Strengths
To put it somewhat ineloquently, Jesse Desjardins’ You Suck At PowerPoint! SlideShare deck is awesome. We’re typically a rather tough crowd to please, but Desjardins really knocked this one out of the park. The use of a gray-scale color scheme for the content heavy slides, and bright colors for section breaks and main points, makes the deck feel fresh and engaging. The splashes of electric color keep the eye visually interested and overall, the contrast between gray and color, as well as the retro images, lends the deck a Pop Art feel, which we love.
The images Desjardins uses throughout are excellent. They’re entertaining and engaging, revealing a great sense of humor. He does well to make them large and interesting, and they look consistent throughout the deck. We also like the placement of type on the photos. Desjardins allows for enough open space around the type to draw emphasis to both the image and the text.
Some of our favorite slides in the deck are the objective slides that reveal Desjardins’ main points, “Mistake 1: Too Much Info” “Mistake 2: Not Enough Visuals” etc. The use of a pink overlay on the black and white photo breaks up the deck masterfully, while keeping the style consistent. And numbers on each– yellow inside a blue circle– are eye-catching, as is the large type on slide.
Most importantly, the design of the deck aligns perfectly with the subject matter. Imagine if a presentation on this topic–– the five design mistakes you need to avoid when working with PowerPoint–– was poorly designed. It would be wildly ironic. Luckily, Desjardins knows what he’s doing, and in keeping with his main points, ends up with a wonderfully designed presentation.
Content
You Suck At PowerPoint! isn’t just effective in its brilliant design, it’s also equally as masterful in its content. Rather than jump immediately into his 5 main points, Desjardins begins smartly with an introduction, explaining to viewers why they should care in the first place. He does this humorously, (“Unfortunately, if they [your slides] suck, so do you.”) which is an easy way to connect with an audience right off the bat. Everyone likes to laugh, and laugh they can, throughout Desjardins’ deck.
We kept exclaiming, “Yes, yes, yes,” when viewing this presentation, so it’s safe to say we agree with Desjardins’ five main points. He covers, with concision, essential characteristics of presentation design that we spend day after day championing at Ethos3. Also, we really like how he gives viewers practical resources by including specific websites to refer to when working.
Finally, we love the last couple slides, which allow the presentation to end on a high note. The “you sign here,” if you “promise to never design a presentation that sucks ever again,” is hilarious. And we laughed aloud at the final call to action: “Now go on tiger, we need you to not suck.” So take Desjardins’ apt advice and don’t suck at your next presentation.
