Consulting presentation examples

Why consulting firms publish research as decks

A consulting firm's research has the same readers as its client work: executives who skim. So it is written the same way, in landscape slides rather than long documents, where each page carries one finding, the headline states it in a full sentence, and the chart below backs it up. Some of these reports come out every quarter, like KPMG's Venture Pulse or Oliver Wyman's airline analysis; others once a year, like Capgemini's World Wealth Report or Deloitte's Gen Z and Millennial Survey. Each deck here is the firm's own published PDF, with the edition it covers in the title.

Consulting firms publish their research as decks, and those decks are the clearest examples of the style: one message per slide, a headline that states the conclusion, and a chart that proves it. Read them for the findings, or study them to see how a consulting deck is built.

Anatomy of a consulting deck

1. 01

   Executive summary first

   The answer comes on page two or three: the handful of findings a busy reader needs, before any of the evidence.

2. 02

   Action titles

   Every slide headline is a full sentence that states the takeaway, so reading the titles alone tells the whole story.

3. 03

   One chart, one message

   Each slide makes a single point with a single exhibit, labelled with its source and sample size.

4. 04

   Sections that follow the argument

   The deck is ordered by the logic of the case (context, findings, implications), with divider slides between parts.

5. 05

   Methodology and appendix

   Survey sample, data sources and definitions sit at the back, along with the detailed tables and the authors' contact details.