Thread by @d_yellowlees

How to build slide decks fast. ⚡

Building slides so often kills time!

Here’s my guide to making endless reusable slides to help you build quickly🧵

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🤔Stop thinking about the presentation as 1 long 10 minute thing.

Big talks, are made of smaller bits of content, things you say in every talk.

These are content chunks.

• That introduction you always do
• That key finding
• the story you always tell
• the method you used

💡 Stop thinking about slides as more than one bit of information

For this to work every bit of key information must have its own slide

This may mean having lots of slides, but that doesn’t matter

1 key idea = 1 slide

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📄➡️📊

Each content chunk has its own slide or set (or slides if it's a long one)

Consistently branded and formatted.

Nothing on there you can’t show in every talk, eg institution logos

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⏱️ A long presentation is made up of several content chunks. I have chunks which are 1 min, and some which are 5mins.

Some can be lengthened or cut down.

The key is that this is content I deliver often - not stuff I need to rewrite and learn every time
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Make the slides really simple:

🚫 no bullet points (more than 1 idea)

🖼️ 1 pic or icon

🔠 1or 3 words no more.

📉 1 graph or figure

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🎵 Note: if you need help finding icons or images to match your content go follow @EvansNifty and check out her visuals database of dreams. ↓

padlet.com/evansemporiums…

📝 As an example here are the slides for my chunk on body language.

(It's actually 5 chunks - body, eyes, ticks, emotion, nerves)

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🤏 The smaller you can chunk the better, get down to 1 slide chunks if you can.

Big chunks are made of small chunks

Save your mini slide decks in one master slide deck of all your chunks

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📄 For any given talk, plan out the content chunks, the order and the flow. Write new links between them if you need.

In text (not in PowerPoint) - ppt is rubbish for this.

Mine looks like this 👇

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©️ Copy and paste the relevant slides from your master slide deck

Because the slides are simple and only refer to one point, they can be used in new configurations without editing

At most, you’ll have to write maybe 1 or 2 new chunks

Add any new slides to the master deck.

💬 Researchers talk often and about the same or similar things. This means you can build your master deck and the number of content chunks you ‘know’ over time.

We’re not starting from scratch every time - but its still bespoke

Mix and match for new audiences and situations.

TLDR: Endless reusable slides

🤏Use the power of content chunking to speed up making your talks

💡1 slide = 1 key idea/chunk

🔻 Build a master slide deck

©️ Copy and paste as you need

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