Say It With Charts: The Executive's Guide to Visual Communication 4th Edition
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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
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From the Publisher
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.
From the Back Cover
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.
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Product details
- Publisher : McGraw Hill; 4th edition (March 15, 2001)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 240 pages
- ISBN-10 : 007136997X
- ISBN-13 : 978-0071369978
- Item Weight : 1.19 pounds
- Dimensions : 7.6 x 0.72 x 9.4 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #232,472 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #81 in Business Communication
- #130 in Business Marketing
- #329 in Running Meetings & Presentations (Books)
- Customer Reviews:
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.
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1. Decide what your message is and THEN design your chart. Don't just generate whatever chart Excel will spit out for you, generate the chart that SAYS what you are trying to say.
2. Once you know what you are trying to say, there are TRIGGER WORDS that lead you to the correct chart. "Increasing" suggests a time series chart. "More than" suggests an item chart. Etc.
3. The author also shows how to highlight certain lines or bars in the chart to draw the eye to the point you're trying to make.
4. The exercises are useful for internalizing what you've read and feeling a sense of mastery.
As others have noted, the book ends at the halfway mark but the author fills up the last half of the book with pointless illustrations and visuals to communicate concepts. But how many pictures of process flows do you need to see to get the point? And what am I supposed to do with a page full of mazes? So the last half of the book is pointless. For this, I take off a mark.
The author has also added a few pages on how to create slides using PowerPoint. But the advice misses the mark by a mile, suggesting you use colored text on a black background, and encourages the use of animations. In fact, black on white has the best readability and animations are more often just self-indulgent play that doesn't improve clarity for the audience.
However, the first half of the book is excellent, practial and will give your charts purpose and your presentation clear meaning. These few simple concepts, accompanied by attractively hand-drawn examples, makes the book more than worthwhile.
The thidd section entitled "Say it with concepts and metaphors" consists of around 60 pages with graphical symbols and pictures. There is little to none explanation given so I tend to consider these pages as plain and simple book page filling.
The last section looks like an recent update added to the existing material. This becomes obvious when knowing only this section contains colored pages. The bulk of the book are pages without color. For a book on presentation techniques this is a serious mistake.
In conclusion reading this book will give you a feeling of "interesting stuff" on one side but also a feeling of incompleteness and clumpsy finishing. A rework by adding colors and some explanation about when and how to concepts and metaphors is more than welcome.
The author breaks problem down and recommends best practices solution.
A must read for any data analyst!!!







