Text slides use a familiar medium of communication-words. But exhibit slides (charts, graphs, tables, and diagrams) employ a wholly different means of communication-visual relationships. They enable you to present to your audience masses of data and complex relationships that you cannot convey as effectively by words alone.

In general, exhibit slides should convey their message as simply and readably as possible. The viewer will not have the opportunity to study them and figure out what the various elements mean. And if the chart or graph is too complicated, detailed, or cluttered, you will waste precious time explaining it rather than discussing its message. This does not rule out the occasional, more complex diagram or chart that becomes clear as the speaker develops the ideas. But you would not want more than one or two of these to a presentation.

Exhibit slides generally show the parts of a structure or process, or display data in a visual way, using charts formed into pies, bars, columns, curves, or dots. The diagrams and charts tend to be used to answer five kinds of question (Exhibits 63-67):

- What are the elements?

- What has/how has it changed?

- How do amounts compare

- How are items distributed?

to the whole?

to each other?

over time?

- How do items co-relate?

The trick is to decide the question you want the exhibit to answer, state the answer as the title to the chart, and then choose the chart form most appropriate to showing that point.

Do make sure that the title to a chart or diagram directly conveys its message, either as a full sentence or as a phrase that contains a verb. Doing so allows you to check that the visual impression the chart gives the viewer is consistent with the message you wish to convey. "Share of profits by region," contains much less information than "Western Region accounts for almost half the profits."

Stating the point of the chart also minimizes the possibility of confusion. Different viewers, left to themselves, will focus on different relationships depending upon their point of view, their background, or their interest. This way you focus them instantly on the aspect of the data you wish to emphasize.