More slides, more words, less credibility
- Michael Rickwood
- Mar 11
- 2 min read
Many professionals still believe credibility comes from explaining more.
More context
More background.
More slides.
More words.
I’ve seen this pattern again and again in meeting rooms throughout my career. We all know it kills our audiences but sometimes company culture or fear can override this.
Over the years, I’ve sat in on meetings in large institutions, including UN organisations, where the material was prepared for senior leaders, yet was so dense it struggled to separate what was truly crucial from what was simply content.
Too many slides.
Too much text.
Poor visual design.
And speakers are trying to narrate everything at once.
And the surprising thing? In an AI world of advanced productivity. This is still happening today.
AI is not solving this problem, btw. In many cases, it is making it worse by generating even more content without improving the judgment behind it.
To be clear, I’m not arguing for elegance over accuracy. Complex issues are complex. Some leaders will ask for detail. Sometimes organisational politics makes it difficult to remove material.
But dense slides combined with rambling delivery rarely help anyone decide, and its draining precious cognitive energy from all involved.
Senior leaders often interpret over-explaining very differently from how it is intended.
It can signal:
• uncertainty
• lack of prioritisation
• fear of judgment
• covering one’s own position
What experienced leaders are actually looking for is something else. Not just simplification, but the judgment to decide what matters and what can wait.
A useful structure is often surprisingly simple:
Here’s the issue.
Here’s the decision.
Here’s the risk.
You can present that in ten minutes and then open the room for questions. Many organisations already use this approach because it respects how senior decision-making actually works.
Senior leaders are constantly making trade-offs. They don’t need the entire map at once.
Your job is to filter the signal and help them decide.
And above all, reduce cognitive friction.
Checkout my website vortolocoaching.com for more articles
I run one-off diagnostic sessions for leaders looking to sharpen their leadership readability. It’s called Executive Signal Calibration.
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