Summary
Nancy Duarte is a leading American author and the Chief Executive Officer of a leading design company, Durate Design Inc., in California, United States of America. In particular, her work has influenced business managers, teachers and speakers as a result of providing practical lessons in how subjects may be best explained and communicated.
A Journey of Influence
Duarte began her journey in presentations by volunteering on the slideshow for Al Gore's documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. She entered the field with a combination of passion and skill. This particular project put her in this light and made her a go-to expert in the presentation design field.
Her skills did not stay limited to environmentalism for long and she was soon assisting other organizations in preparing their high-octane performances. She also worked with speeches of TED Talks, improving them and conducting her own TED talks.
The impact of Duarte’s groundbreaking books
Currently, as the CEO of a company, Duarte Inc., which she owns, she has managed to execute the design of thousands of presentations for other companies, cutting across different fields in persuading messages that are not only appealing to the eye but also balancing on the mind.
Her company has grown into a presentation design industry where she provides new solutions and in-service training in presentations to the practitioners.
| Book Title | Year | Description |
| Slide:ology | 2008 | Principles for developing effective graphic and visual communication. |
| Resonate | 2010 | Focused on storytelling, structured narratives, and emotional appeals to action, building on the Gordon methodology. |
| The Harvard Business Review Guide to Persuasive Presentations | 2012 | A compact manual offering crucial guidance for creating convincing presentations. |
| Illuminate | 2016 | Co-authored with Patti Sanchez, focused on how leaders can use stories to drive change. |
| Data Story | 2019 | Teaches how to persuade and advocate using data visualization. |
Through his immensely popular books, Duarte has greatly defined the presentation arena. Her first, Slide:ogy by Brian Hoff (2008), presented the reader to a set of principles for developing effective graphic and visual communication.
Resonate (2010) brought about the continuation of the Gordon methodology and furthered the concentration of the storytelling as well as structured narrative and emotive appeals to action.
The Harvard Business Review Guide to Persuasive Presentations (2012) presented a useful, compact manual for basic, crucial guidance for working individuals to create convincing presentations.
She also wrote, co-authored with Patti Sanchez, in Illuminate, published in 2016, about how leaders can use stories for change.
Among her most recent titles is Data Story: Advocacy in the Age of Data Visualization, published in 2019, which teaches on how to bootstrap and persuade with data. Both of these books have supported her role as a leader in presentation design and narrative.
Q. How Handled the Dot-Com Crash and Built a Resilient Business ?
It was during the early 2000’s that the internet businesses were at their best with coming up of businesses dealing with dot-com. One of them was Nancy; she had her design firm and chose to expand by adding on it as a printing and web design firm.
However, the position remained invulnerable to changes until 2001, when the dot-com crash occurred. Overnight, Nancy lost 25 percent of sales. It was a slap, but the rock and the feedback Nancy gave was awesome and thought-provoking.
Entering "Hedgehog Mode"
When the customers dropped, instead of fumbling for a way to add new services so that she could recover the lost clientèle, Nancy opted for the opposite. Based on the hedgehog concept from James Collins’s book Good to Great, she got into what she now refers to as hedgehog mode.
The hedgehog concept is an approach to doing the thing that you love well and investing your time in it to do it well. The analogy comes from the way a hedgehog defends itself: it’s not afraid to leave out features; it just does one thing properly: curl into a ball, spikes out.
For Nancy, this meant refocusing her business on something she was truly passionate about and could excel at: presentations.
Mastering Presentations
Indeed, most other companies would have opted to push their existing popular products and services or diversify in order to cope with such a challenge, but Nancy focused on a strength.She used to do presentations as part of her design and now presentations were going to be her bread and butter.
I liked Nancy’s strategy; it was not doing presentations per se; it was all about ensuring that one mastered the whole art of creating presentations with an added bossaltiesque touch.
The finely tuned and highly professional aspect of presentations completely captivated her and she eventually became an expert on the subject.
Her hard work and dedication paid off when she wrote her first book, Slideology.
Even at that time, Nancy could not understand the extent of positive changes this was going to bring in both her career and her company. The book quickly gained popularity and helped to place Nancy as an expert on presentation. It also opened up a completely new avenue for her business, training.
Nancy’s evolving business models
Today, Nancy runs two successful business models: a presentation-based learning type and one that is based on teaching people how best to go about making their presentations. However, it is on the side of training that the business has evolved faster and where rewards are much more rewarding to Nancy.
Nancy’s experience also goes to show that there is nothing wrong with keeping it basic, especially when dealing with strife and struggle: just try to gain mastery in one area.
Rather than chasing after new markets or attempting to appeal to everyone, what was far more productive and valuable? Nancy’s decision to take time to hone her skills and abilities and, in so doing, look for larger possibilities of expanding her range and reach.
Explore her works and learn how to improve your presentation!
