5-minute presentation training

You Can Present Your Work.
Just Follow a Formula.

(hopefully they're charts)

The Five-Step Formula

Every chart on this page uses the same delivery sequence. Memorize these five steps and you won't worry about what to say next. The formula applies to most visuals an analyst would create and present.

  1. Explain the horizontal axis.
  2. Explain the vertical axis.
  3. Walk through the legend or groups.
  4. Put one number into a sentence.
  5. Share the takeaway.

Before the case · Why the formula matters

Bad example

You can't present every chart. If a chart is too busy the creator didn't spend enough time on it.

WeWork — Everything We Could Possibly Measure

Too many metrics · too many scales · no single number · no clear takeaway

$2.0B $1.5B $1.0B $0.5B $0 − 600K 450K 300K 150K $47B val −$1.06 SoftBank in $47B round S-1 filed IPO pulled Revenue Net loss Members Locations Rev/member Gross margin Valuation revenue doubles but loss too? growth = proof? of what, exactly is this dollars? or members? 2016 2016 H2 2017 2018 2019 H1 IPO Legend: revenue, net loss, memberships, locations, revenue per member, gross margin, cash burn, valuation, funding rounds, events, and management actions

This chart resembles the same WeWork story, but it is not ready to present. Revenue, net loss, memberships, locations, gross margin, cash burn, and the valuation all share one frame, on scales that don't belong together, with no single number the audience can hold onto.

Do not judge your presentation ability by a slide like this. No one can present it clearly because the slide does not give the presenter a path. We are going to tell the same story one chart at a time.

Practice Case · WeWork 2016–2019

The story we will use for practice

To practice the formula, we need a story with real charts and a clear narrative. We will use WeWork from 2016 to 2019.

WeWork leased office buildings on long contracts, fixed them up, and rented out the desks on short, flexible terms. From 2016 to 2018 revenue doubled every single year. Investors saw a number going up and to the right, and they treated that growth as proof the business worked. By January 2019 the company was valued at $47 billion.

Doubling revenue is the kind of headline that ends the conversation. But a growth number only tells you the company is getting bigger. It does not tell you whether getting bigger is making the company healthier. The question nobody on stage was asking: as WeWork doubled, was each new dollar of revenue costing less to earn, or more? When you have to choose one number to judge a company, do not let the most flattering one stand in for the rest.

WeWork filed to go public in August 2019 and pulled the IPO five weeks later. The four charts below give us enough story to practice with. The chart type changes. The delivery method does not.

Chart 1 of 4 · Bar chart

Slide takeaway

Revenue doubled every year — the headline looked spectacular.

WeWork — Annual Revenue

Calendar year · USD billions · 2016–2018

$2.0B $1.5B $1.0B $0.5B $0 $0.4B 2016 $0.9B 2017 $1.8B 2018 more than doubled ×4 in two years

Source: WeWork S-1, filed August 2019. WeWork's fiscal year is the calendar year. Navy bars = the early years. Orange bar = 2018, the number that carried the IPO.

Presentation script using the five-step formula

  1. Explain horizontal axis "On the horizontal axis, we have calendar years from 2016 through 2018. WeWork's fiscal year is just the calendar year, so each bar is one full year."
  2. Explain vertical axis "On the vertical axis, we have total revenue, measured in billions of dollars."
  3. Walk through legend/groups "Each bar is one year of revenue. The navy bars are the first two years. The orange bar is 2018, the year the company used to sell the IPO."
  4. Put one number in sentence "In 2018, revenue reached $1.8 billion — more than double the year before, and more than four times what it was in 2016."
  5. Share takeaway "The takeaway is that revenue doubled every single year. On its own, that is the kind of chart that gets a company a $47 billion valuation."

Notice the order

The presenter does not start with the whole business story. They follow the same five-part order every time: explain the horizontal axis, explain the vertical axis, walk through the legend or groups, put one number into a sentence, share the takeaway. And if the number matters, put it on the slide so the audience does not have to do the math.

Chart 2 of 4 · Line chart

Slide takeaway

The loss grew just as fast as the revenue.

WeWork — Revenue vs. Net Loss

USD billions · 2016–2018 · two lines, one dollar scale

$2.0B $1.5B $1.0B $0.5B $0 $1.9B loss larger than $1.8B revenue 2016 2017 2018
Revenue Net loss

Source: WeWork S-1, filed August 2019. Both lines are measured in the same units — billions of dollars — so they share one axis. Navy = revenue. Orange dashed = net loss.

Presentation script using the five-step formula

  1. Explain horizontal axis "On the horizontal axis, we have the same three years, 2016 through 2018."
  2. Explain vertical axis "On the vertical axis, we have dollars, in billions. Both lines use this one scale, because both are measured in dollars. The navy line is revenue. The orange dashed line is the net loss. Net loss is what's left after you subtract every cost from revenue — a loss means the costs were bigger than the revenue, so the company spent more than it took in."
  3. Walk through legend/groups "Two lines. Revenue climbs, and the loss climbs right alongside it, step for step. The loss line never drops below the revenue line."
  4. Put one number in sentence "In 2018, revenue was $1.8 billion and the net loss was $1.9 billion — the loss was actually bigger than the revenue."
  5. Share takeaway "The takeaway is that the growth everyone celebrated came with a loss that grew just as fast. The headline showed you one line. The story was in both."

Chart 3 of 4 · Bar chart

Slide takeaway

The bigger WeWork got, the more it lost on every dollar.

WeWork — Net Loss Per Dollar of Revenue

Loss in dollars for each $1 of revenue · 2016–2018

$1.20 $0.90 $0.60 $0.30 $0 $0.99 2016 $1.05 2017 $1.06 2018 $1.00 — losing a dollar for every dollar worse than 2016

Source: derived from WeWork S-1 revenue and net loss figures. The dashed line marks $1.00 — the point where the company loses a full dollar for every dollar it earns.

Presentation script using the five-step formula

  1. Explain horizontal axis "On the horizontal axis, we have the same three years again, 2016 through 2018."
  2. Explain vertical axis "On the vertical axis, we have the net loss for every one dollar of revenue. You get it by taking the year's loss and dividing it by the year's revenue. So $1.06 means that for every dollar that came in the door, the company lost a dollar and six cents."
  3. Walk through legend/groups "Each bar is one year. The dashed line across the middle is one dollar — losing a dollar for every dollar earned. Every bar sits right at that line or above it, and they get taller as the years go on."
  4. Put one number in sentence "In 2018, WeWork lost $1.06 for every $1 of revenue — worse than the 99 cents it lost back in 2016."
  5. Share takeaway "The takeaway is that scale was supposed to fix the economics, and it did the opposite. The bigger WeWork got, the more it lost on every single dollar."

Chart 4 of 4 · Table

Slide takeaway

A bigger rival, doing the same thing, turned a profit the same year.

WeWork vs. IWG (Regus) — 2018

Revenue, net result, and locations · same business, same year

Company Revenue 2018 Net result 2018 Locations Made money?
WeWork $1.8B −$1.9B 528 No
IWG (Regus) ~£2.5B ~+£100M 3,000+ Yes

Source: WeWork S-1 and IWG plc 2018 annual report. IWG reports in pounds on a calendar year; WeWork reports in dollars. The IWG profit figure is approximate. Currencies and definitions differ slightly, but the direction is the contrast.

Presentation script using the five-step formula

  1. Explain horizontal axis "Across the top, we have the measures: 2018 revenue, the 2018 net result, the number of locations, and a simple yes-or-no on whether the company made money."
  2. Explain vertical axis "Down the left side, we have the two companies: WeWork, and IWG, which runs Regus. Both do the same thing — lease office space long and rent it short."
  3. Walk through legend/groups "Each cell is one company's figure for that measure. Blue-shaded cells are good news. Red-shaded cells are bad news. The middle column, the net result, is the one to watch."
  4. Put one number in sentence "In 2018, IWG earned about £100 million in profit on £2.5 billion of revenue, while WeWork lost $1.9 billion on $1.8 billion — and IWG ran more than five times as many locations."
  5. Share takeaway "The takeaway is that flexible office space can make money. A bigger competitor proved it the same year. The losses were not the business — they were WeWork."

What you just practiced

The chart type changed. The approach to presenting them didn't.

The lesson: do not make the audience decode the chart alone. Use the five-part order: explain the horizontal axis, explain the vertical axis, walk through the legend or groups, put one number into a sentence, share the takeaway.