2012 log
We all know the adage. Â We all know it’s true. Â (Okay, there are pictures out there that aren’t worth the price of the crayons they’ve been drawn with – the London 2012 logo, anyone?) Â But generally it’s true.
So why do people use bullet points? Â Errrr….. pass.
image of debt
I recently came across this graphic recently, which I think nicely illustrates the point (thanks to http://justaddwater.dk/). Â It’s a very simple visual of who owes money to whom, in Europe. Â It’s from the New York Times, which is why everything is converted to dollars but that doesn’t matter.
Take a look at it, and think for a moment…. if you’d got to provide that amount of information in bullet points, how many slides would you need and (more importantly) how many people in your audience would be listening at the end of your presentation! Â (Actually, forget about listening to your presentation, ask yourself how many of them would even be awake at the end of your presentation!)
Great point – but I wouldn’t necessarily agree that this diagram could be classed as a ‘ very simple’ visual! If you put this on a slide, it would confuse and bore an audience *almost* as much as bullet points. As an infographic it works well, but there is still too much information here for a slide.
It could, however, be made to work without text, with all but the most important figures were removed, and if the diagram were to animate in in stages, so that the audience were not asked to process that amount of data at one time.
The point still stands, though. Bullet points just can’t explain this sort of thing effectively – pictures and diagrams will make a huge difference to audience understanding and attention levels.
Fair point – as I mentioned, it was from the NYTimes, so it’s origins are print. For a slide I’d still want to strip down further – no text for example! You’re absolutely right.
Wow, I didn’t know there was a blog about presentation!
This is a great example of some creativity used in presentations.
But Simon, what about us who can’t really come up with creative ideas? What can we do? Is there a systematic approach to generating creative ideas like this one for presentations?
Best,
Darren Search
HI Daren – a very good question!
To be honest, I’m not sure there are many people who can’t come up with any creative ideas! It’s harder for some, sure, but I’ve never trained anyone who couldn’t get it (eventually! :) )
There’s a whole host of techniques called “creative thinking techniques” which you can Google when you’ve got time but to be honest, one of the most simple techniques is simply to put your concept (in quotes) into google/images. You’ll be amazed at how often something pops up which grabs your imagination!
S