Purposeful communication in the age of AI
Visual communication can be your competitive advantage... If you learn how to use it well
You don’t need to be a former McKinsey professional to realise this - in the last year or so, creating presentations has become a hundred times easier.
Only recently, producing a polished deck required a meaningful investment of time. You needed to structure the storyline, decide how information should be presented, build charts, arrange content on the page, and spend far longer than anyone would like adjusting formatting details. While software helped, most of the work remained firmly in human hands.
Today, that process looks very different. Modern AI tools can generate an entire presentation in a matter of minutes. A user can describe a topic, provide a few instructions, and receive a finished deck complete with layouts, charts, icons, colours and supporting commentary. The quality is often surprisingly good, particularly when compared to the effort required.
This is undoubtedly a positive development. Much of the mechanical work associated with presentation creation adds little value and few people will mourn the loss of hours spent aligning text boxes or searching for icons.
Yet there is a growing problem that is becoming increasingly visible across corporate environments.
Many AI-generated presentations successfully communicate information while failing to communicate importance.
The facts are usually present. The analysis may be entirely correct. The story often follows a logical sequence. However, the finished product frequently lacks judgment. Important messages receive no more emphasis than secondary observations. Visual elements are added because they are available rather than because they serve a purpose. Colours, symbols, charts and design features compete for attention without any underlying logic governing their use.
The result is something that feels superficially polished but ultimately forgettable. The presentation says what its author intended to say, yet it fails to ensure that the audience understands what matters most.
This distinction is more important than it may first appear.
In most professional environments, people are not judged solely on the quality of their thinking. They are judged on their ability to communicate that thinking effectively. A brilliant piece of analysis that is poorly presented will often have less impact than a good piece of analysis that is communicated exceptionally well. Senior leaders, investors, clients, colleagues and boards rarely have the time or inclination to excavate insights hidden within a dense presentation. They rely on the presenter to identify what matters, explain why it matters, and direct attention towards the conclusions that deserve discussion.
Good communication therefore performs two functions simultaneously. It conveys information, but it also guides attention. It helps the audience separate signal from noise. In an environment where AI can generate information almost instantly, the ability to guide attention may become even more valuable than before.
Over the years, I have reviewed thousands of presentations across consulting, private equity, finance and corporate environments. Industries differ and audiences vary, but the strongest presentations tend to share a surprisingly consistent set of characteristics. They are rarely the most colourful. They are rarely the most visually impressive (although often, they are). What distinguishes them is that they make important ideas difficult to miss.
The same communication mistakes, meanwhile, appear again and again. AI has changed how presentations are produced, but it has not changed the underlying principles of communication. If anything, the arrival of AI has made those principles more important because poor habits can now be reproduced at scale.
Most Presentations Contain Too Much Information
One of the more surprising observations from reviewing presentations over many years is that communication problems are rarely caused by a lack of effort. If anything, the opposite is usually true. Most presentations contain too much effort.
Teams spend days refining charts, adjusting layouts, changing colours, introducing icons and searching for ways to make the presentation more engaging. Every individual decision appears reasonable in isolation. Collectively, however, they often create a document that becomes harder rather than easier to understand.
The reason is straightforward. Every visual choice asks something of the audience. A colour must be interpreted. A symbol must be understood. A highlighted number must be compared with other numbers that are not highlighted. A box, arrow or shape implies a relationship that the audience must decode before returning to the underlying message.
Most presenters underestimate how quickly these small decisions accumulate.
This is particularly evident in many AI-generated presentations. Modern software is extremely good at generating visual variety. It can produce sophisticated layouts, colourful diagrams and elaborate page structures almost instantly. Unfortunately, it has no inherent understanding of which of those elements matter and which are merely decorative. As a result, many automatically generated presentations resemble a room in which every object is attempting to attract attention simultaneously.
The strongest presentations usually take the opposite approach. They eliminate decisions wherever possible. Colours are used sparingly and consistently. Visual conventions remain stable throughout the document. Layouts are predictable. Emphasis is reserved for genuinely important points. Rather than asking the audience to continually interpret the presentation, the presenter allows them to focus their energy on understanding the argument itself.
There is a certain discipline required to achieve this. Most people instinctively add. Strong communicators often remove. They remove the colour that serves no purpose. They remove the icon that contributes nothing to understanding. They remove the decorative elements that draw attention away from the message rather than towards it.
The audience should spend its time thinking about the business problem, not thinking about the presentation.
The Chart Is Not the Point
Another recurring issue appears when people become overly focused on the mechanics of presentation rather than its purpose. This often reveals itself through charts.
Entire conversations take place around whether a bar chart should be horizontal or vertical, whether a line should be thicker, whether a legend should sit at the top or bottom of the page. While these decisions matter, they are usually secondary to a much more important question.
What exactly is the audience supposed to learn?
The best charts are rarely memorable because of their design. They are memorable because they make a conclusion immediately obvious. The audience sees the visual and understands the point before the presenter has even begun speaking.
Achieving this requires a subtle shift in thinking. Rather than beginning with the chart, strong communicators begin with the insight. They identify the pattern that matters, the relationship that matters, or the comparison that matters. Only then do they decide how it should be visualised.
Different messages naturally lend themselves to different forms of communication. Some stories are fundamentally about change over time. Others are about comparison. Others are about process, geography, relationships or segmentation. The visual should emerge from the message rather than the other way around.
Many AI-generated presentations struggle in this area because they tend towards standardisation. Slides begin to look remarkably similar. Every page adopts the same visual template regardless of whether the underlying story demands it. The result is a presentation that feels consistent but not necessarily communicative.
The irony is that genuine variety often comes from focusing more closely on the message. When each page is designed around a specific insight, the presentation naturally develops a richer and more varied visual language.
A useful test is to imagine removing all explanatory commentary from a slide. If an intelligent reader would still understand the main point within a few seconds, the communication is probably working. If the chart requires a lengthy explanation before its significance becomes clear, there is usually an opportunity to simplify.
Remember this: The chart is not the point. The insight is. The chart merely exists to help the audience see it.
Most People Explain Their Journey Instead of Their Conclusion
Perhaps the most common communication mistake in professional environments stems from a misunderstanding of how audiences consume information.
Most people present information in the order they discovered it. They begin with the data, explain their methodology, describe their analysis, discuss their findings and eventually arrive at a conclusion. This sequence feels natural because it mirrors their own intellectual journey.
The audience, however, is rarely interested in taking that journey. Senior stakeholders generally want to know the answer first. They want to understand what was found, why it matters and what should happen next. Once those questions have been answered, they are usually willing to explore the supporting evidence.
Top-tier consulting firms have long recognised this reality, which is why they place such emphasis on top-down communication. A recommendation appears before the analysis that supports it. A conclusion appears before the details that explain it. The audience receives the destination before being invited to review the map.
This approach is sometimes criticised as simplistic, but in reality it reflects a respect for the audience’s time. Executives, investors and decision-makers operate under significant constraints. They are forced to process large volumes of information every day. The communicator’s role is therefore not merely to provide information but to help prioritise it.
The best presentations exhibit a remarkable clarity of purpose. They know precisely which messages must survive. Every page contributes to reinforcing those messages. Every chart, supporting analysis and appendix exists for a reason.
When reviewing a presentation, I often find it useful to read only the page titles. If the story remains coherent without any supporting detail, there is a good chance that the overall structure is sound. If the story disappears the moment the supporting content is removed, the presentation may contain information but it probably lacks a narrative.
People remember stories far more readily than they remember collections of facts. The strongest communicators understand this.
Reality Is Usually Messier Than the Slide
There is, however, an equal and opposite danger. In the pursuit of clarity, some presentations become so simplified that they cease to resemble reality.
Business is rarely neat. Markets do not move in straight lines, customers do not behave consistently, and data rarely produces perfectly clean conclusions. Most important decisions involve ambiguity, trade-offs and incomplete information.
Experienced audiences understand this intuitively. In fact, they often become suspicious when a recommendation appears too simple.
One of the characteristics that distinguishes strong analysts from average analysts is their ability to understand complexity without becoming trapped by it. They recognise the caveats, the exceptions and the contradictions. They understand where a conclusion is robust and where it is more tentative. They know which observations reinforce the recommendation and which observations merely provide context.
The best presentations communicate this richness without overwhelming the audience.
A strong recommendation becomes stronger when it demonstrates an awareness of nuance. A conclusion becomes more credible when the presenter acknowledges the limitations of the analysis. Supporting observations often matter not because they change the answer, but because they demonstrate that the answer has been thoughtfully derived.
This is another area where human judgment remains particularly important. AI systems are generally incentivised to produce coherent and complete answers. Real-world analysis is often less tidy than that. Contradictions frequently exist. Exceptions frequently matter. The strongest insights often emerge from understanding why reality deviates from expectations.
A presentation should therefore strive for clarity without pretending that complexity does not exist. The objective is not to eliminate nuance, but to organise it.
The Audience Does Not Care About Your Presentation
Perhaps the most valuable communication lesson has nothing to do with charts, colours or page layouts. It concerns incentives.
Presenters spend days, weeks or sometimes months immersed in their topic. They know the details. They understand the analysis. They have become invested in the outcome. Inevitably, they begin to assume that everyone else shares the same level of interest. But reality is that the audience almost never does.
Every audience arrives with its own priorities, concerns and objectives. Whether consciously or unconsciously, people are constantly evaluating information through the lens of their own interests. They are asking themselves what the information means for them, how it affects their decisions and whether it deserves their attention.
This reality should shape the structure of communication.
One of the most common mistakes in business presentations is asking for something before demonstrating value. Investment proposals often begin with discussions about funding requirements, headcount, resources and implementation costs. Before the audience has even decided whether it wants the outcome, it is already being asked to evaluate the price.
A more persuasive approach is usually to reverse the sequence. First, establish the opportunity. Demonstrate the value that could be created. Show the future state that becomes possible. Allow the audience to understand why the destination is attractive. Only then introduce the investment required to achieve it.
One former colleague described this as “selling the beach house before discussing the mortgage.” The phrase has remained with me because it captures something fundamental about persuasion. People become far more interested in the means once they have become convinced of the outcome.
The same principle applies across almost every professional setting. Whether seeking approval, support, funding or alignment, communicators must first answer the audience’s most important question. Why should I care? Everything else follows from that.
The Human Advantage
The capabilities of AI will continue to improve. Presentations will become easier to create. Design quality will continue to rise. Tasks that once required specialised skills will become increasingly automated. None of this reduces the importance of communication. If anything, it increases it.
When everyone has access to tools capable of generating competent presentations, the differentiating factor shifts elsewhere. It shifts towards judgment. Towards taste. Towards the ability to recognise what matters and what does not.
AI is a remarkably powerful tool. It can generate slides, charts, summaries and narratives in seconds. Yet tools have always been most valuable in the hands of people who understand the principles underlying their use.
A calculator is useful because someone understands mathematics. Statistical software is useful because someone understands analysis. Presentation software is useful because someone understands communication. The same logic applies to AI.
The professionals who derive the greatest benefit from these tools will not necessarily be the people who use them most frequently. They will be the people who know how to evaluate the outputs critically. They will recognise when a slide is cluttered, when a chart obscures rather than clarifies, when a story lacks structure or when an audience is likely to lose interest.
Most importantly, they will understand the difference between saying something and making it impossible to ignore. Information has become even more abundant nowadays, but good communication has not.
The ability to guide attention, highlight significance and create understanding remains a fundamentally human skill. It is also one of the few skills whose value may actually increase as artificial intelligence becomes more capable.
AI can help us create presentations faster than ever before. But often, it cannot yet tell us what deserves to matter. That responsibility still belongs to us.