Shorthand.

For the first twenty years of my forty year-career we didn't worry about what decks looked like. In part, because we didn't have decks.

We had foam core boards.

We'd arrange the foam core in order and present our work that way. Some people of my vintage learned to read upside down as they stood and flipped through ads and TV spots and even the occasional radio spot all enlarged and mounted on foam core.

A funny thing happened when you presented on foam core. The clients looked at you. And not the screen. You could look up and look in their eyes and actually talk directly to them.

We never designed presentations in those days. We designed work. Designing a presentation? That's like designing the rags you use to wax your car. How the rags look ain't important. How they treat your car is.

Today, we design presentations. 

As if the presentation is the communication, not the work in the presentation. And there are myriad online tools to have dissolves, reveals and sweeps to make your presentation cooler.

To my mind that's diametrically opposed to the line I've heard attributed to the recently-deceased legend, Sal DeVito. "Make the logo smaller and the idea bigger."

Today we make the presentation prettier and the ideas scarcely matter. 

See above. 

Vomit. 

Continue reading.

Back in my Ogilvy days I was chastised for not knowing keynote or powerpoint. I was told knowing them was the key to getting ahead.

Oh. 

Presumably that would allow me to put a slide in a deck that reads "We're on a Journey," as my boss once did while I was at Ogilvy. No. Magellan was on a journey. You're a brain-worm infested dweeb.

Late last week because they're spread around the globe, I had a client presentation at 5PM on a Friday. I don't like to work that late on Fridays. A) I'm tired. B) Most everyone else is too.

But in an effort to be gracious and accommodating, and because I wanted to sell some work and get my money, my Account Director and I agreed. From 5PM to 6PM on a Friday.

Here's the first page of my presentation. 

As ugly as the bottom of my shoe.

My client didn't care. My client didn't say anything. Nor did my Account Director. Nor I.

Here's a bit of the last page of my presentation:

What's salient here is the page number: 38.

Outside of the cover sheet, we had 37 pages of ideas. Of ads. Of lines. Taglines. Strategically based. Intrusive. Assertive. Bold.

Loud. PATW. (Punching above their weight.)

Yes.

I showed 37 ads.

37 different ways to do what I do for brands.

Define who they are.
Differentiate them from everyone else.
Demonstrate to readers so they can feel it not just learn in.

Often, I don't even think in terms of ads in the Wall Street Journal. I think about a deck that lands in front of an investor at Andreessen Horowitz. Or in front of a customer who for whatever reason gave my client a minute for a meeting.

What will make those targets salivate. Literally, salivate. And say "I need me some of that." Or "that's a great idea." Not, "that's a great ad." But "that's a great product."

I think advertising today is like established religion. Interested in dogma and minutia and monetary enrichment. Not improving lives and fulfillment. 

We're interested in aesthetics for aesthetics' sake. Not for functionality's sake.

Our industry has become deeply masturbatory. We're self-gratifying seed spillers. (SGSS. Not a bad name for an agency, right?)

Occasionally, I bring a little theory to a deck. But it's never more complicated than this. 

And then I jump into the work that does all that.

I couldn't give a rat's ass that I'm not A) on a journey. B) going to Cannes. or C) cool.

The only journeys I'm interested in are the ones my clients, and eventually me, take to the bank.