Have you ever noticed our brains like to avoid hard work?

‍
Imagine you are driving up a road and see a traffic sign with a speed limit of (273+27)/6km/hr. What would you do? Slow down, do the arithmetic and potentially cause a car accident? Or would you simply continue driving and ignore the traffic sign?

‍

Well, chances are high you would simply ignore the sign. It turns out our brains are lazy. We like thinking fast and avoid thinking slowly, according to Nobel prizewinner Daniel Kahneman. Our actions and opinions often result from snapshot judgments. Our communication only succeeds when the listener can quickly connect to our message.

‍

Translating these principles to presentation design is clear: no excuse for crowded slides! The audience prefers to think fast and wants to process the slide in a few seconds. So safeguard your presentation from crashes and stick to simple speed limits. As it turns out, 50 km/h is more than difficult enough ;-).

‍