PowerPoint Storytelling: Build a Powerful Structure to

Presentation.

When building a presentation, regardless of who the audience is, we have one primary goal: to make it
as easy as possible for the audience to understand what you’re trying to tell them. And this can be
difficult – business presentations tend to have a lot of data and information, and it can be hard for the
audience to grasp the key insights right away. Especially if they’re trying to also listen to the speaker and
think about what they’re gonna say in response.

Structure is the backbone for any presentation: never neglect it

Structure, structure and structure again. This is how you can get people to understand, agree with and
remember any presentation you create and deliver. A presentation without structure is a presentation
without logic. And would you trust and follow people without logic? I bet not. So why should they trust
and follow the ideas your present if they are not structured?

So when building your deck, it’s especially important to make sure it’s structured in a way that makes it
clear, insightful, and engaging. It’s something top consulting firms do really well, thanks in part to two
important concepts: the Pyramid Principle & the SCQA framework.

The Pyramid Principle: how it works

The Pyramid principle is a hierarchical structure to create a logic and data-supported
storyline. It should be prepared in advance. To make it short, your presentation needs to
start with an introduction that states both the issue and your answer, and the rest of the
presentation is here to support your answer.
That key message is supported by a combination of supporting arguments that,
together, create a logical storyline naturally leading to conclude that your key message
is true. Each supporting argument is made irrefutable with the help of supporting data.
Step 1: build the SCQA logic

First things first, you need to make clear what you are going to talk about, why it’s important, what
problem you are going to answer, and what your answer will be. This will make sure that you are on
topic, and it will allow your audience to clearly identify where you are going. It is called the SCQA:

 Situation: describe who or what we are talking about (e.g. “The client is a leading car
manufacturer”)

 Complication: you wouldn’t be here if everything was good, so what’s wrong? (e.g. “the client is
losing money”)

 Question: formulate what you are trying to solve. It needs to be a single and simple question.
(e.g. “how can the client make profit again?”)

 Answer: the brilliant solution you have found out or worked on to solve the question (e.g. “the
client needs to focus his effort on the light vehicles segment of the market”)
Step 2: write the logic that supports your answer
Now people now what your answer is, but they do not necessarily agree. You need to
convince them that your statement is strong and relies on solid logic.
Define the supporting arguments that, together, lead to your conclusion. The supporting
arguments should be MECE (Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive).
For instance, if you recommend focusing on the light vehicles segment, three supporting
arguments could be “the light vehicles segment has the highest margin”, “that segment
is currently growing” and “we have the ability to capture a good share of this market”.
Depending on the size of your presentation of on the complexity of the topic, each
supporting argument can be itself supported by sub-arguments.

Step 3: back your arguments with supporting data

You have probably done some research or analysis before you have reached to your conclusion. This is
where you use it.

Don’t just make statements, bring proof. If one of your supporting arguments is “the light vehicle
segment has the highest growth”, then back it with a comparison chart that will clearly show that the
growth in this segment is the highest, and that your argument is irrefutable.

If you have a lot of data to support your arguments, you can also just state the gist of it and keep the
details in annexes.

Step 4: write the introduction

A presentation needs to start with a clear introduction. Most of the time, people don’t read your slides
until the end (oh sorry, I though you already knew that). Also very often in business meetings, some
people have to leave before you are done, or you get short on time. And if you haven’t reached your
brilliant conclusion yet, you never will or nobody will hear you. People will be distracted, tired, bored or
hungry and will not be paying attention anymore.

So make sure everything that really matters is in the introduction. That way you are sure everyone hears
it.

And what people absolutely need to know is the SCQA logic you have already done in the very
beginning. So just reuse if to write your introduction! You can also add in your introduction the key
supporting arguments for your answer. If you don’t, people will probably interrupt with a question like
“why is that your recommendation?” which is also fine, since it logically leads you to the slides that
come next.

Step 5: challenge your structure

Now that you have your SCQA storyline, your supporting logic, the data to back it and a concise
introduction, you are ready to challenge your structure. You don't want to spend hours producing
dozens of slides before you get challenged and have to change it all, do you?

So as far as you possibly can, stop right here, go meet some colleagues or your boss and make sure
people are convinced with your presentation's structure. If you structure is solid it should resist. If it
doesn't then you will just need to rework the structure, not a huge number of slides.

Step 6: prepare the rest of your slides

Now that you have defined your logic and what piece of data is going to support it, just make the
corresponding slides. It should be much easier now that you know exactly where you are going.

Make sure your titles reflect that logic and that if people only read the title (like that guy sitting last row
in the room who forgot his glasses), they will still understand your storyline.

Remember to use action titles, i.e. actual sentences with a verb in it. In that way people don't need to
guess what your point is or interpret the content of your slide.