The Slaid Way
Our Philosophy
Youthful innovation
At Slaid, we are tired of doing things the way they have been done since forever. Sometimes there is a reason why that is, but many other times the status quo just does not get questioned, and we are here to take a stance against that.
Sure, many common tips for becoming better presenters make sense, e.g., communicate with purpose and let the narrative guide you, but, in addition to being intuitive for most, they do not contribute to being better presenters, as they say little about the execution.
Slaid is here to break away from the constraints of legacy. Know the rules, sure, but break away from them as soon as you feel limited. There is no correct way to make and give a presentation but the one that feels right to the presenter.
Use everything your intuition says it’s right: every tool, every medium, every idea, every gimmick and feature you can think of. Audiences have attended a billion of the same good presentations, take gambles and shock them to be the first memorable one.
Passion has been long overlooked by professionals as key element of all presentations, and there is no passion in standardization.
For the team at Slaid, presentations are not a plan B that we have pivoted to after our careers took a turn for the worst, but our very own purpose, the thing that lights up each of our member’s eyes when it comes up as a topic at the bar.
Multidimensional presentations
There is a lot to presentations other than aesthetics and delivery, so much more than most people usually think of.
The features of a presentation include a myriad of other crucial aspects that may be overlooked: the degree to which the audience is asked to interact, the role of visual aid, the tone of voice, the measure of warmth and personality, and more.
Every presenter, when preparing and eventually giving a presentation, takes a decision for all of these elements above; however, most do so without being aware, thus wasting a lot of potential that would otherwise be expressed.
Intimacy and ownership
There is a degree of intimacy to making and giving presentations. Often, they represent a moment where we are subjecting our ideas to the world, perhaps for the first time, thus making us vulnerable and exposed to stakeholders.
Furthermore, they can represent a bottleneck to the future of our ideas, since presentations often serve as a tool for briefing higher-ups and people with authority, which raises the stakes of being able to own each presentation.
In light of this, Slaid’s role becomes one of empowerment of its users. Rather than taking over and including our touch, the purpose of our collaboration is to elevate customers and enable them to take ownership of their content.
We believe that everybody is the best possible figurhead for their own presentations, and there is no way to fully replace them in the design or delivery stages, and reach a better result than involving the original creator in the process.
It’s not that serious
Here at Slaid, we believe that presentations are not something that should cause stress and anxiety. Don’t get us wrong, they are our favourite thing in the world to do, but most people get way too worked-up and lose focus on what’s important.
A presentation should reflect your personality and style, and serve the ideas you are trying to communicate. There are (almost) no rules for how a presentation is supposed to look like, as long as there is a lot of you in it. If you do not feel comfortable in making the presentation, reharsing it, or presenting it, something’s wrong and you should refocus on what’s important.
That’s where we disagree with most other educators that train professionals on making and giving presentations, since they prepare decent presenters, but ones that remain monotonous, robotic, and ultimately unmemorable.
