speaker is too cheap to do it right.

• How to Fix It: If you've got to use clip art, buy the good stuff.

Skipping around• Diagnosis: The speaker flips

ahead to another slide, then flipped back.

• Why It Happens The speaker is trying to edit the presentation real-time.

• What Results: The audience rightly figures the speaker isn't fully prepared.

• How to fix it: If you must improvise, do so within the structure of the presentation.

Wrong audience• Diagnosis: The presentation is on

a subject that isn't appropriate to the audience.

• Why It Happens: The presenter didn't bother to research the audience.

• What Results: The audience rightly concludes that the presenter doesn’t give a flying.

• How to Fix It: Always research your audience and customize a story to match.

Technical difficulties• Diagnosis: Something

happens that screws up the slides or the sound.

• Why It Happens: Nobody bothered to test the setup prior to the presentation.

• What Results: The audience rightly concludes that the presenter isn't prepared.

• How to Fix It: Always check, then double-check, the setup.

Introduction too long• Diagnosis: The first third of the

presentation introduces the speaker, his firm and the topic.

• Why It Happens: The speaker is used to giving a longer presentation and didn’t shorten the intro.

• What Results: Eye rolling all around as everyone wonders when the speaker will come to the point.

• How to Fix It: Never spend more than 1 minute on your introduction. Never.

Weak Attempts at Humor

• Diagnosis: The speaker tries to be a comedian but lacks the skills.

• Why It Happens: The speaker heard somewhere that humor will make a presentation better.

• What Results: Blank stares. • How to Fix It: Unless you've

got the skills, leave the humor to professional comedians.

Overly Fancy Slides

• Diagnosis: The presentation is chockablock with special effects and visual jim-cracks.

• Why It Happens: The speaker was afraid that the audience would find him boring.

• What Results: Your audience watches the pretty pictures and misses the real message.

• How to Fix it: Use the minimum visuals that you need to tell the story.

All data and no story• Diagnosis: It presents scads of

information without any context or meaning.

• Why It Happens: The speaker wrongly assumes the presentation was a lecture.

• What Results: The audience pulls out their smart phones by the time the fifth slide comes up.

• How to Fix It: Make your presentation tell a story, ideally with the audience as the heroes.

Meandering• Diagnosis: The speaker wanders

off on a tangent rather than following a train of thought.

• Why It Happens: The speaker didn’t really take the time to think the presentation through.

• What Results: The audience rightly assumes the speaker is disjointed and disorganized.

• How to Fix It: Review your presentation with a colleague, make changes, then rehearse.

Discussion Ratholes

• Diagnosis: The presentation has a slide guaranteed to pitch the discussion down a rathole.

• Why It Happens: The speaker probably didn't realize that the rathole was there.

• What Results: The audience starts arguing about the slide, making the entire exercise useless.

• How to fix it: Think through the emotional impact of EVERY slide in your deck.

Wrong Time of Day• Diagnosis: The presentation is

scheduled for when everyone's mind was elsewhere.

• Why It Happens: The speaker wrongly believe his message is too important to wait.

• What Results: The audience barely hears what is said.

• How to Fix It: Schedule presentations for a time when people will give it proper attention.