In every presentation, slides exercise a force over the content of the talk. They will try to make you say what they want you to say. The more text you have on slides, the more powerful the force, and the more you will be tempted to say it as the slides say it.

It is up to you to take action to remove the text and make the slides be aids, not patrons. Start with removing just a word, and then just keep on going. My rule of thumb is that removing 50% of the text will still leave 50% too much.

Better than removing is not putting text on the slides in the first place. Start from a blank page and add a word only when you cannot find a picture. And no, it’s not true that you cannot find a picture :).

If you still find yourself with more than 1 sentence on a slide, consider splitting the slide. In the end, you should be left with essential points that just highlight and not dictate what you are saying.