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Visual Storyteller
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BOS —> ATL
What’re UX designers making at big tech?
UBER & LYFT puts tomorrow?
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Chief
Go back to English 101. Write a 1 sentence thesis. What is the end result you want everyone to know. Everything else flows from that. Everything else tells the story.
Story boarding helps some, outlining others. But the key is to determine the story before you start making slides.
It's one of those things that is hard to teach, but once you get it then you wonder why it was ever a concern.
Use your network, lean on the M/SM to help you structure - you'll only need to do this 3 or 4 times and you'll get it.
Also it's worth noting that generally in order to build a 20 slide deliverable you will make 150 slides that get either consolidated, junked or related to the appendix - that's just the process and it's totally normal, you won't (or at be least not until you've got 15+ years experience of doing this behind you) get 20 slides structured and created perfectly on the first time of asking
The problem here is that nowadays people aren't used to the natural slide evolution and attrition because it used to happen in "war rooms" (a physical office where the entire team collocated and worked on slides side by side so changes were just a natural thing). Hybrid/remote work has meant that people tend to think "it's done" much quicker than they used to - which means when someone tells you it's pants it hurts harder
Empathy. Step into your audience’s shoes. What is the 1 key thing you want them to take away? And what do you want them to do? Think about why they’re receptive and also their barriers to believing this.
Open notepad so there’s no distractions with formatting.
List the slides you plan to make, short titles that note the point of the slide
Once you’re satisfied with the organization and flow of that, add 2-3 things under each title that will be the content of the slide. A graph of x. A table with abc columns. Etc. a diagram of z.
Once you’re satisfied with that, go make the slides. Sometimes if I want to iterate the visuals more like what kind of graph - I’ll storyboard them on paper first.
Yeah I always outline the flow and beginning, middle, and end, evidence im going to use, etc in a Word doc or something first so you don’t get distracted by trying to do graphics at the same time. Only make one point or argument per slide.
Chief
Whether slides or building a website or designing a process…. a pencil and big sheet of paper can really help focus you ideas/story.
I think through the key things that need to be communicated as a summary slide and then layout my slides (blank w/ titles) for other key areas we need detail on (or those that might be required). That helps me at least to think through priorities in the presentation
There's a format. Hey we see you're good at this. We think that doing this with this systematic approach will bring you more money. Here is the process. Here is the team. Thanks for your time. Here is my information. Please stay in constant contact so we can make sure this is done correctly.
Keep it succinct and watch redundant information. The storyline is we can make you more money.
Create a blank slide and just write a story, then build shell slides following that story, then fill those with content
I use PowerPoint with company branding. Add tables and text as needed. The wording comes naturally and from experience. Charts are used as well.