It’s really easy to create presentations that include every step that was followed, every number that was generated, every risk and issue that was dealt with, a list of every person interviewed, and the conclusions that were ultimately drawn. The most natural story for a project is the one that actually happened from step 1 through to the end. This story is also long, complicated, and unclear.
The best storytellers know how to get to the core of what’s important. Most projects take unnecessary details, make unrelated discoveries, and generally have activities that proved to be excessive. No one likes to say that the tasks they did were ultimately of little value. And it’s not that those steps had no value, they probably had to be completed before it was possible to know it didn’t matter. Simply checking the box had a value.
But the story at the end doesn’t need to mention all of those detours and extra steps. Good storytelling is able to quickly summarize the important details, give context for why they are important, and then quickly get to recommendations without extraneous information. Good presentations typically go through a lot of bad versions before the right one emerges.
Unfortunately, plenty of bad presentations also leave out detail either because of incompetence, incompleteness, not enough editing, or the work was unrelated to what was actually needed to get a conclusion. Being able to tell the difference between the two is critical if you want to get right answers. I’d even venture that 9 out of 10 “good looking” presentations fall into the bad category.
I come across a lot of conclusions that missed the real details of what should have been important. Usually, it’s as simple as:
- Verify the problem
- Review the root cause issues
- Address how to improve the issues
- Recommendation/next steps
It’s that easy.