Becoming a Slidesmith
Cohort-based Course
Practical and proven strategies for technical experts to build slides that enhance your credibility by elevating cognitive ease.
Becoming a Slidesmith
Cohort-based Course
Practical and proven strategies for technical experts to build slides that enhance your credibility by elevating cognitive ease.
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Course overview
Describe the transformation students will have in your course
Say goodbye to presentations full of text and empty of impact. You will design intentional slides like a pro; without having to become a designer!
You will be pleasantly surprised at the slides you create after this course! And shake your head with a smile when you see your old slides - this is called personal growth.
Total time investment - 6 hours spread over 2 weeks.
The course is delivered in 3 stages in 6 hours; 3 hours self-paced , 3 hours live sessions on Zoom spread over 2 weeks.
Stage1 - Self-paced : 3 hours
This course uses an inverted teaching method - which means you'll get full access to all the instructions via short videos. Total duration is 3 hours.
Stage2 - Instructor-led : 2 hours
We then meet as a group to work on your slides to polish them and give them a professional touch in two interactive sessions 60 minutes each.
Stage3 - Expert-led : 1 hour
60-minute live session on narrating compelling story through slides; leveraging the strategies from the course for storytelling.
Lastly, you'll connect with other cohort members to accelerate your learning through examples, others' insights, and implementation.
With this course, you'll leverage the 80/20 principle on your slides to increase cognitive ease using simple, practical, and proven strategies.
Recorded course contents cover the following topics.
1. The principle of cognitive ease to enhance your credibility
2. Starting with WHY before creating a single slide on your deck
3. How style & structure impact your presentation flow
4. Leveraging the power of layouts for crafting your message
5. How to harness the power of slide titles
6. Using ART framework for text slides
7. How to orchestrate visual path and hierarchy
8. Punctuating your audience's thinking via chunking
9. Storytelling in bits & pieces via builds
10. How can pictures impact your audience
11. The 4-step process for impactful data visualization
12. Sample layouts for applying these strategies during the course
Who is this course for
01
Senior Engineers, Tech Leads, and EMs who create high-stake presentations to communicate with their leadership & cross-functional partners.
02
PMs, TPMs, and other functional team members who aren't yet comfortable building presentations or take a long time to build one.
03
Anyone whose role involves building presentations and they have more than 6 lines on several slides on your deck! That's a good indicator.
What you’ll get out of this course
How to put your audience at the center?
You'll learn a framework to brainstorm your presentation goals to ensure your time and effort matter and make an impact on the audience.
How to design slides that reflect cognitive ease?
You'll learn strategies and proven tools to use text, color and visuals effectively to lead the audience on your story path.
How to reduce the terror of text on slides?
You'll reduce text on your slides by using the concept of information chunking and leveraging pre-built content types and layouts.
How to create effective data visualization?
You'll learn a 4-step process for creating an appropriate and appealing graph or chart. You'll also master the art of eliminating distractions and orienting attention from your visualizations.
Live master class on "Visual Storytelling with Slides" by Kelvin Gee
Kelvin Gee has 20+ years of experience as a demand generation marketer who focused on Modern Marketing Enablement and Training on topics like visual storytelling. Kelvin was the Head of Strategic Client Marketing at Oracle.
Becoming a Slidesmith
Course syllabus
Week 1
Week 1
Dec 7—Dec 10
Events
- Dec
7
Slide Dojo:Session1
Slide Dojo:Session1
Thu, Dec 7, 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM UTC
Modules
- Module1:Introduction & Big PictureModule1:Introduction & Big Picture3 Lessons
- Module2:Style & StructureModule2:Style & Structure2 Lessons
- Module3:Working with TextModule3:Working with Text2 Lessons
- Module4:Organizing InformationModule4:Organizing Information3 Lessons
- Module5:Working with VisualsModule5:Working with Visuals2 Lessons
- Additional ResourcesAdditional Resources2 Lessons
Week 2
Week 2
Dec 11—Dec 14
Events
- Dec
12
Visual Storytelling with Slides - Live session by Kelvin Gee
Visual Storytelling with Slides - Live session by Kelvin Gee
Tue, Dec 12, 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM UTC
- Dec
14
Slide Dojo:Session2
Slide Dojo:Session2
Thu, Dec 14, 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM UTC
What people are saying
Umang Vanjara
Nassar Stoertz
Ursula Ortiz Banda
Vijay Kumar
Meet your instructor
Pramoda Vyasarao
CEO & Founder of Changesmith
I became an engineering manager in 2008. My role involved close interactions with Marketing and sales leaders at Oracle.
I was inspired by their ability to narrate stories using compelling slides. I attended various trainings, read books, and engaged in 1:1 mentoring to hone to become a Slidesmith.
Over time, people started admiring my slides after presentations. That's when I started teaching these skills to other engineers and managers. I ran monthly courses to help others.
If you're looking to add a professional touch to your slides without investing hours of training, this course is for you!
Course schedule
3 hours per week
Self-paced video consumption
1 to 2 hours a week
Curated video content will take 3 hours to complete. Take an existing slide you have while you watch these videos.
It's recommended to watch this in multiple sittings as opposed to watching all at once.
After watching a lesson, apply what you learned immediately on your slide.
Thursday Live Sessions
8AM to 9AM Pacific Time, 12/7 and 12/14
On Thursdays, 7th and 14th December, we will come together as a community to polish your slides from the strategies you learned in the pre-class videos.
We'll have breakout rooms to learn from other participants' slides and understand their perspectives.
Guest Lecture on Visual Storytelling with Slides
8AM to 9AM Pacific Time, 12th December
Kelvin Gee has 20+ years of experience as a demand generation marketer who focused on Modern Marketing Enablement and Training on topics like visual storytelling. Kelvin was the Head of Strategic Client Marketing at Oracle.
3 Core Principles of Slidesmith
In this 8-minute video, you'll learn the core principles behind "Becoming a Slidesmith".
You'll understand the causes and consequences of cognitive ease. This knowledge will help you design and frame your slides to amplify your credibility.
Credibility + Cognitive ease = Impact on your audience!
Get this free video
Learning is better with cohorts
Active hands-on learning
You bring your slides to this course. Start making changes immediately while watching recorded videos and polish your slides - you'll apply theory to practice in minutes!
Interactive and project-based
You'll review your slides and embellish them in two 60-minute "Slide Dojo" sessions. This is an opportunity for deliberate practice with feedback on your work.
Learn with a cohort of peers
Join a community of like-minded people who want to learn and grow alongside you. You'll interact with the community during and after the course for feedback on your slides. In breakout rooms, you'll see how others apply the Slidesmith strategies on their slides.
