But it’s only 40 slides – a common training mistake

In business it is not only training team members that develop training materials, but local experts and specialists.

Often I hear a subject specialist say things like “we need to educate users to do things differently, it wont take long, it is only 40 slides”

On its own 40 slides as a framework is not significant, but we need to look at things from the learners perspective.

When using a slide deck it is not unreasonable to expect each slide to take 1 to 2 minutes to explain. So a 40 slide deck will take about 1 hour with context and questions. Again in isolation does not seem unreasonable.

Context

this could be an additional slide deck to existing training, of 10 such decks, we are looking at adding to the existing 400 slides.

In addition, how long does the task take to do “in the real world”. If the actual task only takes 1-2 minutes, then an additional hour to explain this is way too much! We also need to think about our learners, will they remember 1hr or 40 slides for a 1 minute activity.

Look at the whole

When designing any training, even if it is a change, we need to understand the learning load around this one “small” pack. Will most users be able to maintain their attention? Will they just switch off?

Do we really need 40 slides for a 1 minute task?

Perhaps there is a better way!

Presentations

Presentations are not training.

40 slides for any presentation is IMHO way too many! – what are the key 7 points that people need to know? If its more than that – one presentation wont work – it is too much data

Powerpoint can be a great tool for training technical subjects but it can easily be over done!

see Pech Kucha technique on how to use 20 slides really effectively!