Sometimes it’s the little things that set me off. I have mentioned many times that I am so old school business that at this point I am probably an anachronism. I believe in clarity. I believe in definition. I believe in simplicity. In today’s world of ever increasing complexity and confusion the ability to bring clarity and focus to an issue is the sign of a leader. This is business. We are not trying to understand the tabulated data associated with the new types of matter that have recently been observed at the Large Hadron Collider, nor are we supposed to be analyzing Mendlebrot patterns and images associated with understanding chaos theory as it applies to structures found in nature. Unfortunately it seems we are drifting in this direction when it comes to reviewing our business performance.

Periodically good businesses review how they are doing with various sales, financial and operational reviews. The standard form of communicating information in the business world in these types of reviews is the PowerPoint chart. PowerPoint charts are an excellent medium for communicating information and images. Images are more quickly comprehended and better retained than written verbiage by the viewer. Since we usually have only a limited time for these reviews, we tend to use PowerPoint charts as the medium for review in them.

Excel spreadsheets are good also. Since we use numbers in our measurements and metrics they fit well in the spreadsheet format where they can more easily be manipulated. So what do we do? We embed Excel spreadsheets in our PowerPoint Charts. We also need a few bullet points on the chart to explain certain items and draw attention to specific points that we want to make. We must now make the Spreadsheet smaller to accommodate the added information of the bullet points, which must all be contained on the chart.

Because the spreadsheet is tabulated data and we know that management does not want to have to read the tabulated data we do two additional things to the chart. We color code the cells on the spreadsheet so that management can just look at the color Red, Yellow, Green, and understand if it is a good number or a bad number, sometimes without having to actually understand the number or what it means. We also add at least one pie chart or candle chart to the slide to graphically represent the now color coded numbers on the spreadsheet that have been explained by the bullets on the slide, since we know that images are better understood and retained.

We can now move on to the second slide in the deck.

And so the chart deck grows. There are now charts on topics that are required to be covered by management, charts explaining the charts that are required to be covered, topics that are not required but are being covered because the presenter wants to cover them, charts explaining these charts, and then there are the “backup” charts that are there just in case there is a question that can be easily covered by one of these charts.

Team members are invariably only allocated about half the time they would require to present the number of charts that have been created for the purpose of the review. Instead of removing charts, and summarizing some of the information from the deck, what normally happens is that charts are consolidated. Two charts, or in some instances as many as four charts are reduced in size and put on a single chart. The number of charts in the deck has successfully been reduced. The amount of information in the deck has been retained. There is now no possibility that the team member will be able to present the reduced number of charts within the allotted time. The probability of audience comprehension has also been reduced due to the quantity and complexity of the charts.

Now reviews take too long because of the amount and complexity of the information that is trying to be captured in each single chart. The value of the review is diminished because the comprehension level of the review audience has been reduced due to the complicated formats and quantity of information on each chart. A communication format that is designed to communicate simple images and information that can be quickly understood and processed has been turned into a multimedia structure that has lost much of its value due to the complexity that has been added.

PowerPoint charts are supposed to be simple. By necessity that means that they need to be communicating summary information. PowerPoint charts are a structure well suited for providing a few specific details, not all of the details. They are designed to help communicate through the use of images, a few simple images. If there are too many images on a chart, none of them get well retained by the viewer and they will all lose their value.

Normal writing as it appears on the printed page is usually ten to twelve point font. This is too small for a chart. You are not writing a document, you are creating a chart. If you find you have to reduce the font on your chart to this level to accommodate all the information you want to provide on the chart there is a problem. Either reduce the amount and detail of the content, or put it on a separate chart so people can read it more easily. I have been told a good rule of thumb is no more than five to six bullet points of eight to ten words maximum. Any more than that and you are getting too verbose for PowerPoint.

Finally, if you cannot present your topic in approximately twenty charts, with twenty five as a maximum, you have a problem. You are either wanting or trying to present way too much information. It is a review. I have seen multi-billion dollar business units presented concisely in twenty charts. It can be done. You need to know and understand the detail of what you are reviewing. The audience does not. They want a summary of what you know. If there are questions, or more detail is desired, they will ask.

We need to simplify our charts. It will help simplify our messages. Simple messages help us focus on the issues. When we focus on the issues we have a tendency to solve them. While complex slides may initially look impressive, more complexity is usually not the answer to any question.