Say It With Charts: The Executive's Guide to Visual Communication [Hardcover]

Gene Zelazny (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 007136997X | ISBN-13: 978-0071369978 | Publication Date: February 22, 2001 | Edition: 4

Step-by-step guide to creating compelling, memorable presentations

A chart that once took ten hours to prepare can now be produced by anyone with ten minutes and a computer keyboard. What hasn't changed, however, are the basics behind creating a powerful visual - what to say, why to say it, and how to say it for the most impact. In Say It With Charts, Fourth Edition --the latest, cutting-edge edition of his best-selling presentation guide -- Gene Zelazny reveals time-tested tips for preparing effective presentations. Then, this presentation guru shows you how to combine those tips with today's hottest technologies for sharper, stronger visuals. Look to this comprehensive presentation encyclopedia for information on:

* How to prepare different types of charts -- pie, bar, column, line, or dot -- and when to use each
* Lettering size, color choice, appropriate chart types, and more
* Techniques for producing dramatic eVisuals using animation, scanned images, sound, video, and links to pertinent websites

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Today's most comprehensive, up-to-date business presentation guidebook

Easy-to-Follow Tools and Strategies for Creating Powerful, Interactive Business Presentations

As a professional, your career relies on reaching audiences, convincing them that your message is valuable, then making them remember that message. Say It With Charts, 4th Edition, walks you through the entire visual presentation process and shows you­­step-by-step­­how to create compelling, memorable presentations.

Business presentation tools have changed tremendously. A chart that once took ten hours­­and ten co-workers­­to prepare can now be produced by anyone with ten minutes and a computer keyboard. What hasn't changed, however, are the basics behind creating a powerful visual­­what to say, why to say it, and how to say it for the most impact.

Say It With Charts, 4th Edition, reveals time-tested tips for preparing effective presentations, then shows you how to combine those tips with today's technologies for sharper, stronger visuals. Look to this comprehensive presentation encyclopedia for information on:

• How to prepare different types of charts­­pie, bar, column, line, or dot­­and when to use each
• Hands-on recommendations on lettering size, color choice, appropriate chart types, and more
• Techniques for producing dramatic eVisuals using animation, scanned images, sound, video, and links to pertinent websites

"When well-conceived and designed, charts help us communicate more quickly and more clearly than we would if we left the data in tabular form."
­­From Chapter 1

Business is about communication. Every day, scores of questions must be answered, and each answer must be communicated quickly, completely, and with a minimum of confusion. Time has become our most valuable, irreplaceable commodity, and­­in today's rapid fire, ultra-competitive business environment­­delays or errors in communicating information are uncalled for, unaffordable...and unacceptable.

Say It With Charts, 4th Edition, shows you how to put your message in visual form and translate information and ideas into persuasive, powerful charts, visuals, and multimedia presentations­­holding your audience's attention as you communicate exactly what you want, with no confusion. The newest edition of this bestselling classic covers every important point from previous editions and, in addition, shows you how to use today's digital technologies to create professional-quality, attention-grabbing visuals on your computer screen.

Everything you need to know to make your charts and visuals eye-catching and memorable is in these pages, including:

• Commandments for designing successful onscreen visuals
• Techniques for conveying your messages using visuals and visual metaphors
• How to decide when to use a chart­­and know when a chart could work against you
• Graphic representations of ineffective, counter-productive charts­­with examples of how they could be improved
• Time- and money-saving methods to make one presentation template serve multiple audiences
• Hands-on practice projects and exercises to help you grasp each important concept

Over the years, Say It With Charts has become the standard guidebook for executives, sales managers, management consultants­­all those who want to make their points clearly and concisely, whether speaking directly to a packed conference room or communicating on computer screens across the globe. Now updated for today's technological communications revolution, it will show you how to translate your most compelling data and messages into even more compelling visuals, and hammer home your message every time.

About the Author

Gene Zelazny is Director of Visual Communications for McKinsey and Company, and has over 40 years of experience working with colleagues and clients to design powerful management reports and presentations. In addition, Zelazny frequently presents his ideas at the world's top business schools, including Chicago, Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, Wharton, Haas, MIT, Oxford, Kellogg, Stanford, Tuck, INSEAD, and others. He also is author of the how-to classic Say It With Presentations.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 225 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 4 edition (February 22, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 007136997X
• ISBN-13: 978-0071369978
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 7.4 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #29,713 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #37 in Books > Business & Investing > Skills > Running Meetings & Presentations
  • #75 in Books > Business & Investing > Marketing & Sales > Advertising

More About the Author

Gene Zelazny is Director of Visual Communications for McKinsey and Company, and has over 40 years of experience working with colleagues and clients to design powerful management reports and presentations. In addition, Zelazny frequently presents his ideas at the world's top business schools, including Chicago, Harvard, Columbia, Cornell, Wharton, Haas, MIT, Oxford, Kellogg, Stanford, Tuck, INSEAD, and others. He also is author of the how-to classic Say It With Presentations.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

77 of 84 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Know what you're looking for before buying this book., November 4, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Say It With Charts (Hardcover)

Although there were some very good points about graphics communication, this book was very deceptive when buying it. 198 pages in length, I'd say that about 160 of the pages deal with exercises and sample graphs to jog your brain with good and bad ways to represent data. There's about 30 some pages of actual "stuff" to read and absorb for tips for Visual Communications. Add to that the fact that the fonts used for the book were something that elementary school students would be accustomed to reading and you could probably boil the book down to about 10 pages front and back of normal 12 point Times Roman font. That was really the most disappointing thing about the book for me. $45 retail for a book that boils down to about 10 pages of actual reading was definitely not worth it from a simple cost/benefit analysis. The reason I gave it a 3 star rating was that it was ridiculously easy to read and understand, and it did have some very good points. I really would give it more of a 3.5 star rating independent of cost, and 2 stars cost dependent. Cost aside, the book did discuss some very good principles about presenting information for audiences and goes specifically into McKinsey's recommendations for graphics presentations. Although not an unusually exciting or groundbreaking book I did pick up one or two very good business suggestions from it, and for that reason alone, I consider the book valuable.

38 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good Little Book With Many Useful Ideas., April 14, 2003

By 

Robert G. Barnwell "Robert G. Barnwell" (New York City) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Say It With Charts: The Executive's Guide to Visual Communication (Hardcover)

If you're interested in getting ideas on how to present ideas graphically, this is a good little book. As many other reviewers have pointed out, several of the articles were prepared by graphic designers (some by hand in fact) and not computer graphics packages. If you're looking for suggestions on how to present ideas graphically, this is perfectly fine,... even useful. However, if you're looking for information on how to prepare graphics using Excel, you're out of luck (however, there are dozens of other books that can help you). That's just not what this books is about. Instead, the book gives you several suggestions for expressing the relationship between various activities (flow charts, diagrams, etc) illustrating performance timelines (bar graphs, area graphs, etc), and other information. However, where this book really shines, is in showing you how to incorporate various illustrations into your graphics to make them truly unique and informative. The benefit of this book is in teaching you how to conceptialize and develop unique graphics -- not in telling you how to produce generic off-the-shelf graphics. I'd recommend this book, along with "Information Graphics" by Harris and "Digital Diagrams" by Bounford, to anyone interested in learning more about charts. Overall Grade: B+/A-

29 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superceded by Excel? NOT!!, August 10, 1999

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Say It With Charts (Hardcover)

I think the fellow from Indiana misses the point. This bookhelps people to understand how to communicate ideas with charts. Inthe process, lots of hand-drawn charts are shown. Sure, Excel and similar programs can make them prettier, but the point is understanding what kind of chart is best for making a specific substantive point. No program can make that judgement, and too many people let software pick the chart format with predictably uninformative results. Students, excutives, etc., who work through this book will know what kind of a chart they really need. That knowledge in hand, turn to Excel or whatever to produce presentation quality graphics. In some cases, the data will have to be transformed in ways you might not have anticipated before the right graph can be produced. This is a great book, certainly the best and clearest introduction to statistical graphs I have seen. I also strongly recommend Tufte's books on effective graphics.