Powerful Presentations Workshop: Designing and Delivering for Impact
July 28-29, 2025 | Livestream, virtual training
Registration is open! Join us for the next Powerful Presentations Workshop on July 28-29, 2025.
The Powerful Presentations Workshop is a two-day intensive workshop of lecture and hands-on work to provide an overview of concepts, techniques, and methods used to create effective, memorable presentations.
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Jump to: Overview | Audience and Requirements | Instructors | Scholarships | Location | Testimonials | Registration Fees | Additional Information
Training Overview
Summer 2025 dates: Livestream, online training July 28-29, 2025; 11:00am - ~3:00pm EDT.
Communicating data plays a crucial role in the work of researchers and analysts. Often, however, effective ways to communicate data is an after-thought, secondary to the analysis, which ultimately limits the effective relay of information. In this Powerful Presentations workshop, attendees will learn the key, practical strategies to creating, designing, and delivering great, effective presentations.
Powerful Presentations Workshop: Designing and Delivering for Impact is a training workshop that provides a well-rounded introduction to improving how people design and deliver their work. This workshop is divided into three main parts to guide attendees’ process from presentation conceptualization, to creation, to delivery. The first part focuses on planning the presentation; instead of booting up the computer and immediately inserting text, graphs, and images onto slides, attendees are presented with a process for outlining the content of their presentation. The second part is about building the presentation: how to create more effective text, graph, and image slides. The final section moves to the practical details of giving the presentation.
By the end of the workshop, participants will be familiar with the following topics:
- Learn how to increase message clarity and impact through better slide design
- Improve presentations to more effectively communicate data and analysis
- Learn, and exchange ideas about, presentation best practices
- Think critically about presentation slide design
Audience and Requirements
This course is for anyone interested in being a better, more effective, and more persuasive presenter. Participants should have the Microsoft PowerPoint software program installed on their computer. The workshop will help attendees develop, design, and deliver better presentations including:
- People working with and analyzing data including analysts, researchers, data scientists, and data engineers who are interested in improving how they present their work.
- Communication designers and other creatives looking to expand their communication design skillset.
Instructors
Jonathan Schwabish, PhD, PolicyViz. Dr. Jonathan Schwabish is an economist, writer, teacher, and data communications expert. After nearly ten years working as an economist at the Congressional Budget Office, he moved to the Urban Institute, a nonprofit research institution based in Washington, DC, where he conducts research on nutrition policy and policies that affect people with disabilities, as well as work in the organization’s communications department. Dr. Schwabish is considered a leading voice for clarity and accessibility in how analysts, researchers, and scholars communicate their findings. Across four books, he has provided a comprehensive guide to creating, communicating, and distributing data-rich content. Better Presentations coaches people through preparing, designing, and delivering data communication products; Elevate the Debate helps people develop a strategic plan to communicating their work across multiple platforms and channels; and Better Data Visualizations details essential strategies to create more effective data visualizations. His most recent book, Data Visualization in Excel, hit bookshelves in May 2023 and helps readers create better graphs and charts in the Excel software tool.
Scholarships
Training scholarships are available for the Powerful Presentations Workshop.
Location
Summer 2025: The Powerful Presentations Workshop will be a livestream, remote training that takes place over live, online video on July 28-29, 2025 from ~11:00am - ~3:00pm EDT. Please note this training is not a self-paced, pre-recorded online training.
Testimonials
"I have been wanting to work on improving my slide presentations for a long time. This Workshop helped give me the tools to accomplish this. I'm actually looking forward to creating my next PowerPoint (never thought I'd say that!)." - Faculty Member at Johns Hopkins University, 2024
"The Better Presentations Workshop was a great training on the content and presentation of research. It helped me to think about the way I set up the order of what I present and how to adjust for different audiences." - Faculty Member at Yale University School of Medicine, 2024
"I feel a lot more confident being able to produce visually interesting and compelling presentations in the future." - Faculty Member at New York University School of Global Public Health, 2024
Registration Fees
| Early-bird Rate (through 5/15/25) | Regular Rate (5/16/25 - 7/21/25) | Columbia Discount* | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Student/Postdoc/Trainee | $895 | $1,095 | 10% |
| Faculty/Academic Staff/Non-Profit Organizations/Government Agencies | $1,095 | $1,295 | 10% |
| For-Profit Organizations | $1,295 | $1,495 | NA |
*Columbia Discount: This discount is valid for any active student, postdoc, staff, or faculty at Columbia University. If paying by credit card, use your Columbia email address during the registration process to automatically have the discount applied. If paying by internal transfer within Columbia, submit this Columbia Internal Transfer Request form to receive further instructions. Please note: filling out this form is not the same as registering for a training and does not guarantee a training seat.
*Mailman Alumni Discount: This discount is valid for any individual who graduated from the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. To access the Mailman Alumni discount and receive a registration code, please email sharp_program@cumc.columbia.edu your graduation year and degree.
Invoice Payment: If you would prefer to pay by invoice/check, please submit this Invoice Request form to receive further instructions. Please note: filling out this form is not the same as registering for a training and does not guarantee a training seat.
Registration Fee: This fee includes course material, breakfast, and lunch on training days. Course material will be made available to all participants both during and after the conclusion of the training. The fee does not include travel/accommodation costs.
Cancellations: Cancellation notices must be received via email at least 30 days prior to the training start date in order to receive a full refund, minus a $75 administrative fee. Cancellation notices received via email 14-29 days prior to the training will receive a 75% refund, minus a $75 administrative fee. Please email your cancellation notice to Columbia.betterpresentations@gmail.com. Due to workshop capacity and preparation, we regret that we are unable to refund registration fees for cancellations <14days prior to the training.
If you are unable to attend the training, we encourage you to send a substitute within the same registration category. Please inform us of the substitute via email at least one week prior to the training to include them on attendee communications, updated registration forms, and materials. Should the substitute fall within a different registration category your credit card will be credited/charged respectively. Please email substitute inquiries to Columbia.betterpresentations@gmail.com. In the event Columbia must cancel the event, your registration fee will be fully refunded.
Additional Information
- Register for the Powerful Presentations Workshop.
- Subscribe for updates on new training details and registration deadlines.
- Contact the Workshop team.
The Powerful Presentations Workshop is hosted by Columbia University's SHARP Program at the Mailman School of Public Health.
Jump to: Overview | Audience and Requirements | Instructors | Scholarships | Location | Testimonials | Registration Fees | Additional Information