This article is part of Make It Land, a 5-part series on leadership communication. Each essay explores a different reason why an idea can fail to land with the audience. The pieces stand alone. Together they reflect on a simple leadership discipline: communicating so that ideas are understood, remembered and acted upon.
Leadership Communication Principle:
If your deck works perfectly well without you in the room, you should not be in the room either.
On January 28, 1986, Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart 73 seconds after launch, killing all seven crew members. The failure was caused by the rupture of an O-ring seal in the right solid rocket booster, a component that had not been tested adequately in cold temperatures.
The night before the launch, engineers at Morton Thiokol had serious concerns. They knew that temperatures at Cape Canaveral were forecast to drop to 26-29°F at launch time, well below the 53°F temperature at which O-rings had previously shown damage. They prepared a presentation to recommend postponing the launch.
The engineers had data. They had evidence of O-ring erosion in previous cold-weather launches. They had legitimate concerns about structural integrity.
They presented their case using slides.
In his analysis The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint, information design expert Edward Tufte examined the presentation structure. He found that critical information was buried in bullet points. The severity of risk was not visually prioritized. Technical data was presented in formats that obscured rather than clarified the engineers’ concerns. Recommendations were tentative rather than directive.
NASA managers, under schedule pressure and without clear visual hierarchy to guide their attention, interpreted the presentation as inconclusive. Morton Thiokol’s senior management eventually reversed the engineers’ recommendation and gave approval to launch.
The Presidential Commission investigating the disaster later concluded that the decision-making process was flawed and that concerns about O-ring performance in cold weather had not been adequately communicated or resolved.
The engineers knew the risk. The slides failed to convey it with the force it required.
PowerPoint Will Not Do Your Job:
Slides are not a script. They are not a document. They are not a substitute for clarity and they are certainly not a replacement for the presenter’s judgment.
A presentation is a communication event. Something must happen in the room that could not happen without you. If your slides can be read and understood in your absence, not only are you surplus to requirements but you are also circulating a document disguised as a deck.
The problem is not PowerPoint. The problem is the belief that slides themselves carry the message.
They do not.
Three Types of Presentations
Not all presentations serve the same purpose. The structure that works for one will fail for another. Before building your deck, know what you are trying to do.
What Good Slides Actually Do:
Good slides anchor. They give the audience a place to look while you talk. They provide visual reference points that make abstract ideas concrete. They help people remember what you said after you have left the room.
But they do not carry the message. You do.
The Challenger Lesson:
The Challenger disaster was not caused by slides. It was caused by organizational pressure, flawed decision-making processes and a failure to elevate engineering concerns to the level they required.
The slides did not help.
Tufte’s analysis demonstrated how the visual presentation of data can either clarify or obscure risk. In high-stakes decisions, clarity is not optional. It is a leadership responsibility.
When someone knows something critical, the communication structure must allow that knowledge to land with the force it deserves. Slides that diffuse urgency, bury recommendations or rely on inference fail that test.
The presenter’s job is to ensure the message is received.
A Question for Reflection:
Before your next presentation, ask yourself:
- What am I trying to do: inform, persuade or align?
- What would I say if I had no slides at all?
- Is my presence doing work that the slides cannot?
If you cannot answer those questions clearly, your audience will not be able to either.
References
Heath C, Heath D. (2013). Decisive: How to Make Better Choices in Life and Work. Crown Business.
Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident. (1986). Report to the President. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.
Tufte ER. (2006). The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint: Pitching Out Corrupts Within. 2nd ed. Graphics Press.